I read that the astonishing salaries and expenses claims of the BBC‘s most senior executives are revealed for the first time today.
They show the corporations’s 50 highest earning executives take home up to £13.8 million in taxpayers’ money between them. The salaries of the executive board members of the publicly-funded corporation range between £310,000 and £650,000 excluding bonuses.
Should Sir Fred Goodwin apply for a job? Nice to know where your license-tax goes, isn’t it? It’s that “special link” that the BBC are SO keen to keep!
Isn't it wrong that a beeboid was interviewing another beeboid about their pay and expenses?
Shouldn't the BBC have got someone independent to properly beat up on their own management? After all the BBC have been spouting that very same message at our politicians
Isn't that kind of normal for TV? Although, I guess we won't be hearing Robert Peston tut-tutting about high BBC salaries any time soon the way he has done about exec. comp.
I was absolutely flabbergasted by The World Tonight with Robin Lustig just now. The guest speaker was psychologist Oliver James who was asked why we are so keen to see people's expenses. In summary "It's not that the proles are concerned with misuse of our money. It's that we're all obsessed with money now thanks to thirty years of the market creeping into everything and it's all THATCHER'S FAULT".
Yes, really.
The Empty Suit,
Isn't that technically true, though? After all, without Thatcher, Britain would never have achieved the level of prosperity to provide such high salaries.
Oh, wait. These fools think high earners are the same as hereditary titles.
What is sickening is that these parasites continue to lord it, while the wealth producing sector of the economy, on which all rests, are having to take a cut in their salaries, or even forgo any wages, while still continuing to work.
Surely it is those who depend on the wealth producing sector – MPs and the BBC come to mind, should forgo their salaries, rather then those who produce the wealth.
It has been remarked, that in times of famine, flies wax strong and live a full life.
Good posts above, although I can hardly believe the Empty Suit's comment about it being Thatcher's fault. They live in their own little world.
It is very satisfying to watch them being shamed and exposed, some paying themselves more than the prime minister.
On Radio 4 they use the term 'Daily Mail Reader' as an insult. How satisfying it must be for the Daily Mail to expose them so thoroughly.
'Daily Mail' front page goes to town on BBC salaries and expenses:
"BBC bosses on more than Brown: Flowers for Ross, champers for Brucie and a fat expenses handout for top executives"
By Paul Revoir, Liz Thomas and Sam Greenhill
[Brief extract only here]:
"Expenses and salaries for BBC bosses are revealed.
Dozens earn more than the Prime Minister.
"Thompson family flew home for £2,200 after Sachsgate.
Ross given £100 flowers at time of £18m contract deal.
"Jana Bennett claimed £500 for stolen handbag.
"Executive's dinner at five-star Vegas hotel costs £1,430.
"Up to 47 of the BBC's top executives are paid more than the Prime Minister and have been reaping the benefit of inflation-busting expenses claims."
In the heat (and little light) generated by the Today Montague interview with Mark Thompson, the ignorance (wilful with Thompson – experiential with Montague) was manifest. There is no use talking about executive salaries at the BBC unless the starting point of such a discussion is the fact that the BBC is not a commercial organisation.
In the real commercial world (one without dependence on taxpayers) broadcasting enterprises have two broad problems which concern income and product. The BBC has only one of these problems – product. To compare Thompson's job with the head of Sky is invidious: Thompson's job is one-dimensional and his salary should reflect this.
The head of Sky is sacked if he cannot generate sufficient income to produce profit for Sky's shareholders (and therefore has to see that commercial product has to be created). That is why Thompson's job (as he admits) is so enviable: not that he heads an organisation with the admirable history of the BBC: it's that he has no worries about income. This issue will never be discussed on the BBC airwaves except in the shadow terms clearly illustrated this morning. BBC executives and journalists, ignorant and/or contemptuous of commerce as they are, remain savvy enough to know not to open this particular Pandora's box.
'Times':
"Unusual patterns of spending at BBC need to be explained."
[Extract]:
"Officials using public money rightly need to be careful about accepting entertainment from potential suppliers. Even so, the willingness of the BBC to pick up the tab looks odd."
'Daily Mail':
"Real world vs Planet BBC: In the private sector, 800 BA staff work for free. At State run BBC, up to 47 bosses earn more than PM."
[Extract]:
"The stark contrast between job fears in the private sector and feather-bedded life on public funds was dramatically laid bare yesterday.
"At recession-ravaged British Airways, thousands of worried staff offered to work for nothing or take pay cuts.
"But documents released by the BBC, under pressure, exposed a luxury culture of six-figure salaries and lavish expenses."
George R
The BBC treats its employees as the privileged coterie they are: there are no commercial strictures on entertainment and expenses because there is no commercial rigour imposed by a need to generate commercial income. Furthermore the BBC's income side is not only not commercially driven, it's almost completely politically driven. Hence keeping in the good books of the political class is its overriding priority. That this involves over-generous entertainment to members of that class is not only expected, it's part of the BBC ethos (and that of all other taxpayer-funded entities).
I notice that beeboid Caroline Thompson claimed for a £2 bus fare on her expenses.
No doubt she thought this little gesture would give her some street cred.
Many other London employers now refuse to reimburse the full £2 bus fare, expecting their staff to use an Oystercard, where the fare is only £1.
