Licence fee under fire

The BPIX poll in today’s Mail on Sunday gives the following headline voting-intention figures: Tories on 45 percent (down 1); Labour on 31 percent (up one); and the Lib Dems on 13 percent (no change).  Political Betting’s Mike Smithson  outlines the reasons to be wary of those numbers – but some of the poll’s below-headline findings on the BBC remain striking.  They suggest that around 73 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds – the so-called ‘yoof’ audience that the BBC targets with hosts like Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand – think that the current licence fee is unjustified.  Across all age ranges, that figure rises to 74 percent.

Now, this – along with other recent polls – indicates that there may be some political mileage in pushing for a licence fee reduction; or even a more general reorganisation of how the BBC is funded.  If anything, there’s an argument that it’s a moral necessity, given that the public will be more and more fiscally squeezed as the economic downturn bites deeper.