In Japan the vast majority of people stopped paying their TV license after a string of NHK scandals and there's no penalty for failing to pay either.

It's just not enforced. Also the party platform wasn't to get rid of the license system but to encrypt the broadcast signal so that only willing NHK viewers would pay for the license.

The penalty for not paying the TV license is dealing with their harassment specialists (aka fee collectors)

There's a great, and somewhat terrifying character relating to this, the "NHK Fee Collector" in Haruki Murakami's 1Q84.

Some people actually voted them into office as a joke and they turned out to be a bunch of racists with some really awful views and were overall absolute shite politicians. Who could have imagined?