BBC licence fee to be frozen for next six years

[dutchman]

The BBC licence fee is to be frozen for the next six years at £145.50, it has emerged.



The corporation will also take over the cost of the World Service, currently funded by the Foreign Office, as well as the Welsh language TV channel, S4C.

There was a proposal to make the BBC pay the cost of free TV licences for the over-75s but the BBC understands this will now not happen.

A formal announcement will be made on Wednesday during the Spending Review.

The BBC are refusing to comment but insiders say that this is a significantly better settlement than the proposal to force the BBC to pay the cost of free TV licences for the elderly.

It will mean a 16% real terms cut in the BBC's funds over the next six years as opposed to a 25% cut over four years if they had been obliged to cover the licence fee costs.

Ministers are expected to present this as "reining in" the corporation's costs.

The BBC Trust earlier warned the government it would fight any move to force the BBC to meet the cost of free television licences for the over-75s.

A trust spokeswoman said it would be "unacceptable" for licence fee payers to foot the bill.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) currently funds S4C.

The government's contribution to the funding of the S4C is currently just under £100m a year.

The BBC will also take over the cost of BBC Monitoring, part of the World Service which monitors how global media are telling news stories.