Thursday 1 November 2012

Making Crime Pay

In an earlier blogpost, TV Licensing Watch, posed what seemed then to be a rhetorical question about what the BBC had to gain from the vast scale of “enforcement” activities undertaken for and on its behalf by Capita Business Services and other contractors and sub-contractors under the Service Provision Agreement.

In the unholy alliances that are the BBC TV Licensing™ contract, set out in the Service Provision Agreement between the BBC and Capita Business Services there seems to be a very interesting anomaly. As part of the Service Provision Agreement there is a “Profit Share” arrangement between the BBC and BBC TV Licensing™ contractors. That seems to be tacit admission that as far as the BBC and Capita Business Services are concerned, “crime” can be made to generate additional profit. In short, “crime” can be made to pay. So seemingly, without so-called “tv licence evasion” the opportunities to generate additional profit for the BBC would not exist.
It seems to us at, TV Licensing Watch, the “Profit Share” arrangements in the Service Provision Agreement present a very interesting inconsistency. On the one hand, the BBC spend several hundred millions of pounds over the term of the Service Provision Agreement with Capita Business Services and other contractors under the TV Licensing™ contract further to eradicating “tv licence evasion” yet on the other hand without “tv licence evasion” an additional profitable revenue stream would not exist.
This seeming inconsistency arises on page 155 of the Service Provision Agreement between the BBC and Capita Business Services and again in Schedule 5. The relevant texts of which are presented here. As will be seen, the “Profit Share” threshold is set at 23%. Seemingly, it is not only in the vested financial interests of Capita Business Services and other contractors and sub-contractors to discover and report “tv licence evasion” but also in the BBC’s vested financial interests.
In most other fields of “enforcement” the direct rewarding of the detection, reporting and prosecution of crime on what can seemingly only be described as a “piece rate” basis is not permitted. This is because of rules relating to conflict of interest. Lest the enforcers concerned are incentivised to lodge frivolous and vexatious reports and bring about equally frivolous and vexatious prosecutions.

The value of domestic cctv surveillance and handheld video camera can prove invaluable in gathering evidence of the serial abuses and misdemeanours perpetrated by employees of Capita Business Services under cover of the BBC TV Licensing™ contract. TV Licensing Watch advise anybody who has the misfortune to have face to face dealings with Capita Business Services TV Licensing™ to make an audio-visual record of those dealings in their entirety covertly or overtly with cctv and handheld video cameras.

For people who have not exercised their right to remain silent, TV Licensing Watch advise anybody who has had the misfortune to have face to face dealings with Capita Business Services TV Licensing™ and have received a summons as a consequence to contact a licensed law practitioner if: there is the slightest discrepancy between the actual situation regarding viewing habits and/or what actually happened during the interview compared with what has been written on the TVL178 Record of Interview self incrimination form.



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