BBC scrapping (for some) the free TV licence

BBC bought 75,000 copies of The Guardian in 2016. FFS why?

Spent £x thousands hiring a helicopter to film a raid on Cliff Richard's home.

Lineker £1,800,000

Chris Evans £1,600.000

The salaries of these two alone would fund 22,000 TV licences for over 75s.

The list goes on .... poor financial judgement.

 

Thing is the majority get far much more out than they put in, and younger generations have to fill the gap. There won’t be a state pension for the vast majority of people in 20/30 years time, yet those reaching retirement age in 20/30 years time will have been paying for everyone else’s pensions all their life. Where’s their entitlement?

 

I agree blivy, I also think if you have paid for YOUR goverment pension ( NI contributions) and worked hard all of your life then I think your pension and how much you recieve should be based on what you have paid in through your working life. The qualifying period for a full state pension is now 35 years, once you have paid in for that time I think you should stop paying or be on a reduced rate, to cover the ones who cant work and also to cover the ones who can work but choose not too

 

Yes sod the old gimmers chuffing scrounging generation ...FFS

 

I'm sorry if this offends some, but if you are able to work and choose not to (or somehow can't get a job for 20 years, despite "best efforts") then you deserve nothing. There are jobs available, both skilled and unskilled. I feel for people who have lost their career due to the evolution of technology (coal mining etc.) or due to outsourcing (Steel work etc,) but it's not that expensive or difficult to retrain. There are a lot of fields that are severely lacking in qualified people.

An an example, in my field of software engineering, there are something like 10x more jobs than there are engineers. This is what lets you demand the top wages if you have some experience.

 

Petition been launched in the Mirror today. I don't think this problem is going to go away
any time soon. Suggestion that as well as " Children in Need", the BBC should now stage
" OAP's in Need" as it's a fact, that *one in six pensioners are living in poverty.


* Source : The Joseph Rowntree Trust.

 

Perhaps a lie down in a quiet room

 

The tories have cut the free licences they just forced the BBC into pulling the trigger. It’s time to look at the way it’s funded and run it more along the lines of C4. As a public service broadcaster it has failed.

 

Did they include the old ladies up and down the country hiding their money to fraudulently claim benefits

 

Can't blame them really. Only copying politicians and businesses who move their assets offshore, tradespeople who claim
benefits and then work for cash in hand and the many Companies who are advised by accountants on how to
avoid paying fair levels of income tax. Amazed to read in today's paper, that my former employer YPO which is part
owned by Barnsley MBC and firmly resides in the Public sector, has just awarded a £400 million contact to Amazon, who it
is alleged are legendary for their persistence in avoiding their full tax liabilities.

 

So you really think that most pensioners claiming pension credits and other benefits are doing it fraudulently

 

I agree, last time I wrote something like that I got slated on here, so I was trying to be somewhere in the middle, but I agree with you 100%

 

No I believe you have to give your correct details and meet the DWP qualification criteria.
It's not just old people who are at it. We've always had a "black economy" and some people will always try to milk the
system or act fraudulently. I used to do Register of Electors and the Census for the City of Wakefield.

If you don't return your register of Electors form you can face a fine of up to £1,000 to cover
the grants that Towns and Cities recieve per capita. When Community Charge was introduced
it imposed a set fee on everyone in a particular household. The discrepancies in returns between
2009 and 2010 and the Census of 2011, were astronomical.

If "people" don't send the form back or are suspected of falsifying information, the canvasser can ask a Police officer to accompany them to a dwelling to get the required information. I never did that, but you could tell by just looking at
someone at the doorstep they were being liberal with the truth. I don't know what the answer is but people will always
find loopholes in any system.

 

There’s the best part of £100m in the bank from Children in Need. Perhaps rather than have children in need how about people in need..