The BBC wants to make 20% cuts over the next 5 years as a result of a freeze in your licence fee.
It will mean the loss of 2,000 jobs and cuts to core news and programming across the BBC. Under the plans 22% of local radio output will go, at a time when listening is up.
Current affairs and investigative programming will be cut – with 40% reductions outside London. By the end of 2012, there will be almost no television or radio made for the national networks from Birmingham. There will be reductions in sports coverage including Formula One.
Staff inside the BBC face redundancy and stringent cuts to terms and conditions. Since 2004 the BBC has already lost more than 7,000 jobs – 1,000 every year. It’s not sustainable.
Licence fee payers were not asked for their views when the deal was done. The BBC has even said it will press ahead with making the cuts before the BBC Trust’s current public consultation has closed.
Licence fee payers should have a say. Research has consistently shown that people would be prepared to pay more than the current licence fee to protect the BBC.
The cost of an annual licence fee has gone up by just £10 since 2007. It now costs just over £12 a month for all the TV, radio, website and live events the BBC covers. That compares to more than £60 a month for some subscription services.
If all the current licence fee paying households paid just 7 pence more per day these cuts could be stopped.
Please send this postcard – or hand it to Stuart Watkin, c/o John McDonnell MP. The consultation runs until Wednesday 21 December 2011.