BBC Chairman Samir Shah has suggested the licence fee could be based on the value of a property (Image: Getty)
The should rise for wealthier households, the corporation’s chairman has suggested. Samir Shah has challenged the current £169.50 TV licence fee, appearing to favour levying a fee based on the value of a property.
He told the : “Why should people who are poor pay the same as people in wealthy households?” Mr Shah, 73, didn’t endorse a household levy fully, but pointed to advantages such as the “problem” posed by enforcing the fee.
The sent 41 million letters to households in the UK between 2023 and 2024, urging them to pay the fee. It represents a near 13% increase year on year, according to the Telegraph.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy is also reported as having said previously that she is considering funding the broadcaster via general taxation and mutualising the .
Mr Shah has also said the broadcaster needs “more variety” and “diversity of thought” as well as more staff who are “northern working class”.
Samir Shah has questioned why poorer households should pay more than wealthier ones (Image: PA Images)
He reflected on claims the corporation has a liberal bias too, telling The Sunday Times: “The media recruits graduates from the arts, humanities, and they tend to be metropolitan and to have a point of view you could describe as liberal centre, centre left. We kind of reflect that.”
The corporation has faced a backlash over its coverage of the the -Hamas conflict and it recently emerged that a documentary it aired about Gaza featured the son of a senior Hamas figure.
A protest was held outside Broadcasting House on Thursday with demonstrators claiming the had aired Hamas propaganda. Mr Shah said: “We make mistakes in our journalism. We correct mistakes.”
He added: “There needs to be greater accountability. People have to face the consequences of what they do.”
Mr Shah also spoke about the importance of diversity and said the “needs to do a lot more to ensure our staff reflects the country as a whole. We need more variety and diversity”.
Expanding on this, he said: “More diversity of thought. It’s on, frankly, the northern working class where we’re poor. That’s where the focus should be.”
Don’t miss… [COMMENT] [REPORT]
Lisa Nandy has reportedly suggested funding the BBC from general taxation (Image: Getty)
Mr Shah has been in his role since March 2024 and said he was “surprised” in his first year at having a “procession of men” who have had allegations made against them. These include former newsreader Huw Edwards.
The ‘s chairman said: “The theme that keeps coming through is that junior staff are vulnerable to being preyed on by people with power. We have to stop it. I will not tolerate junior staff being scared to report what’s happening or their managers looking the other way.”
He added: “We need to have some way of preserving whistleblowers’ anonymity, so we can throw people out and do it quickly. I’m absolutely determined. This is a cancer we need to cut out.”
Last year, Edwards was handed a suspended sentence after admitting three charges of “making” indecent photographs after he was sent 41 illegal images by convicted paedophile Alex Williams over WhatsApp.
The continued to pay Edwards his annual salary after discovering he had been arrested on “suspicion of serious offences” in November 2023.