In 2020, broadcast media consists of hundreds of broadcast channels on both TV and radio, all funding themselves, many making their own content, and all competing in the consumer marketplace for both audiences and advertising income.

Yet there is one broadcasting organisation in the UK which spreads across all broadcast and online media, and has a completely free hand to do what it likes, with its income guaranteed from a TV License system, in which everyone who owns a TV and watches broadcast TV in almost any form and delivery method has to pay that organisation £157.50 a year - over £12 per month. It is, of course, the mighty BBC.

The BBC is catering to a declining audience, and spending ever more to generate a massive output for smaller numbers of viewers - and it is forecast to get worse over coming years, as our younger population moves away from broadcast media to online media. It opens new youth and specialist outlets until they prove unpopular, and then closes them without a thought for the wasted money.

So I believe it is time that the BBC stood on its own feet in the marketplace. Support this petition to bring the day when the BBC is compelled to become a proper, competitive broadcaster, generating its own income in the marketplace, and not dependent on an outmoded and unfair income  system which penalises ordinary TV viewers of all ages and incomes.