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Gary Lineker’s voluntary licence fee idea for the BBC is an own goal

<span>Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian</span>
Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

Gary Lineker’s proposal to make the TV licence fee voluntary is well argued – as a means of totally obliterating the funding of the BBC, and probably wiping out his own extremely comfortable salary in the process (Lineker: make BBC licence fee voluntary, 28 January).

He is accurate in describing the charge of £154.50 per annum as a tax, though few taxes can be as fair and reasonable as this. But the concept of the nation volunteering to pay a tax stretches credulity to the limit. This would truly be a first! I would put money on most of the population – however well-meaning – adopting a “well, someone else is bound to pay it” mentality, and quietly ignoring it.

Mr Lineker is entitled to his opinion, but I suggest it is a complete non-starter and should be dismissed as such. Giving it undue attention risks providing succour to those on the right who are looking for any excuse to hobble this astonishing national asset, which they see as a threat to their sinister agenda.
Ian Bartlett
East Molesey, Surrey

• Being paid £1.75m for part-time work at the BBC whilst earning shedloads more for advertising crisps and presenting a few programmes at BT Sport, Gary Lineker is probably not best placed to voice opinions about the “broadcaster’s fundamental problem”.

In fact, with the BBC preparing to announce cuts “to reduce costs by millions of pounds”, it is being given a wonderful opportunity to prove the worth of its justification for paying such huge salaries (BBC cuts; Newsnight and World at One among targets, 25 January). If some presenters are to be “asked to work across programmes and channels”, others will inevitably find themselves surplus to requirements, so it will be interesting to see if they are indeed snapped up by rival broadcasters.

The claim that such “talent” had to be paid salaries 10 times or more than the national average for fear of defections to the likes of commercial radio, Sky and ITV can now be put to the test. Indeed, free transfers would in many cases prove most welcome, creating job opportunities for young presenters with gender-equal starting salaries of a mere £100,000!
Bernie Evans
Liverpool

• I suppose the hidden benefit of Gary Lineker’s suggestion of making the BBC licence fee voluntary will be that viewers can opt out of contributing to his over-inflated salary.
Paul Jowitt
Edinburgh

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