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Television: Licensing

Answer

The number of persons proceeded against at magistrates courts and found guilty at all courts for TV licence evasion in England and Wales 1997 to 2008 (latest available) can be viewed in the table.Court data for 2009 are planned for publication in the autumn, 2010.

Number of persons proceeded against at magistrates courts and found guilty at all courts for television licence evasion¹, ², England and Wales, 1997 to 2008³, 4
	1997	1998	1999	20005	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	20086
Proceeded against	92,728	96,616	68,778	120,626	96,471	110,160	93,897	106,435	122,923	130,019	135,508	134,518
Found guilty	76,984	76,605	55,813	105,318	83,739	96,589	79,856	89,240	104,930	115,470	120,874	120,785
¹ For 1997 to 2007 as well as television licence evasion, these data include proceedings for summary offences under the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1949 to 1967.
² For 2007 and 2008 these figures relate to the offence Television Licence evasion - Communications Act 2003.
³ The figures given in the table relate to persons for whom these offences were the principal offences for which they were dealt with. When a defendant has been found guilty of two or more offences it is the offence for which the heaviest penalty is imposed. Where the same disposal is imposed for two or more offences, the offence selected is the offence for which the statutory maximum penalty is the most severe.
4 Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that these data have been extracted from large administrative data systems generated by the courts and police forces. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when those data are used.
5 Staffordshire police force were only able to submit sample data for persons proceeded against and convicted in the magistrates' courts for the year 2000. Although sufficient to estimate higher orders of data, these data are not robust enough at a detailed level and have been excluded from the table.
6 Excludes data for Cardiff magistrates' court for April, July, and August 2008.
Note:
Wireless Telegraphy Act offences (mainly television licence evasion) prosecutions increased by 75 per cent from 1999 to 2000. These figures fluctuate from year to year depending on the level and manner of enforcement by the licensing authorities. The increase in prosecutions in 2000 was largely due to changes in visiting practices so that enforcement visits to households took place at times when TV was more likely to be watched.
Source:
Justice Statistics Analytical Services in the Ministry of Justice

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

508 c1102W; 324382

Session

2009-10

Subjects

Television licences

Contains statistics

Yes

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk