It’s Easter time, when the BBC gear up to cover the annual ritual that means so much to so many of the faithful – the annual conference of the National Union of Teachers.
This year, those teachers who want a national strike against Government education policy are being described on Radio Four as ‘committed activists’. Way back in December 2001, when I searched the BBC News website for occurrences of the phrase ‘far-left’ and ‘far-right’, the NUT, with its ‘various far-left groups’ was one of only five mentions of a British far-left.
The other four were in a Scritti Politti review, a story about Peter Hitchens having been a youthful far-leftist (how come we never hear that about Andrew Marr – or indeed any of the vast number of other BBC journalists to which it would apply ?), a story that the Animal Liberation Front had both far-left and far-right members, and a Peter Tatchell profile.
There were 32 stories about the British ‘far-right’ – of which no less than 11 involved the Tory party.
The overall figures were – ‘far-left’ 46 stories, ‘far-right’ 338. I repeated the search in August 2002 – 66 far-left, 502 far-right.
And one minute ago – Fascinatingly 97 far-left, 420 far-right. Is this an indication that the BBC is now reporting at a 1/4 ratio rather than 1/8, or does the BBC’s search engine needs its indexing looking at ? Fortunately I kept all the 502 search results, but further analysis will have to wait till I have more time.
Not needed – try the ‘advanced search’ option and drop down the date listboxes, while leaving the range at 1997-2006. You still get 97 far-left stories, while the far-right feature in a staggering 1,550. Looks like the ratio is 1/15. Anyone using BBC search is advised to use the advanced option.
If, like most human attributes, political views were subject to a normal distribution about a mean, you might expect far-left and far-right views to have a pretty equal distribution. Unless, of course, there’s bias in the measurement. The kind of bias, say, that doesn’t consider the Socialist Workers Party, who support the Iraqi ‘resistance’ while simultaneously controlling the ‘anti-war’ movement, to be far-left. After all, half their college friends were in it.
Peter Hitchens ?
What about “Red Dawn” Primarolo as Paymaster-General; Harriet “Daddy works on Harley Street” Harman; Patricia “Daddy is a KCB in Canberra” Hewitt; Charles “NUS President & Son of Treasury Perm Sec” Clarke; Kim “I’m A Commie” Howells; Peter “I’m A Commie and Friend of John Birt” Mandelson; David “My Daddy was a CPGB Official” Aaranovitch; David & Ed “Daddy was a Commie friend of Gordon Brown’s wife’s Business Partner, Hobsbaum” Miliband;
Must we go on ?
Life’s Journey has brought so many of Labour’s barefoot soldiers from affluent middle class upbringing to expense account living and fat bank balances after a short detour to play at being plebs and eating porridge with a silver spoon………………………….”Didn’t like it, moved on.”
New Labour is the Party of Reformed Communists – keeps the doctrine of Absolute Power but adores the Private Wealth
Most recommended comment on (D)HYS about the recent Tel Aviv bombing:-
“You can bet that whatever Israel does, apart from rolling over like a dead dog, it will be criticised. As ever, the BBC will be at the forefront of such criticism. Surely the time has come for us to focus less on what Israel is doing, and more on exactly what a Hamas-led Government is doing, apart from approving of the murder of Jews.”
Could have been written by a Biased BBC commenter!
Third most recommended:-
“Another glib excuse to selectively publish anti-Israeli comments by Auntie beeb, how suprising. Jews were being butchered by Arabs since well before the state of Israel was even created. Guess what, armchair warriors? Israel will not roll over and die, no matter how many times you vote for it on an internet forum.”
Where does all our BBC Licence fee go?
The BBC is embarrassed as the pay of D.J’s is leaked.
Terry Wogan is paid £800,000 a year.
(Note: I say paid not earned)
Jonathan Woss is on £530,000 a year, the equivalent of £57 an hour for a 3 hour show each week.
Chris Myles £630,000
Chris Evans £540,000
Steve Wright £440,000
Jo Whiley £250,000 (poor Jo)
These record spinners account for over £3 million of licence fee money, so about 25,000 licence payers are supporting six BBC employees, an average of over 4,000 licence payers per disc jockey.
Laban is using yet another opportunity to expound his far-right views.
