Gary Lineker says if it was up to him the BBC licence fee would be optional

MATCH of the Day presenter Gary Lineker has today said he would make the BBC licence fee enforced by his employer optional.

The presenter tweeted: “If it was down to me, the licence fee to get BBC would be optional. But it’s not.”

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Lineker- paid around £2 million a year - was responding to tweet about paywalls earlier this afternoon when he made the claim.

TV viewers are required by law to pay the £145.50 fee for the BBC or face prosecution.

The TaxPayers' Alliance chief executive John O'Connell told the he supported Lineker’s views on the fee.

He said: “The licence fee is clearly a relic of the past.

“With hard-pressed families struggling with ever-rising bills, the licence fee is yet another burden which should be drastically reformed to allow consumers the freedom to pay for only what they want to watch.”

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Tory MP Andrew Bridgen added: “Not for the first time I think Gary Lineker has put the ball in the back of the net. But I fear that his BBC masters may think that he has scored an own goal."

Last month reported Lineker as saying: “Perhaps it would be better if they put [the TV licence] up a bit and made it a choice.”

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The Beeb came under pressure to fire former footballer Lineker, 55, after he spread false claims about an Afghan at the centre of the child migrant storm.

Last month millionaire Lineker retweeted a charity’s lie that the oldest-looking asylum seeker pictured with new arrivals was a Home Office interpreter.

Lineker forwarded the message to his 5.3million followers with the words: “Wow! Surely not?” — sparking social media indignation.

But the Home Office confirmed the unidentified mig­rant was not their employee and instead among the group entering the UK claiming to be children.

Lineker was accused of breaching Beeb guidelines on impartiality.

BBC editorial guidelines warn that presenters’ “external activities” must not affect the public’s “perception” of its impartiality — or bring the broadcaster into “disrepute”.

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