Funding Television-The BBC

Part 2 –Funding Television

The cases of ITV and The BBC

There are 4 main ways to pay for television

ü      A compulsory licence fee e.g. the BBC

ü      Subscriptions e.g. Sky TV

ü      Advertising supported programming e.g.  ITV

ü      Pay per view e.g. TV Gold

The one thing every one who works on television is agreed is that it is colossally expensive.  Television involves a huge amount of money.  If we look at the page showing a summary of the BBC’s accounts you will see that it had an income from the licence fee of over

£3,000 million   in 2009.  So you can see that this organisation is richer than some small countries.

How does the BBC get its money?

The answer to this is simple but very controversial.  The BBC receives money from everyone who owns a TV set in the UK.  Even if you never watch the BBC you still have to pay for it. The current licence fee is about £145.00. 

The advantage of this levy on the viewer is that it is simple and goes directly to the broadcaster.

The link gives access to a summary of the BBC's revenue and expenditure.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/annualreport/exec/financial/consolidated.shtml