A licence to spend at the ‘hard-up’ BBC
By Anil Dawar
(Filed: 27/03/2006)
It is one of London’s most glamorous restaurants and fronted by one of the country’s top chefs where a bottle of champagne can cost up to £125.
If you are short of cash, the Criterion in Piccadilly is not the kind of place you would want to hold a party for 100 people.
But Marco-Pierre White’s restaurant was the unlikely scene for a £23,000 Christmas party held by the BBC for some of its highest-paid radio stars.
..BBC found £238 a head to wine and dine Radio 2 DJs including Terry Wogan, Clive Anderson and Jeremy Vine, which has angered BBC staff and listeners alike.
News of the party leaked out when the Radio 2 disc jockey Sarah Kennedy boasted on air about the evening, which did not cost her a penny.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/27/nbbc27.xml
Today at 8.35am – Stourton introducing an article on Buster Crabb, the diver who disappeared in Portsmouth harbour many years ago:-
“Some say he was murdered by the British, others that he was killed by the Russians”.
Got that? The Reds merely killed him (self defence perhaps?), but we must have murdered him. Clearly the far-right strikes again.
How To Run A Radio Show In The UK
Running a radio show is like driving a car. It looks very complicated, but when it boils down to the basics, it’s just pushing buttons and turning wheels.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A2218501
Rules of the Air
There are several rules and laws that must be observed while broadcasting. These rules are decided and maintained by the British Broadcasting Authority. Essentially the rules boil down to these:
News must be accurate and from a reliable source
No religion may be given more weight than another
Each political party must be given equal airtime
Advertising is strictly controlled2
Guests must be treated with respect
The paranormal must be treated sceptically
Try not to swear
ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION? STOP LAUGHING!
Jonathan Woss is on £530,000 a year, the equivalent of £57 an hour for a 3 hour show each week.
Correction; £57 a minute, or half a licence fee a minute, after two minutes of his waffle your compulsorily deducted fee for public broadcasting has gone into pocket.
Did I hear it right? Was the “Thought for Today” on Today this morning the most vomit-inducing piece of moral equivalence I have heard in recent days?
The speaker was Rev Angela Tilby of Westcott House. “Westcott House is a Church of England theological college based in the university city of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. Our primary task is to train women and men for ordained ministry in the Anglican Church.”
I think that it trains “women and men” says it all really. Also I was quite worried by the photo at top left of the montage here:
http://www.westcott.cam.ac.uk/
So, take a woolly female Anglican minister, mix liberally with the ivory towers of university life, and then let her loose on the matter of suicide bombing. Cook at a high temperature for 2 minutes and serve for breakfast at around 7.50 on the nation’s premier vehicle for “intelligent speech”.
We could have done with some Jeff Randall insight on Today this morning re the Peugeot closure and (likely) move Eastwards.
Today had a Corporate Affairs man from Peugeot on at 7:09am, but then later we were given the man from Amicus, a Head of Commerce from one of our state funded higher education institutions, and the Sec of State “we did try to throw millions at Peugeot to stay, but they wouldn’t listen”.
I bet there are a lot of small businesses who need some of that subsidy/funding to stay in business, expand and create jobs. Can they get some too, or taxpayers subsidy just for your friends in the unions?
Where is the BBC Business Editor? or the BBC Economics Editor? Obviously to the ‘Today’ producers this is neither a ‘Business’ story, nor an ‘Economics’ one. Its a ‘Union vs overnment’ story. Analogue BBC in a digital age? (sorry!)
The guy from Amicus was saying this couldn’t happen in France. I choked on my cornflakes when Naughtie surprised the guy from Amicus by actually challenging him, reminding him of the sclerotic nature of the French economy and their dire unemployment rates. The guy from Amicus was speechless for a couple of seconds then said “well, I don’t know much about that”. Evidently. Bet he was surprised after years of mollycodling and easy rides from BBC interviewers. The UK unions must look over at France with jealousy though. Even those not in work in France (students) have stronger unions with more power to change Government policy than UK unions could ever hope to have.
Anyway, who/where is the the BBC’s new Business Editor? I though they had taken someone else on. Is he going through his BBC whitewash.. er I mean ‘induction’?
ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION? STOP LAUGHING!
Sarge uncensored | 19.04.06 – 8:42 am | #
Thanks Sarge, I’m still laughing!
BBC liberal use of the word ‘extinct’.
