“Fundamentally unfair”: The BBC Licence Fee prosecutions hitting the vulnerable hardest

A controversial fast-track prosecution for those not paying their BBC TV Licence was supposed to speed up justice. But more evidence is emerging that vulnerable people are being failed by the system.

“This is tick-box justice and we should totally reform the system.”

Penelope Gibbs, a former magistrate and director of campaign group Transform Justice, was referring to the Single Justice Procedure, or SJP, and how it is being used to target people who haven’t paid for their TV Licence. 

The process, which was introduced in 2015, enables magistrates to sentence defendants without legal representation, behind closed doors and based on written evidence alone. 

The SJP was intended to allow for a more efficient use of court time, quickly dealing with low level offences to free up the courts to focus on more serious crimes. 

But multiple cases have emerged where vulnerable individuals have been prosecuted for not paying their TV licence, revealing huge flaws in the fast-track system and sparking calls for reform.

A 55 year-old woman, who was in debt, relying on food banks and suffering from mental health issues, was prosecuted under the SJP for not paying her TV licence. 

An elderly woman pleaded guilty in her written response to the charge, but also insisted that she never even had her television on and was “very unwell” when she received the notice. 

A 57-year-old woman with Down’s Syndrome was taken to court and convicted via the SJP for not paying the TV Licence, despite the fact her finances were managed by Greenwich Council. Due to the public outrage following the revelations, her criminal conviction was later quashed. 

This method of justice, which has been thoroughly reported by the Evening Standard, has become increasingly widespread since being introduced. 

While it has also been used by other bodies such as the DVLA, the BBC, via TV Licensing, is a huge user of the SJP process for unpaid licence fees. Licence fee evasion is a criminal offence that carries a maximum fine of £1000.

In 2016, just under 40 per cent of all TV Licence cases, about 67,400, were dealt with under the SJP, but this increased to 98 per cent, or 121,020, in 2019, according to the latest available figures from the Ministry of Justice. While the overall number of prosecutions for non-payment dropped in 2020 and 2021, largely because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the rate of SJP cases remained high. 

Vulnerable people being handed criminal convictions and fines for skipping out on the TV licence is not the only issue, however. It has also been revealed that women are overwhelmingly hit with convictions in such cases. A recent BBC report found that 75 per cent of prosecutions for non-payment of TV licence fees are against women.

The BBC, TV Licensing and the Ministry of Justice did not disclose the value of fines that have been extracted by way of SJPs since they were introduced. The BBC does not directly receive any of the fines issued by the courts. 

David Wood, a barrister at 25 Bedford Row, pointed out that in many cases magistrates weren’t properly looking at the mitigating evidence and failing to take account of the public interest in these cases. 

“The big issue with [SJP cases involving] TV Licensing is that quite frequently, people are pleading guilty and sending in reasons why it happened, so they don’t go to court,” he told City A.M. “What they put forward may demonstrate that if it was reviewed for public interest reasons, then maybe they wouldn’t have been prosecuted at all.”

BBC under scrutiny

Shocking SJP cases like these ones have not gone unnoticed by politicians. 

Culture secretary Lucy Frazer said in December that prosecuting people for failing to pay their TV licence was “morally indefensible”, adding that the process will be looked at as part of review into the licence fee model. 

While it is unclear when this review will be concluded, Lord Christopher Bellamy, the parliamentary under secretary of state for justice, said last month: “At present, the government has no plans to amend the SJP process.”

Sir Bob Neill, chairman of the House of Commons justice select committee, told City A.M. that while he wasn’t against the process in theory “in practice, it’s not working satisfactorily”. 

“There is an issue in principle about open justice. And so we’ve always argued, it would be better if you’re going to do that, that the list of the cases to be heard must be publicly available,” he said. 

Asked about issues including mitigation not being seen by judges, he said: “That’s where I think we need a bit more transparency about the thing.

“If the mitigation was sent in then it ought to be in the papers which are in front of the single magistrate. If it’s not being looked at, that’s not a problem with the principle but with the way it’s operating.

“There is a concern that sometimes people may write in and plead guilty. And then what their mitigation says is that in effect, they didn’t do the thing.”

Neill added that he was personally in favour of decriminalising non-payment of the BBC licence fee, arguing it should instead be treated as a civil debt. 

He said: “I think it should be taken out of the criminal system entirely.

“[It] shouldn’t be cluttering up the criminal courts, which we’re using for the people who are committing real dishonesty or offences of violence or matters, which I think the public will regard as much higher priorities.”

Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesperson Alistair Carmichael called for the House of Commons justice select committee to “look into this, to make sure the system is working as it should be”.

“When it comes to any convictions for non-payment of the licence fee, it’s vital that the justice system is fair, reasonable and efficient in all cases,” he told City A.M.

“When it comes to any convictions for non-payment of the licence fee, it’s vital that the justice system is fair, reasonable and efficient in all cases.”

Alistair Carmichael, Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesperson

Campaign groups, meanwhile, are trying to pressure both the government and the BBC to ditch the procedure. 

Dennis Reed, director of the over-60s campaign group Silver Voices, told City A.M. that the system is “so unaccountable and not transparent”.

“It’s very unclear how the BBC and indeed other people like the DVLA and all the rest of them that use this procedure, actually determine what is in the public interest,” he said. 

Gibbs, from Transform Justice, told City A.M. that “the single justice procedure is a fundamentally unfair system”. 

“The single justice procedure is a fundamentally unfair system.”

Penelope Gibbs, a former magistrate and director of campaign group Transform Justice

“The prosecutor doesn’t find out whether the person they are accusing is vulnerable. So people are being prosecuted for not having their TV licence when it is not in the public interest,” she added.

Change unlikely

City A.M. asked the BBC for its position on the Single Justice Procedure in light of reports of multiple prosecutions of vulnerable individuals. 

A spokesperson for TV Licensing – a trademark used by companies contracted by the BBC to administer fee collection – said that its “primary aim is to help people stay licensed and we work hard to let people know the concessions available and the range of payment plans to help spread the cost”. 

“Prosecution is always a last resort,” the spokesperson said. 

“When it does occur we would encourage people to fully engage with the process and provide all relevant information, particularly if they have evidence showing that there are significant reasons why they could not obtain a licence – such as mental health issues or severe financial hardship,” they added “We have the ability to withdraw a prosecution at any point if relevant evidence is provided that shows it is not in the public interest to proceed.”

“If people don’t give us this information and choose to share it with the courts in mitigation it will be considered as part of sentencing or the case can be adjourned for further investigation,” they said.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “Only uncontested and non-imprisonable offences are dealt with under the Single Justice Procedure – magistrates are always assisted by a legally qualified adviser, defendants can choose to go to court if they want to, and the details of their case are published to provide transparency.”