I wish to speak briefly on this matter. I have a lot of sympathy with the Opposition’s views, and the hon. Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) is right: we have a lot to be proud of. I am always wary of using the phrase, “It is the envy of the world”, but we have a superb television service and largely, the British Broadcasting Corporation is responsible for that.
There are those on the Government Benches—I have some sympathy with some of my, as the hon. Lady would put it, “right-wing colleagues”—who worry about the political bias of the BBC. Even its former director-general, Mr Mark Thompson, has referred to that. None the less, I do not think any of us can deny that the BBC does a very good public service with its broadcasting, and it is one that is recognised throughout the world. My concern is this: we are living in a fast-changing world and the notion that the BBC’s licence fee can remain in aspic as the only model of funding is one that would be dangerous for the BBC, as well as for all of us, necessarily to hold close to our hearts.
Criminalisation is also something that I want to speak about briefly. When my late mother died, she was living alone. She had been widowed for some years, and she died in September 2010. I took on the responsibility for looking after her affairs in the home in which she had lived prior to it being sold, which took place some months later. I was appalled by the experience that I had, which I am sure is one shared by many hundreds of thousands of our fellow countrymen in a similar position. Literally on a fortnightly basis, we got threatening letters from the BBC’s licensing department, saying that we were committing a criminal offence by not having a licence. There is a sense, I am afraid, in which the BBC regards every single home as being fair game, whether anyone is living there or, indeed, using a television set. It certainly was not terribly good public relations, not just for me personally, but, I suspect, for many other people who go through that particular rigmarole. There is a sense that the BBC feels it has the right to claim, almost with menaces, moneys, when the particular circumstances of my mother having passed away made it even more upsetting to get one letter after another in this way.