One of Nigel Farage’s General Election pledges is to abolish the BBC licence fee, after claiming the national broadcaster is “out of touch”.
The Reform Leader launched his “contract” manifesto this week promising a major reform of the BBC.
He continued to add that the constitution, to which UK residents must pay £169.50 a year in order to watch and record live TV broadcasts, was “biased” and does not serve the British people.
Farage wrote: “The out of touch wasteful BBC is institutionally biased. The TV licence is taxation without representation.
“We [Reform] will scrap it. In a world of on-demand TV, people should be free to choose.”
However reacting to the pledge, Deputy Foreign Minister Andrew Mitchell claimed that the Reform UK leader “needs an alternative plan” in place to make his plan work.
Mitchell told GB News host Martin Daubney it is “perfectly proper” for any Government and any party “to look at whether there are better ways of financing the BBC”, but defended the broadcaster as a “great organisation”.
Mitchell claimed: “The BBC has an enormous soft power impact around the world, and it’s also much respected in the United Kingdom as well.”
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