More scare stories this morning on Today, ‘catch em while you can’ sounds of birds & assorted wildlife on tape, courtesy of the environmental campaigning group, the BBC… The BBC said in the intro that many of the animals were now ‘extinct’. Well, not exactly, extinct in Britain perhaps but not elsewhere. Later we are told some birds have been ‘re-introduced’ to Britain so now, err not extinct.
I was left wondering “How can something that has been ‘extinct’, then be re-introduced?” Either it was extinct or it wasn’t. The do-do hasn’t been ‘re-introduced’ yet has it?
I thought the definition of extinct was that the species does not exist anywhere? The BBC definition seems to be by geographical areas ie “BBC Learn: Wildebeast are extinct……. (from Britain).
Wish the BBC would become extinct.
07:40am but not working just now
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/index.shtml
Fear, loathing and envy at the BBC as mole spills salary secrets of radio stars
http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,,1756437,00.html
(registration req’d but free)
· Leak thought to be work of disgruntled insider
· Corporation fears Radio 4 details could be next
Given the focus on radio personalities (so far), the BBC is fearful that Radio 4 will be next, although whether the pay packets of John Humphrys, Melvyn Bragg and Eddie Mair will prove as lucrative to potential informants remains to be seen. Graham Norton, Davina McCall, Gary Lineker and Jeremy Paxman are a few of the television personalities who could embarrass the corporation if the size of their pay packets is revealed.
Forcing the BBC to reveal the size of its biggest star’s salaries would also provide another stick for commercial rivals to beat it with. They have long claimed that the BBC is able to pay more for top talent because of its guaranteed licence fee funding.
Yesterday the Commercial Radio Companies Association said the hullabaloo over the latest revelations “raises the issue of the need for greater accountability at the BBC on how it spends its money”.
Its external affairs adviser, David McConnell, added: “The BBC is able to offer packages which make it difficult for commercial radio to compete, if these figures are right. If you take any day and run down the list of BBC broadcasters in radio, you find most started at commercial radio.”
I bet the Champagne Socialists that run/present Today cost a pretty penny. I’m sure theyd be suitably embarrassed if their salary details ever leaked out….
Telegraph today pick up the BBC salaries story.
Wogan is number one in BBC radio rich list
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/04/19/nradio19.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/04/19/ixnewstop.html
Re-BBC salaries,
The moment I read the Telegraph article, BBC Radio rich list: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=I32ENXOFRZ0BLQFIQMGCFFOAVCBQUIV0?xml=/news/2006/04/19/nradio19.xml
for some reasons, I immediately got the picture of Animal Farm’s fat pigs (at the end of the movie) in mind. The most classic example of cognitive dissonance. There are no words to describe this phenomenon of pesudo intelectual hypocrites preaching socialism while hoarding OUR money
Roger Bolton on Broadcasting
http://news.independent.co.uk/media/article358126.ece#Scene_1
Roger Bolton takes a swipe a BBC bias in reporting religion.
“Let’s set aside the fact that its (Hamas) success in the Palestinian elections took many by surprise. More relevant is the fact that the organisation was treated (by the media) as if it were a Middle Eastern version of Sinn Fein. OK, some commentators remarked that it has an armed wing, but suggested that once in power it may well compromise with Israel. It took a long time for news programmes to wake up to the fact that Hamas is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, that it is committed to the elimination of the state of Israel and a restoration of the Caliphate. Its religious beliefs do not allow it to compromise on the recognition of Israel, only on the timetable for its removal.
I don’t think the BBC gets that Roger.
“Just read the book, or at least the website, where you can also find an approving reference in the organisation’s founding document to that notorious anti-Semitic fabrication, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
And in assessing the danger, or otherwise, of Iran’s developing nuclear weapons programme it would surely be helpful to know about its president’s apocalyptic religious beliefs.
So here are some practical suggestions for the BBC in particular, whose governors have been concerned about the coverage of religion, and, ironically, whose top two executives are Roman Catholics (the two Marks, Thompson and Byford).
First, appoint a BBC news religion editor, on a par with the business and economics editors, someone who will routinely appear on the main bulletins to provide context. Second, ensure that the Today programme’s brief is expanded so that its religious coverage and awareness are not confined to priestly paedophilia. TV news may then follow suit. Third, make religion a key element of the curriculum in the corporation’s College of Journalism.
the article continues….worth a read.
