Scrap the TV licence

whosurpaddy

Originally posted by Rev Hellfire
If you don’t like the current situation and you feel there is a ground swell behind you, get off your áss and start campaigning. But I suspect you'll just sit and moan rather than do something proactive about this deplorable situation you and your television have found yourselves in.

why dont you? can I not ask a question without you telling me what i should be doing? maybe i dont care, maybe i do, maybe im the leader of the anti tv licence coalition.

point is you dont know, yet ul quite happily pick a random post of a poster you know nothing about and proceed to apply your theory that im lazy appethetic and generally a tosser who would rather moan about something than do anything about it.

in short STFU

Originally posted by Earthman
That will become possible after analog shut down which is still at least ten years away.

does anyone know when analog is being switched off? i thought it was a lot closer than 10 years?

quote:

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Originally posted by Rev Hellfire
If you don’t like the current situation and you feel there is a ground swell behind you, get off your áss and start campaigning. But I suspect you'll just sit and moan rather than do something proactive about this deplorable situation you and your television have found yourselves in.

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Where is this determined? Because I've never heard of a campaign that related to this or such. Is this just another issue that falls with our TD's?

Redleslie2 -- You do realise that by submitting Johnmb's info you could be charged with submitting false information. If the Agencies found Johnmb to be clear of any guilt, you could be called to account. Also submitting the name "John Byrne" and saying he lived in Dublin, would have you laughed off the phone.

rubadub

Originally posted by Wicknight
You have the ability to watch RTE because you have a TV. Therefore you should pay for the public service in the form of a tax. You are actually given a choice in the matter. You can choose not to own a TV in which case you cannot avail of the service and dont have to pay for it, which is more than a lot of taxes.

The govenment could just as easily start sending spam text messages with weather forecasts etc. to everybodys phone in the country and start charging a mobile phone licence for their great service, I think €150 would be reasonable. You could ask them not to send them to you if they were of no interest to you but you still should pay, after all...
"You have the ability to avail of these text messages because you have a mobile phone. Therefore you should pay for the public service in the form of a tax."

What other appliances you not mind paying licence fees on for a public service the government could supply, I already suggested recipies and food for your cooker licence. How about the govenment offering models that you can take photos of with your camera? Or a internet licence for a government website.

DublinWriter

First of all, let's get one thing straight. RTE are not a public service broadcaster.

Huh you say? But we pay them all that money for a TV licence. How so?

RTE receive around 75% from commercial advertisers and 25% from licence fee revenue. So bearing that statistic in mind, answer the following:

a) RTE are a public service broadcaster
b) RTE are a commercial semi-state broadcaster who subsidise their commercial advertising revenue with the licence fee.

If you answered b, then well done, full marks. And if you're in any doubt about this, just look at the Late Late when it bothers to come back on air later this year. Chat show, or show case for Renault Ireland? You decide.

Just imagine Parky breaking off at the end of an interview to discuss the merits of
the new Clio (well, now that he's with the ITV I suppose thats a possibility).

With all that corporate buy-in, it’s it small wonder that RTE never had a consumer affairs programme in their schedule……..ever?

RTE are a semi-state commercial organisation and they use the Licence Fee as justification for their 'public service' status, when in reality it's just a safety net.

We should scrap the Licence Fee and privatise RTE. If RTE only lose 25% of revenue then can you imagine how much worse they could get? In short, not a lot.

Tommy Vercetti

Originally posted by halkar
that is serious, then, even if you get reception but not watch it, you shouldn't have to pay the license fee. You can have tv for sattelite, dvd, video or gaming and in this case it is like buying an Xbox but not paying Xbox license Why pay license if one doesn't watch RTE?
Though I am still in favour of paying the license and having RTE upgraded to digital to be put on FTA on sattelites and so I can kick the sky's @ss

in the case I'm referring to though, it was demonstrated/proven that the guy could not get any reception...like I said, I only vaguely remember reading about it, probably 10 years ago or so....


just as a matter of interest, say a shop or whatever has a monitor/TV solely for CCTV purposes, do they have to pay for a licence?

Gurgle

Would everyone be happy if their income tax was raised by 1% and the TV ownership tax, car ownership tax and a few more of the 'window tax' types were abandoned ?

This would also ensure that nobody could avoid these taxes, we would be taxed proportionally to income and the extra costs of collection and enforcement wouldn't be needed (wasted).

PBC_1966

Originally posted by Gurgle
and the extra costs of collection and enforcement wouldn't be needed (wasted).

I think that's a point which is often overlooked. Bureaucrats tell people "Well, if we took away this tax we'd have to put it on something else," but neglect to mention that every new tax they impose seems to involve the creation of "jobs" for thousands more civil servants to shuffle even more bits of paper around. VAT would be an excellent candidate for removal and would probably help save several forests a year into the bargain.

The Corinthian

The ‘TV’ Licence fee is in fact a throwback of when there was no other means of funding radio. Advertising was an American invention and we were above that sort of thing, after all. This was also at a time when radio was a public State service, and often the only means for the population to keep in contact with the events of the day.

Of course, as time progressed, sponsorship and later advertising were introduced as alternative means of funding Radio and later Television. With the advent of commercial television that did not benefit from licence fee revenue, further diminished broadcasting need for the licence fees.

Regrettably while the reasons for the tax have gone, the tax itself remains, largely due to the chronic inefficiency of State broadcasting companies. And while it may be law, it does not mean that we should not seek for it to be changed.

Indeed, I find it amusing that one of the individuals most ardently defending this law here has on a number of occasions (and incarnations) defended the right to public demonstration and disobedience. Obviously only when it suits him.

PBC_1966

I know that Telefis Eireann (later RTE) started broadcasting in 1961. When did they start showing commercials, rather than being entirely license-fee funded?

It's always struck me as kind of odd that in the U.K. the government authorized commercial TV, which started in 1955, yet officially-sanctioned commercial radio had to wait until 1973.

whosurpaddy

Originally posted by Gurgle
Would everyone be happy if their income tax was raised by 1% and the TV ownership tax, car ownership tax and a few more of the 'window tax' types were abandoned ?

This would also ensure that nobody could avoid these taxes, we would be taxed proportionally to income and the extra costs of collection and enforcement wouldn't be needed (wasted).

personally id much prefer this. seems a much fairer and open way of collecting the neccessary money. its the idea of being taxed multiple times that sticks in a lot of peoples throats as opposed to the actual amount they have to pay.

rubadub

Originally posted by Tommy Vercetti
just as a matter of interest, say a shop or whatever has a monitor/TV solely for CCTV purposes, do they have to pay for a licence?

If it is a TV, yes. A monitor, no.

If you have a TV and use it only to watch DVDs you must pay the licence,
If you have a car that you dont drive around your garden in you dont have to pay road tax.

Hospitals have to pay the full licence for every single TV in the building, no discounts for anybody.