A bedbound disabled woman struggling with her mental health after she lost her husband to cancer has been convicted of not paying her TV licence.
The 54-year-old woman is among more than 500 people prosecuted and convicted in the last month for not keeping up with the £174.50 annual charge.
She revealed her tragic circumstances in a letter as she was prosecuted through the fast-track Single Justice Procedure.
Court papers reveal she was interviewed by a TV Licensing agent just one day after she had been discharged from hospital.
In her letter, she set out how she was “not feeling well” and “forget(s) a lot of things”.
“I’m on a lot of tablets, I am disabled and I broke my shoulder”, she wrote.
“I have been in bed with the council carers coming in for six weeks.
“I have now a frozen shoulder, I can’t get dressed or really go out.
“I’m sorry I haven’t paid.
“My mental health too is not great as my husband died with cancer – had a lot to deal with.”
When she was interviewed on the doorstep of her Basingstoke home in mid-May, the woman said her TV Licence had expired and she had recently watched ITV News.
The criminal case was decided on by a magistrate sitting behind-closed-doors in the Single Justice Procedure (SJP), a fast-track court process which handles low level offences.
TV Licensing did not see the woman’s letter, which was submitted to the court as mitigation alongside a guilty plea.
However, it did know at least a little about her circumstances.
In the agent’s record of the doorstep interview, he recorded her as “disabled” and also noted that she had told him: “My husband has recently passed away and only came out of hospital yesterday. Also I suffer from depression and mental health issues!”
Magistrate Matthew Ubogagu, sitting at the City of London magistrates court, opted not to send the case back to TV Licensing for a check on whether it remained in the public interest to prosecute.
He convicted the woman and gave her an absolute discharge rather than a fine.
A TV Licensing spokesperson said: “We work hard to support customers who tell us they have vulnerabilities, and who may need extra help to stay licensed.
“If someone’s personal circumstances have made it genuinely difficult for them to get licensed, we’d urge them to contact us and share any evidence they have. We would review their case carefully, and if we find that prosecuting wasn’t in the public interest, we can apply to have the prosecution withdrawn – even after sentencing.”
The Standard has for months reported on vulnerable, sick, and elderly people who are regularly prosecuted and convicted in the Single Justice Procedure for not paying household bills.
Due to the design of the system, prosecuting bodies like TV Licensing and DVLA often do not realise they are bringing cases against people with severe mental health difficulties, dementia, or cancer, hospital patients, and even care home residents.
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