Oh dear
BBC climate change experiment cocked
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=31073
The scientists at the Oxford Institute for Extreme Cleverness confessed to a “major error in one of the files used by the climate model,” here.
Project Coordinator Nick Faull, said the file had underestimated levels of man-made sulphate emissions and models had tended to warm up too quickly. The file error was “also responsible for causing models to crash in 2013 which is how we originally came across the problem,” he said.
So, BBC model of climate change has the earth warming up at a much faster rate than actual reality. Now, there’s a surprise.
Lucky someone noticed before a fresh media studies grad Beeboid, headlines the story “BBC Learns, we’ll all be dead by 2013 (due to global warming, we told you so).
Project news
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/hottopics/climatechange/updates1.shtml
If you are checking the date of your model regularly, you may notice it return to the year 1920 within the next few days. Many of you have also noticed that your models have been warming up faster than the real world did over the 20th century.
The reason for this is that the scientists at Oxford have discovered that one of the input files to the model hasn’t been increasing the amount of sulphate pollution in the atmosphere (sometimes called the “global dimming” effect) as it should have done. So what you are seeing is the full impact of greenhouse warming not masked as it was in the real world by sulphate pollution.
The experiment you have done is still a useful contribution to scientific research, as well as a graphic illustration of how much warmer the world might already be were it not for the global dimming effect.
“climate change, climate change, CLIMATE CHAAAAANNGE zzzzzzz”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/hottopics/climatechange/
Crikey, how much does it cost to keep all that going?
Re: searching the BBC.
Their search facility is a nightmare; it’s not at all comprehensive and seems to offer a selection only.
I’d like to know how it works on the inside, whether for example they can place articles in an unreachable place, and whether there is some selection process that takes place in building their archive.
Ed – try Google
Google has indexed over 90 million BBC internet pages.
Results 1 – 10 of about 92,200,000 from http://www.bbc.co.uk
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site%3Awww.bbc.co.uk
53 million of those are the BBC News pages:
Results 1 – 10 of about 53,400,000 from news.bbc.co.uk
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=site%3Anews.bbc.co.uk%2F
Quick experiment on say “Hamas”. A BBC News search comes up with 840 pages:
Your 835 search results for “Hamas”
http://newssearch.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/search/results.pl?scope=newsukfs&tab=news&edition=d&q=Hamas&go.x=30&go.y=16
Same on Google shows 461,000 pages.
Results 1 – 10 of about 461,000 from news.bbc.co.uk for Hamas
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=site%3Anews.bbc.co.uk%2F+Hamas&btnG=Search
So, if you want to find something on the BBC website, you’ve more chance with Google than you have with the piss-poor BBC search engine. On Google use
site:www.bbc.co.uk/news your search word(s) here
.
Sarge, re the wages, I suspect that they earn that money from a lot more than just the radio show. Now I have to disclose that I’m a full-time wogan fanatic and verging on togdom (unfortunately for me) so naturally I’m minded to support him but, that aside, it strikes me that a good deal of radio 2’s output is very unusual in terms of the BBC’s usual bias. There’s vine, who sticks to the BBC’s line like glue, and the news department is hoplessly biased, but many of the DJs themselves seem more or less sane most of the time. I’ve even heard wogan complementing george bush at least once.
Ehh, personal bias I guess. I’m torn now… 🙂 were it a commercial station I might feel less defensive of my currently quite precarious position.
But, all that aside, like I said, these wages are probably for a lot more than just the radio work they do. Pity we’re forced to pay for it really…
Does the USSR still exists for the BBC, with “Russians” as its inhabitants?
R5 “Upallnight” piece on Chernobyl.
Russians consider Greenpeace estimate of (please note, future) deaths more accurate than UN/WHO.
UN condidered inclined to conspire to a cover up, as IAEA part of their umbrella!
Russia & Russians were used repeatedly throughout the piece.
Not once was it mentioned that Chernobyl is in Ukraine & that it would be Ukrainians who would have more interest in this matter than the Russians.
Well since they cut geography lessons at school this is the result – and the BBC only ever employ the brightest and best so they say…..especially if they are lefties or related!
