BBC director general says licence fee decision 'not easy'
BBC Director General Tony Hall has said scrapping free TV licences for all over-75s was "not an easy decision".
Under new rules, only low-income households where one person receives the pension credit benefit will still be eligible for a free licence.
In 2015, the government announced the BBC would take over the cost of providing free licences for over-75s by 2020 as part of the fee settlement.
But that would have cost £750m, a fifth of the BBC's budget, by 2021/22.
Lord Hall said the BBC had tried to "strike a difficult balance" between preserving its services and honouring the settlement.