Rather telling that bbc executives are such strangers to the oystercard concept, innit?
Tom writes: "Rather telling that bbc executives are such strangers to the oystercard concept, innit?"
And even stranger that they are not under strict orders to use them, given the sinister system's creation by comrade Livingston and his enabling pals at 'totalitarianism R us' (aka Capita).
I wonder how many times I have heard the likes of Humphrey's berating the "Fat Cats" of industry….. what a marvelous "investigative" reporter/broadcaster/peoples Champion he is along with all the other overpaid idiots of the BBC "News" teams.
All these years sat right on an excellent story of "Fat Cat" largess at the expense of the downtrodden masses that he purports to support…. and he missed it… didn't he?
I am finding the close detail of the BBC expenses every bit as compelling as MPs' expenses.
Former HR chief, Stephen Kelly, I note took out a journalist for lunch and the BBC PAID. Why? Kelly is a personnel manager – what conceivable benefit to the licence payer could there possibly be in his wining and dining the editor of an HR magazine? I can see why a trade paper journo might want to pay for Kelly's lunch…. but the other way round?
Oh, but I forgot. Soon afterwards, his profile duly raised, Kelly was out the door on the way to Logica.
Logica shareholders might want to look at Kelly's previous habit for billing the licence payer for small sums justified as "career chats".
Kelly appears to have been very keen on "career chats" with female employees.
At around £7.50-£12 a throw, they seem suspiciously in line with the price of early evening drinks.
"Career chat."
A new euphemism is born.
Let's all have a "career chat" this evening: trebles all round.
…..oh and Jana Bennett's taxi claims are a model of "defensive claiming"….. she never takes a cab without pointing out that she's carrying "heavy bags".
I wonder what they're stuffed with…. licence payers' money?
Is it just me or is it more than a coincidence that news of Michael Jackson's death broke just as the next day's headlines were going to be dominated by BBC expenses?
Think of it this way:
1. Jackson is a bit black and a bit white, just like Obama.
2. He has flirted with Islam.
3. He is widely believed to be into boys.
4. He's dependent on state cash, albeit Gulf state cash.
As Martin and pounce constantly reminds us, these are all fascinations of the BBC elite, who, when they are not commanding the skies in hired Cessnas, are busy bumming each other, praying to Allah and sucking up to non-whites, especially the Pres.
Is it any wonder we get mad?
Re Martin…. beeboids interviewing beeboids. The Toady programme managed to convey the impression that it really was no concern of the little people, questioning their betters' expenses.
Utterly failed the 'they don't get it' test – people working for real companies would have been deeply uninpressed.
It's disgusting. and i'm looking at you tube with all this bbc content to circumvent the iplayer for non uk residents. i really object to that. why should i pay a licence fee for you tube to post their stuff for free?
and they have a channel on there as well a free web sharing site they most likely pay for someone to run.
its fucking the tax payer is what it is.
Personally I was amused to hear that the DG had hired a PRIVATE JET, at our expense [think of the CO2 emmissions]….
Apparently, this was because he needed to return to home quickly to deal with an urgent staffing issue. But he was holidaying in America, not outer Mongolia. So why didn't he drive to the nearest airport and purchase a scheduled ticket, like everybody-else? I mean, would it really have made that much difference if he had arrived back 5-6 hrs later?
Much respect to all commentators, although I am especially excited to learn from Anonymous that Cessnas have now started making jets, not just those whiney little propellor planes…
But aren't we missing the big picture?
BBCexpensesGate has been submerged in the wailing about the loss of the King of Poop. Today should have been nemesis day for the BBC's cat fats, and what do we get…acres of praise for a mixed-race, Muslim-facing man of questionable sexual tastes.
Don't tell me this is an accident. Just don't….
Yet the number 2 headline today on BBC mobile – ahead of Jackson popping his clogs – is fat cat rail chiefs and their bonuses:-
"There were also accusations – strongly denied by Network Rail – that the company had attempted to "bury bad news" on the day Michael Jackson's death dominated news coverage."
This sounds like sour grapes to me, but can anyone tell me what BBC policy is with regard to weasle words as this Also sounds like a clear case of BBC editorializing.
Also can anyone suggest a useful email address I can write to the BBC to complain about their Continual use of weasel words?
Exactly.
But can we be sure that the BBC was not in any way involved in the timing of Jackson's announcement?
No? Thought not….
As another who really cannot be bothered to get around this new system's identity crisis, which is rather a pain (esp. for readers I'd hazard), I am looking forward to seeing how this looks with the addition of my own anonomoniker atop…
Anonymous said…
… I am especially excited to learn from Anonymous
3:02 PM, June 26, 2009
However, the company is good. The Daily Telegraph blogs have just fixed what wasn't broken, and those who are dubious are dismissed as 'old' and 'conservative'.
The bloke in charge, in rather defensive mode, has gone so far as to claim that most folk are readers only and 'have told him they just love it' (a familiar refrain to any on the wrong end of a Gordo press release via Aunty), and it's just those scummy, independent-minded posters who question them that are not impressed.
I have asked how it is that if they are readers only, and they haven't blogged (self-evidently as 99% of posts are critical), he comes to be aware of this.
No reply as yet.
But, as here, it's their ball so they can decide the game rules.