France to scrap television licence fee to tackle cost of living crisis

France’s National Assembly has voted to abolish the TV licence fee in favour of financing public broadcasting through VAT.

The €138 annual TV licence bill is paid by every household in France with a television set. It raises €3.7 billion a year, which is invested in public broadcasting.

Of this, 65% is allocated to France Télévisions, 15.9% to Radio France, 7.5% to Arte, 7% to France Médias Monde, 2.4% to audiovisual archive agency INA and 2.1% to TV5 Monde. The remainder of their budgets are made up through advertising and other state subsidies.

The National Assembly voted to scrap the licence fee as part of its plans to tackle the cost of living crisis and to boost the purchasing power of consumers.

President Emmanuel Macron pledged to end the licence fee during his recent reelection campaign.

“We are working hard to abolish taxes that weigh on people,” said Minister of Public Accounts Gabriel Attal.

French news organisation RFI said that the government would instead allocate “a fraction” of VAT - about 3.7 billion euros – to fund public broadcasters.

The move raises has raised concerns about the independence and future financing of French public broadcasters.

Staff at France Télévisions and Radio France went on strike on June 28 in protest at the changes, saying that getting rid of the fee amounted to a “threat” to the independence of the channels.

International producers and broadcasters will be closely eyeing the changes in France. France Télévisions and Arte are significant European co-producers. France Télévisions, for example, co-produced hit drama Around the World in 80 Days with Germany’s ZDF and Italy’s RAI.