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| "The world's most famous football show. Gary Lineker with the big names and the big games from the Premier League." Source: BBC One |
The government has announced that the current TV licence fee of £159 will increase by £10.50 to £169.50 from next April, a rise of 6.6% - but less than the BBC had anticipated.
The BBC must find £400m in annual savings by 2027/28. In 2023 as part of a drive to save money 1,000 fewer hours of new TV programmes.
Hit in the cuts is a trimmed down Newsnight, one of the more serious programmes among the BBC's deteriorating standards as it seeks to appeal to the lowest common denominator rather than educate people in accordance with its mission to "act in the public interest, serving all audiences through the provision of impartial, high-quality and distinctive output and services which inform, educate and entertain”.
Soccer coverage, by contrast, goes on and on and on with Match of the Day taking centre stage.
Earlier this year it was reported that BBC currently pay £211million to the Premier League for the rights to show the highlights programme every weekend on Saturday night and a repeat on Sunday morning.
Last month the Mail Online reported that the BBC were preparing to open contract talks with Match of the Day presenter, Gary Lineker whose £1.35million-a-year contract expires when the BBC’s existing deal for Premier League highlights runs out at the end of next season,
Apparently the corporation are eager to secure their top-paid presenter despite reports that he has "continued to talk politics, backing pro-Palestine marches since the terrorist attacks in Israel" and "supporting protesters’ right to hold events in London on Armistice Day".
It is a travesty that those of us who have no interest in soccer, and even less in the private opinions of the BBC's overpaid presenters, are forced to pay inflated licence fees for content directed to a specific audience requiring an additional multitude of pundits, reporters and sports correspondents.
The Chief Executive of the English Basketball Association was right to question the amounts of television rights money spent on Soccer as the BBC.
They should let it go or move soccer to a separate pay channel.
Postscript [11.12.2023]
Overpaid, over indulged and licence payers are funding it.
