You need a license to watch TV in UK?!

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Thus really confused me. Maybe you Brits can explain what's happening here?

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Type: Discussion • Score: 24 • Views: 26,546 • Replies: 422

[+8] - izzythepush - 04/24/2017We don't have lunatics shooting up schools either. Dead children pay the price of American liberty every day. I prefer ours. I gladly pay my licence, it's a lot cheaper than medical insurance.
[+7] - farmerman - 04/24/2017we differ on the definition of "best". We do have several outstanding programs. However, we alwo have an equivalent ampount of crap. How bout strictly partisan news networks?? FOX, CNN....
[+7] - farmerman - 04/24/2017I consider your groups definition of freedom , a childish wild west idea. Weve got gun deaths rivaling Somalia
[+6] - centrox - 04/24/2017[quote="Baldimo"] Liberty at it's best... a warrant to inspect for a TV license? ******* govt bureaucratic twits. If you don't have a license for a TV and they can take your TV and see...
[+6] - saab - 04/27/2017Sorry farmerman, that I did not express myself clearly. I meant to be on your side and certainly not against you - on the contrary.
[+6] - farmerman - 05/02/2017perhaps you should try that bullshit on someone who gives a **** about your whining. You and oralloy sound like zealots when you guys define what "MUST" happen before you can enjoy...
[+6] - Walter Hinteler - 12/13/2018[img]https://i.imgur.com/ToupXMz.jpg[/img]
[+6] - farmerman - 12/16/2018you can deal with oral. He seems to be wanting to occupy several poles at once.
[+5] - izzythepush - 04/24/2017The license fee goes straight to the BBC, which ensures complete independence, not reliant on the government for tax, or dependent on commercial interests for advertising revenue. It's what...
[+5] - farmerman - 04/24/2017I have to agree that the resulting program quality in the UK is superior to ours. e have tv geared for retarded 12 year olds. Jezus, we even make believe that "IN SEARCH OF ANCIENT...

@McGentrix,

Quote:

In the United Kingdom and the Crown dependencies, any household watching or recording live television transmissions as they are being broadcast (terrestrial, satellite, cable, or internet) is required to hold a television licence. Businesses, hospitals, schools and a range of other organisations are also required to hold television licences to watch and record live TV broadcasts.[1] A television licence is also required to receive on-demand programme services provided by the BBC, on the iPlayer catch-up service.

wikipedia

In most European countries you need a licence

Quote:

The licence fee in Germany is now a blanket contribution of €17.50 per month (€210 per annum) for all households and is payable regardless of equipment or television/radio usage

wikipedia: tv licence

1 Reply

The license fee goes straight to the BBC, which ensures complete independence, not reliant on the government for tax, or dependent on commercial interests for advertising revenue.

It's what makes it so good, the programmes are excellent and the news reporting second to none. The license fee is a small price to pay for that. When I was in America the telly was **** overall, some good individual shows, which we get over here anyway, but overall pretty lousy.

The BBC sets a standard for all national broadcasters.

If you think it's that bad you should stay away, you wouldn't like it over here. It's much nicer where you are, stay put. If you come over here you'll be forced to wear a burkha and live under Shariah law, and you wouldn't like that.

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@McGentrix,

Liberty at it's best... a warrant to inspect for a TV license? ******* govt bureaucratic twits. If you don't have a license for a TV and they can take your TV and see it? What happened to private property?

1 Reply

We don't have lunatics shooting up schools either. Dead children pay the price of American liberty every day. I prefer ours. I gladly pay my licence, it's a lot cheaper than medical insurance.

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@Baldimo,

Baldimo wrote:

Liberty at it's best... a warrant to inspect for a TV license? ******* govt bureaucratic twits. If you don't have a license for a TV and they can take your TV and see it? What happened to private property?

No. That (awful) guy was a court bailiff. This is is the end of a long process. TV licensing inspectors had previously gathered evidence that he was watching TV without a licence. You don't have to let them in, but they can use detection equipment. At that stage they would have offered him the chance to buy one, paying in monthly instalments if he wanted. He must have refused, following which he would have been taken to court. He must have been found guilty, fined, and failed to pay the fine. The court would have contacted him multiple times to give him a chance to pay it off, again by instalments. After that, as with any unpaid fine for any offence, the court can issue a warrant for a bailiff, who is an employee of a company contracted by the courts, to enter private property and seize goods to the value of the fine plus their fee for doing the collection. He would have had the chance to dispute the need to do that, but again refused to make contact.

The householder is a prat. He thinks the warrant needs to be signed in ink by a magistrate. It doesn't.

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@izzythepush,

I have to agree that the resulting program quality in the UK is superior to ours. e have tv geared for retarded 12 year olds. Jezus, we even make believe that "IN SEARCH OF ANCIENT ALIENS" is science and these clowns who populate those shows are honest to Chrise researchers.

