The BBC has published the Television Licence Fee Trust statement for 2025-26. The Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) has issued a clean audit opinion, providing assurance to Parliament on the financial statements.

Summary

The BBC’s Royal Charter requires that its board ensures the BBC’s arrangements for collecting licence fees are “efficient, appropriate and proportionate”. The BBC has been responsible for licence fee collection, issuing TV licences and enforcing the system since 1991. Everyone in the UK needs a TV licence if they view, record or download ‘licensable content’, that is:

  • programmes as they are being shown live on any channel, paid for TV service or foreign channel (via satellite or online streaming);
  • live streams through an on-line TV service; and
  • all BBC content on BBC iPlayer and S4C.

The BBC publishes two reports annually about how it collects and uses licence fee income: the TV Licence Fee Trust Statement which sets out how licence fee income is collected; and the BBC Group Annual Report and Accounts which sets out how the BBC spends its income, including that derived from the licence fee. Both are audited by the C&AG.

Under Section 2 of the Exchequer and Audit Departments Act 1921, the C&AG is also required to assess the adequacy of the BBC’s arrangements for assessment, collection and proper allocation of the licence fee. This report is our commentary on the BBC’s collection of the licence fee in 2025-26. It sets out our findings and conclusions about the sums that the BBC has collected from licence fee payers in the past year and the BBC’s work in 2025-26 to ensure collection of licence fee income is efficient, appropriate and proportionate, including its estimate of licence fee evasion.

View the accounts and audit report

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