Unions condemn car plant closure
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/coventry_warwickshire/4920740.stm
Tomorrow: “Dog bites man”
Test of news boundaries
http://news.bbc.co.uk/newswatch/ukfs/hi/newsid_4910000/newsid_4919400/4919400.stm
“London lawyer Steven Sugar will see the BBC in court on June 14 over its refusal to release an internal report by the Middle East adviser to BBC News, Malcolm Balen, into its coverage of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.”
Should be interesting….. I assume the report wasn’t ‘glowing’ or the beeb would have published.
Ritter
You got hold of a pearl here. This is really a test of impartiality on a high level on a vital issue.
And we learn from it that the report on coverage of the Israeli/Palestinian issue commissioned by the Governors is published in May. I was wondering about that.
Thanks!
Graham Norton, Davina McCall, Gary Lineker and Jeremy Paxman are a few of the television personalities who could embarrass the corporation if the size of their pay packets is revealed.
From The Sun
THE Sun can today answer the question about how much Jeremy Paxman earns for hosting University Challenge. It’s £240,000.
Stern Paxo — known for barking “Come on!” at students on the BBC2 quiz — banks £7,741 for each of the 31 shows per series.
And that is on top of the £800,000 he is thought to pocket for presenting Newsnight on the same channel.
The University Challenge loot takes 55-year-old Paxman’s annual BBC earnings to more than £1million.
I’ll stick up for the Radio 2 AM mob as well. Sarah Kennedy is an astonishing voice of English sanity at just the right time of day.
Wogan is funny – very funny.
Bruce is good. It all goes down hill with Vine’s pomposity, and Mockney Wright’s ego…
I think if you delve deeper into Terry Wogan and his employment with the BBC, you wiil find that he is actually a freelance DJ who is under contract.I believe that he is one of the better DJ’s on the radio. I can’t understand the reasoning behind employing Chris Evans for the drive time show at 1700. That is of course unless Johnny Walker is ill again. The ginger headed berk will turn people off, thus turning their radios off, which will disgruntle BBC executives and may get them the elbow.
A BBC self promotion slot features night vision shots of a cameraman in combat gear.
The captions tell us
“A few metres in front is the Iraqi army. A few metres behind is the British army.”
So the BBC cameraman is
a) Very brave to be ahead of the vanguard of the British army. Or
b) Very neutral in the conflict. Or
c) In great danger of being shot at by both sides.
“Jonathan Woss is on £530,000 a year, the equivalent of £57 an hour for a 3 hour show each week.”
you might have got your sums wrong.
530k / 52 weeks / 3 hours = £3397 per hour.
peugeot layoffs – coventry MP on classic fm this morning mentioned the grants being given by the Slovaks.
i’ve yet to hear this mentioned on the BBC.
While on a recent tour of Europe I picked up this little gem on BBC news in Brussels.
” Further evidence of Britain useing TO MUCH of the worlds resorces.”
To have further evidence I assume there must have been evidence before. As the above statement is economic nonsense, this evidence can not exsist.
After my visit to France Belgium Germany Austria and Switzerland I can report that there IS further evidence of this countries rapid decline into authoritarian socialist tirany.
I noted NO SPEED CAMARAS. NO VISABLE PARKING ATTENDANTS. NO SMOKING BANS.
The place that we Brits used to laugh at as having to many rules, now has far less than we do.
We can now safely become a full member of the European nightmare as Europe is now less Nazi than Britain. But Nazi, Europe most definately is. Even a take over from Muslim fundermentalist socialism, no longer seems such a bad thing as it used to.
But then THATS THE WHOLE POINT of all this concentrated socialist propergander. Apart from lineing the pockets of the entire establishment, that is. From Terry Wogan to the BMA.
What a terrible shame, on them and us.
I visited Normandy, Leper, Verdun, Bastogne, Waterloo, Nurenburg, and Dunkergue. I not only do not see the point now of these young peoples sacrifice. I feel deeply ashamed that they bothered at all.
This countries Labour socialist goverment and the BBC is not only a sad disgrace to their memmory, but is also a danger to all the freeish people of the world.
We the abused ripped off people of Britain are not only paying for this lieing propergander, we are directly responsible for its everlasting damage to Liberty.
Back to the BBC salaries.
Yesterday the lead discussion on (D) HYS was the high amounts of money certain GPs are said to be earning. Now these figures about BBC presenters pay are published…
3397 GBP per hour works out at about 57 GBP per MINUTE…nice work if you can get it.
The amount of money (provided by the licence payers) these presenters receive make the alleged 1/4 million GPs seem like paupers in comparison.
