The Green party wants to scrap the licence fee and fund the BBC through general taxation in a move the its manifesto says would cost £1.6bn this year and £3.2bn a year for the remainder of the next parliament.
The manifesto, published on Tuesday, commits the party to: “Maintain the BBC as the primary public service broadcaster, free of government interference, with funding guaranteed in real terms in statute to prevent government interference.”
Though the manifesto does not explicitly lay out where the money to replace income from the £145.50 licence fee would come from, the reduction in government revenue is listed in its financial annex and a party spokesperson confirmed this would come from central taxation.
The BBC’s 2013/14 financial report says the licence fee brought in more than £3.7bn for the corporation. However, the figures in the government’s 2015 budget, on which the Greens’ calculation is based, does not include the roughly £500m the BBC receives from the Department for Work and Pensions for over-75-year-olds, who are exempt from the licence fee.
The party has previously said it it believes the BBC should be funded by a non-regressive tax that could be ringfenced. The policy section on public sector broadcasting on the party’s website says: “The existing licence fee will be abolished and in the first instance replaced by a guaranteed inflation-linked payment from general taxation.”
The Green manifesto also says the party supports tighter rules on cross-media ownership and a cap on any company controlling more than 20% of a media market.
On regulation, it goes further than both the Conservative and Labour manifestos in insisting that if a royal charter-backed press regulator is not agreed by all major newspapers, the party will “support legislation to implement the Leveson system of independent press regulation”.
