BBC is lying to us - here's how you can legally watch TV without a licence

Résumé détaillé

A TV licence covers you to watch all TV channels.” Ambiguous at best, misleading, dishonest, and self-serving at worst. The implication in that closing line of the latest,…

“A TV licence covers you to watch all TV channels.” Ambiguous at best, misleading, dishonest, and self-serving at worst. The implication in that closing line of the latest, infuriatingly self-congratulatory BBC TV licence promos, is clear. “Want to watch ANY channel, legally? Better get a licence!” Every time I hear this disingenuous nonsense pumped out in the breaks between BBC radio programmes, my blood pressure soars. Because even the BBC’s widely derided Verify unit would have to admit (doubtless with huge reluctance) that there are actually plenty of programmes you are allowed to watch without a TV licence.

Provided you don’t view or record live TV, or use BBC iPlayer to watch or download any content, you can access multiple on-demand streaming platforms – Netflix, Amazon, Disney+, Apple TV etc. Also non-BBC catch-up or on-demand shows – ITVX, Channel 4 Streaming, My5, etc. And plenty, plenty more.

But by repeatedly telling us that with a licence we’re “covered to watch all TV channels”, the BBC is deliberately muddying the waters. It knows exactly what game it’s playing. It is perfectly aware that viewers don’t need a licence to watch “all TV channels”. But it fudges that fact to bully the fearful into believing they should hand almost £200 to Auntie “just in case”.

It’s cunning manipulation from the same playbook as the TV detection- van nonsense. Remember how for years the BBC implied, without actually quite saying so, that these prowling, sinister grey wagons could “detect” a TV being watched illegally without a licence? The BB in BBC truly stood for Big Brother in what was a naked attempt to menace the public.

Because the threat was empty. Those spinning radar-like devices atop the vans were purely for show: a bluff. The vehicles were no more capable of picking up signals from a TV than a Mr Whippy van could. Scare tactics, pure and simple.

If the BBC wants to win the argument to keep the licence fee, it should stop bending the truth.

The sheer corporate…

If I…

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