Re: Searching the BBC Site
The BBC’s search “engine” is akin to a smokey old two-stroke. Don’t bother with it anyone. You’ll just get misleading results with lots of omissions.
To search the BBC’s site properly go to Google and click the Advanced Search option and then do a URL specific search using the BBC’s web address. e.g. news.bbc.co.uk or bbc.co.uk
archonix
If you think that, try this. Ask Terry Wogans agent how much Terry costs to speak at your charity or birthday party, per min.
Have you also noticed the average age of BBC presenters is getting older every day. This gravy trains gravy is most tasty, when the real world, thinks you are “past it.”
The BBC has not only become this countries “death nell,” but also a geriatric “has been” dumping ground.
Go on, have your say…..
Are BBC stars overpaid?
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?sortBy=2&threadID=1549&edition=1&ttl=20060419151551&#paginator
Some great comments – from ‘Recommended’ posts….
Added: Wednesday, 19 April, 2006, 11:35 GMT 12:35 UK
T.V “tax” should be scrapped. 800K? I’m paying for that pap whether I chose to listen to it or not. Disgusting.
[Missy_G]
Recommended by 23 people
I wanna know what they pay that cnut Naughtie.
An interesting contribution from Laban.
The BBC has consistently treated the BNP as bug-eyed monsters; the political equivalent of the drug-dealer at the school gates. The prospect of the BNP doing well in elections is, literally, described as a “threat”. The other political parties warn us of the evils of the BNP, as does a host of pressure groups. Imran Khan (the barrister, not the cricketer) has issued calls for the BNP to be banned.
In general terms, the BNP is no different to the Respect coalition or Sinn Fein. It is superbly organised at grass-roots level and campaigns aggressively on local issues. It promises to address local people’s concerns, and doesn’t bang on about wind turbines.
But the BBC does not treat the BNP in the same way as Respect or Sinn Fein, both of whom are regarded with much fear and distrust by their opponents. The former includes a host of Islamists and other militant cranks among its number; the latter has had a huge private army at its disposal.
The BBC does not film secretly in mosques, nor does refuse to invite Sinn Fein representatives onto its programmes – indeed, when Sinn Fein was banned from the British airwaves, the BBC and its fellow broadcasters openly defied the government. Unlike Sinn Fein and Respect, the BNP – for the most part – is excluded from the mainstream.
So why the refusal to treat the BNP in the same way it treats other parties who, it could be argued, pose (or have posed) a greater risk to public safety?
Indeed, why don’t the BBC and the mainstream parties simply grow up and stop treating the BNP with such fear and loathing, and actually try to address what the BNP is saying? If they did, the BNP would lose some of its mystique, some of its ‘forbidden fruit’ image.
Ritter
Only 8% of France’s workforce is unionised, compared with 26% in the UK and 13% in the US.
http://www.episcopalhawaii.org/workshop/lambeth/introduction/bible_study.txt
I despair of you chaps – Rev Angela Tilby is a former BBC Producer. She seems to have a thing about New Age Spuirituality – must e the cannabis I suppose.
As for BBC salaries – anyone got to the £140.000 pa newsreader – I think of that pensioner on say £100/week paying £2/week to keep some newsreader on £11.000/week.
Then again Fiona Bruce is £320.000 pa I believe and Michael Buerk around £300.000. These public sector jobs are very lucrative so long as you are not a surgeon – I don’t think there are as many £300.000 or £800.000 a year surgeons in Britain as there are in Germany.
BTW Unionisation in France is pointless – there are at least two union movements, one Communist and one not; and most people work in small companies with a patron.
peugeot layoffs – coventry MP on classic fm this morning mentioned the grants being given by the Slovaks.
i’ve yet to hear this mentioned on the BBC.
archduke | Homepage | 19.04.06 – 2:32 pm |
Not so Archduke – it is the EU which is giving the aid.
The AEG workers in NUremberg are furious – they just lost their jobs as Electrolux moved to a new E70 million plant in Poland paid for by the EU.