Our comedy specials on HBO and NETFLIX will compare well with anything the UK produces, and many of the cable shows that are drama. Outside of that, no comparison.
EWvevn the best science shows are produced by
1BBC
and distant second

2 State Public TV stations (MPT, MMT, WUHB, etc etc)

We pay for better tv. MOST of our Cable tv is pretty much just a marketing trick with crappy shows attached

1 Reply

@centrox,

cable preemie services often prosecute people who "steal cable service"

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@izzythepush,

As Centrox said, that guy was there to basically steal that man's stuff to pay a fine for watching TV...

Basically, it would seem that the UK has successfully taken the testicles off the entire country. Government owns the housing (am I wrong on that? Do people actually own homes in UK?), "bailiffs" can come to your house and steal your personal belongings to pay fines for a license to watch TV. What can you do about it? Write a strongly worded letter?

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@izzythepush,

You are just being baited by the "Teabagger" mentality. "Liberty" to these guys is unbridled chaos where everyone must fend for himself .
I always found Canada (with all its dumb taxes) a much more civilzed and overall "free country" within which countervailing ideas are at least respected and not violently attacked. In the US, people have seemed to have bottled up thweir minds and listen only to other like minded opinions.
Childish really.

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@farmerman,

Not to be too much of a thorn in your side, but American TV really is the best in the world. That is why every country broadcasts it. I am speaking of the major networks ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, CW, MTV, ESPN, FOXNews, MSNBC, TNT, AMC... hell even Nat Geo, Disc, PBS, USA and other channels are around the globe.

This is not to say that there are not good shows on other country TV companies. Dr. Who is a standard bearer of the BBC. Sherlock Holmes, The Young Ones, Monty Python, the I.T. Crown, Black Books (!), Benny Hill and some others.

In general terms though, the programming quality in America blows the doors off anything else in the world.

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@McGentrix,

If I do not pay for my car - the dealer will pick it.
If I do not pay for my furniture the store will pick them up.
If I do not pay the painter - he can sue me.
If I do not pay for my TV I cannot watch TV
If I do not pay for my phone it is disconneted.
Any difference in USA except for the TV licence?

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

You are just being baited by the "Teabagger" mentality. "Liberty" to these guys is unbridled chaos where everyone must fend for himself .
I always found Canada (with all its dumb taxes) a much more civilzed and overall "free country" within which countervailing ideas are at least respected and not violently attacked. In the US, people have seemed to have bottled up thweir minds and listen only to other like minded opinions.
Childish really.

You consider freedom and liberty to be childish? Huh. Never would have pegged you as one of those.

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@saab,

When we don't pay for the cable bill, they don't come to my house and take my silverware. There is quite a difference there wouldn't you say?

0 Replies

@McGentrix,

we differ on the definition of "best". We do have several outstanding programs. However, we alwo have an equivalent ampount of crap.
How bout strictly partisan news networks?? FOX, CNN. Theyre all just different sides of the same bread slice.

If you watch the really good science progrms (Like tHe BLUE PLANET, PLANET EARTH , etc etc) are ALL BBC productions.

Yeh we have Ken Burns but hes only on one week a year and doesnt produce more than one series every few years.

I like Science programs, but the **** they resent on Discovery, "HISTORY CHNNEL" . are junk , total fact-free garbage.

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@saab,

Quote:

Any difference in USA except for the TV licence?

A bit of a difference, when I fail to pay for a traffic ticket, they don't take my car and sell it for fee's. Why should your ownership of a TV be decided by a govt license. What if I only want to use my TV to play Xbox? Do I still have to pay the fee, I'm not watching TV. How about if I only watch movies on DVD or blue ray? Do I still owe the license fee? My entertainment shouldn't be limited by a license from the govt. It's things like this that make me happy to be in the US.

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@farmerman,

I agree that current programming on Discovery is severely lacking. But, do you get the Discovery Science channel? Some good stuff on there. National Geographic channel also has good stuff as does PBS.

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@farmerman,

Quote:

You are just being baited by the "Teabagger" mentality. "Liberty" to these guys is unbridled chaos where everyone must fend for himself .

Since when did you become an extremest?

Quote:

I always found Canada (with all its dumb taxes) a much more civilzed and overall "free country" within which countervailing ideas are at least respected and not violently attacked. .

Now this must be a joke. Have you seen the reactions from the left since the election? Can you really look at fascists like Antifi and say they respect other people's idea's? Can you honestly look at the modern day college campus and say they respect others ideas without using violence?

Quote:

In the US, people have seemed to have bottled up thweir minds and listen only to other like minded opinions.
Childish really

You mean like this weekends BS "March for Science"? I didn't know climate change was the be all and end all of science and if you reject CC then you are rejecting all science... It's really no better than those fools who think abortions are the be all and end all of womens health...

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@McGentrix,

I consider your groups definition of freedom , a childish wild west idea.
Weve got gun deaths rivaling Somalia

0 Replies

@McGentrix,

Quote:

You consider freedom and liberty to be childish? Huh. Never would have pegged you as one of those

By your own phraseology, you make my point. There is only YOUR definition of freedom allowed. (Thats really not freedom is it?)

2 Replies

You need a license to watch TV in UK?!

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