TV Licence article Discussion

Cornucopia

Paul_Varjak wrote: »

It may not be used on Court to prove an offence but is it ever used to get a search warrant? If I had a fake TV switched on it means I am out of the house.

Over zealous man knocks on door cos he thinks I have a real TV and I don't answer (cos I am out)

Over zealous man assumes I am not answering because I have seen the TV detector van.

Over zealous man applies to court to get a warrant to search my house.

Over zealous man detects my fake TV when he returns with his warrant. Does he then break in when I don't answer?

Everything up to that point - yes. Breaking in - no.

Which as I say means that the detection argument is pretty academic for legally licence free people. At best it confirms that you are LLF, at worst they look very silly organising a search warrant for a fake TV.

I agree it is a bit contrived but these sorts of things do happen. I have sat in Court listening to court cases occasionally and, on one occasion, there were a number of alleged TV licence evaders at Court. Some were guilty, some were innocent - simply because they already had a licence!

Some Magistrates hate the TVL sessions - why they put up with the tenuous relationship to justice I don't know.

CC-Warrior

TVL are disgraceful, their methods of intimidation and bullying seriously needs to be looked at. I was threatened with a search warrant just because I wouldn't let one of their 'enforcement officers' in to my home. I wrote to TVL and told them that any further visits would constitute harassment.

MiserlyMartin

jackE17 wrote: »

High quality news and comment unbiased by the influence of political opinion or big business is only provided by one national broadcaster in the world - the BBC.

In any other country you choose a channel for your news based on political bias - as an extreme example Fox News in the USA.
Fox News lies halfway along a spectrum of bias that runs from the objective and intelligent views of the BBC to the publicly broadcast propaganda of North Korea. Where would you rather be on that spectrum?

As the increased amount and frequency of advertising swamps other networks and newspapers the value of the BBC as a national resource is unquantifiable. It is a source of envy around the world and should be the one of the proudest assets of the UK.

Commercial TV by it's very nature has to be able to offer a specific demographic of viewer to it's advertisers. Therefore with news and comment any commercial channel must target a group within the population thus removing all objectivity to satisfy the needs of the advertiser.

Even worse, the basis of the political or business influenced bias often comes from a megalomaniac media mogul such as Murdoch, operating like some sort of unseen dictator.

(I don't work for the BBC by the way!)

On another note, i would love to see some statistics on the demographics of Sky subscribers. It seems to me that Sky is primarily subscribed to by people on very low incomes and often on benefits. I have a theory that a huge part of Sky's funding in fact comes inadvertently from the government through benefits.

I disagree that the BBC is unbiased. It is pro-european, presents one sided views about 'global warming' and promotes that agenda giving no airtime to alternative views, it's PC, nanny state and anti Tory in so many respects, probably due to the licence fee freeze imposed upon it. Just look how they covered the death of Thatcher... inciting protests and stirring up trouble and protests on radio and TV. They almost seemed disappointed on news bulletins when hardly anything happened but kept mentioning how protests are expected. Even Sky News is more balanced! I would rather have a system of news channels that everyone knows is leaning whichever way then one like the BBC that pretends to be unbiased but isn't!

I do agree with you about Sky viewers on benefits though.... it seems to many of them, sky tv first, kids clothes second.

Annabee

Nush wrote: »

My daughter passed away on 3rd January 2013 and when I contacted the tv licencing to get a refund of her licence which she had paid a full year, they deducted a full quarter as she died 3 days into it (which would amount to £1.20).

When I queried this with them in our time of devastation they replied telling me that legally they did not have to give a refund. Absolutely heartless when every penny is needed to pay for a funeral.

yes they were heartless.

So sorry for your loss.

slackhead

Can I clarify something with regards having a virgin cable TV box:

I've been with virgin for some years and maybe 2 or 3 years ago I got rid of my TV and decided just to watch catchup on iPlayer or youtube etc.

Today I've been looking around at dab radios, but then hit upon the idea of plugging in my old cable box to use for just radio.

As I said I have no TV just the cable box. Do I need a license for it if it's just for radio?

Thanks for any pointers

NB: Also I seem to have lost the card that should be in it and I'm led to believe that it won't actually show any pictures (can't check myself obviously).

slackhead

Well, after reading up a few places that popup while googling, they seem to all mention having 'equipment to watch/record live TV broadcasts'.

I'm hoping that my not having a TV will suffice. Any ideas?

Cornucopia

slackhead wrote: »

Well, after reading up a few places that popup while googling, they seem to all mention having 'equipment to watch/record live TV broadcasts'.

I'm hoping that my not having a TV will suffice. Any ideas?

No - you don't need a licence to listen to the radio using a cable set top box. Ideally, connect the audio output of the STB to your hifi, and have no video connection at all. (There should be red and white phono sockets on the back of the STB for this purpose).

kaya

when you think that the BEEB were granted the right to charge a fee for their sevices by royal charter it makes a mockery of the fact that they now imply you need a licence to watch any other channels or even have the capability to watch live tv, im not sure about needing detector van evidence to get a warrant either as i know of a guy who had no tv in his home and came back one day to find his front door smashed in by police and tv people because he didnt have a licence and ignored their letters ,the court case is still ongoing against them. The way i see it is the bbc is a propoganda machine that usually does the governments bidding and has a few lords sitting at the top of the organisation getting paid a fortune for doing next to nothing (lets face it, the icelandic people threw out thier government and imprisoned the bankers but i dont recall the beeb reporting anything about such a historical event) , its in the governments interest to allow the beeb to continue charging a fee for services like channel 5 which they dont provide for this reason alone , why else would it be allowed to continue?

slackhead

I had to use a scart to rca adaptor. There were no rca or other direct audio outputs.

slackhead

kaya wrote: »

when you think that the BEEB were granted the right to charge a fee for their sevices by royal charter it makes a mockery of the fact that they now imply you need a licence to watch any other channels or even have the capability to watch live tv, im not sure about needing detector van evidence to get a warrant either as i know of a guy who had no tv in his home and came back one day to find his front door smashed in by police and tv people because he didnt have a licence and ignored their letters ,the court case is still ongoing against them. The way i see it is the bbc is a propoganda machine that usually does the governments bidding and has a few lords sitting at the top of the organisation getting paid a fortune for doing next to nothing (lets face it, the icelandic people threw out thier government and imprisoned the bankers but i dont recall the beeb reporting anything about such a historical event) , its in the governments interest to allow the beeb to continue charging a fee for services like channel 5 which they dont provide for this reason alone , why else would it be allowed to continue?

That's pretty harsh for ignoring letters. Guess I won't be doing that then. I've had a couple of letters in the past few years and used the tv license website to tell them my circumstances.