Talk to truckers – they are facing competition from Lithuanians and Latvians who have been given EU grants to buy brand new Volvo rigs and are happily breaking the working hours directive and undercutting West European truckers
Ritter
Only 8% of France’s workforce is unionised, compared with 26% in the UK and 13% in the US.
john reith | 19.04.06 – 4:03 pm | #
Hi John. A better way of assessing union ‘power’ (for that is what we are doing here are we?), in addition to looking at membership stats, is to examine union ‘coverage’ rates — that is, “the share of employed wage and salary earners whose terms of employment are affected by collective agreements negotiated between unions and employers.”
Your membership figures, whilst accurate, are somehwat misleading when discussing union power as many non-unionised French workers are actually covered by collective bargaining agreements under which unions negotiate terms of employment for entire companies or even whole industries across France.
Heavy reading but the Monthly Labour Review recently published a comprehensive report that discusses some explanatory factors for the differences and trends in unionisation, and confronts union membership statistics with data on bargaining coverage, measuring the proportion of employed wage and salary earners directly covered or affected by union-negotiated collective agreements.
For example, looking at the countries you picked to compare, UK bargaining coverage is 35%, USA coverage is 13.5% France coverage is… wait for it…. 95%
95%!!!!
That’s 95% of workers in France (paid up union ‘members’ or not) who get their terms and conditions of employment negotiated and agreed by unionised collective bargaining. That puts things into a bit of persepective doesn’t it?
Source: Monthly Labour Review, January 2006
Union membership statistics in 24 countries
An analysis of “adjusted” union membership data in 24 countries yields past and present union density rates; the data provide explanatory factors for the differences and trends in unionization
Click to access art3full.pdf
.
re Peugeot: I don’t know what were all complaining about. It is EU policy to “transfer resources from affluent areas (of the EU) to poorer regions”
The ‘Regional Aid Policy’ is a “an instrument of financial solidarity and a powerful force for economic integration.”
I don’t have the time right now to wade through the reams of obtuse beuro-speak documents on these pages
EU regional Aid Policy
http://europa.eu.int/pol/reg/index_en.htm
…but it would not surprise me in the slightest to learn that Tony Blair, in surrendering more Billions to the EU in the last round of budget negotiations, has put us in the bizarre situation of paying Peugeot (via the EU) to relocate jobs from the UK to Eastern Europe. The irony isn’t lost on me. Surprising that the Unions haven’t picked up on it though. Too busy thinking of balloting for strike action I suppose..
Peugeot unions consider striking
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/coventry_warwickshire/4920740.stm
“One Peugeot employee of 17 years, who attended Wednesday’s meeting, said he did not think workers would support a strike.
He said union members laughed when leaders said they were proposing industrial action.”
.
One hopeful fallout of the radio rich list is the backbiting and sniping its likely to cause among the “jocks” as they realise that a vile oaf like Moyles is earning 10x the amount they do.
Why do these bolshie teachers refer to state schools as their schools? They are paid to work in them, they don’t own them.
Lurker – I think you’re probably right. Whisper it quietly, but the pay at the BBC (as a whole) ain’t great. Technicians, especially, have really grievances. This leak will have them spitting.
Indeed, at regional level, the salary levels of broadcast journalists are not clever. Not clever at all.
Pretty much O/T, but thought people might be interested:
http://www.rogerlsimon.com/mt-archives/2006/04/hollywood_goes.php
An anti-Castro, anti-Communist film has actually been made with top actors — wonder how the Beeb will review it?
pete,
I’d “privatise” schools by giving them to teachers to run as going concerns.
IF in return parents could have choice of schools, and taxpayers didn’t have to fund other peoples children.
The BBC have responded to my complaint about the appointment to Newsnight of Greg Palast, as his past work shows him to be highly opinionated. The BBC write
I understand that you are concerned that Greg Palast will not adhere to
the
BBC’s standards of impartiality.
However, I must stress that all our programme contributors are
appointed on
the basis of their experience and talent. We do not engage any reporter
unless we consider that he or she is the most competent and possesses
the
necessary ability to meet the considerable demands the particular
programme
or broadcast may make.
Journalists are expected to put their own political views to one side
when
carrying out their work for the BBC. They also seek to provide the
information which will enable viewers to make up their own minds; to
show
the political reality and provide the forum for debate, giving full
opportunity for all viewpoints to be heard.
So our Greg will turn over a new leaf.
Andrew Neil manages to put aside his strong opinions and is a model of even handedness when on the BBC. Why shouldn’t Palast manage it too?