The imminent BBC report of how much its highest paid front of camera people earn seems to be generating more media furore than anything since, well, the announcement of of a new Doctor Who who has two hearts but not X and Y chromosomes. I kind of get that they are effectively on the payroll of every license payer, but isn’t this manufactured outrage from the usual suspects (for which read anyone who is convinced the BBC is biased against their own common sense political views)?
Is this an issue on which anyone has strong opinions, or is it just another case of the media loving to talk about themselves, and a useful stick with which to poke the comments boards? I suppose the second is exactly what I’m doing here, but I am a bit baffled that it seems to be such a huge deal. Any thoughts?
Thierry Henry gets £4million from Sky apparently. Lineker could name his price on any other network. He chooses not to.
The Beeb are the classic damned either way case. If they pay competitively, they’re wasteful. If they don’t, and all the talent flees to commercial rivals (Bake Off) the same people accusing them of waste lambast them for that. If they’re popular they’re dumbed down. If they’re highbrow they’re elitist.
The only people who have a problem with Lineker’s salary are direct enemies/competitors of the Beeb, or the usual “I see yer da is taking the divorce well” keyboard-warrior “libertarians”.
Of course, Gary Lineker does top up his BBC salary with fronting BT Sport’s Champions League coverage as well.
I reckon he also gets a premium top-up for having to spend time in the same room as Robbie Savage.
I do worry about Robbie Savage. I fear we are approaching an event horizon where he has finally tried out every stupid hairstyle known to tonsorial science. And then…. what???
He can fuck off then.
He gets around £1.5m per year from Walkers Crisps too. Nice work if you can get it.
Reminds me of one time he was being interviewed on Talksport promoting some event. It was a real old pros backslapping chortlefest, then one of the interviewees just asked “So, what’s your favourite flavour of crisps, Gary?” – intending it to be the softest of softballs.
There followed several seconds of dead air before the WIMH blurted “cheese and onion?” unconvincingly. It was so squirmtastic the interviewer had to make a jocular apology for asking such a tricky question…
Whatever Robbie Savage is being paid, I’m appalled by it.
Same goes for Dean Gaffney.
Dean Gaffney is a SAINT! A SAINT! You hear me, Burgundy?
Found your clock, Bob.
What time is it? It’s Dean O’Clock!
Check the reviews first.
Fantastic.
“The missus has her birthday tomorrow and she’s done nothing but hint she wants a new engagement ring so i did a little outside the box thinking and bought her this Dean Gaffney clock.”
Doesn’t he just paid in crisps?
Not until each of the fiction writers in the Mail has their salary next to their byline.
Surely the Mail et al have spent years telling us that complaining about how much CEOs get paid is the politics of envy, and that you have to pay the best to get the best. How does this differ in television and radio? Yes, let’s pay everybody at the BBC minimum wage shall we and see how much better the output becomes.
Typical bollocks from Dacre and his bloodsucking cronies who will not rest until the level of intelligence and culture in this country has been driven to a point where it is so low it will be invisible.
Don’t give a shit. They can be paid whatever the Beeb thinks they’re worth, according to profile, viewing figures and – yes – talent. If they want to level off male and female salaries – fine. If not, there are some pretty powerful women in there who are capable of doing their own negotiating. Hazel Irvine should be paid more than Chris Evans though.
Yet another fucking Dacre storm in a teacup.
*edit* Dacre is paid 10 times more than the Prime Minister apparently. That’s 3 times more than Steve Wright and not far short of Gary Lineker.
How much is Paul Dacre paid?
I’m very much a defender of the BBC and everything it stands for. The areas of the media and politics who want to attack them are rival companies (News International), right wing toss-rags like the Mail and the Express, who predictably have splashed this all over their covers today – and the Tories they have in their pockets. Public companies should pay the going rate – the notion that the BBC should be less ‘populist’ (ie competitive, making hits like Poldark and Strictly) and more like some local station in the US is laughable. But Murdoch and Dacre have a hotline to the government and are twisting them to suit their agenda – owning the airwaves and the net news.
Yes, some people get paid more than the Prime Minister – a new yardstick cooked up recently. Yes, it’s public money. But the BBC still has a much better hit rate than the sad efforts of ITV and Sky, and the rivals can’t stand it. They won’t be silenced til the license fee is scrapped and we’re reduced to reheated press releases masquerading as news and the Potter’s F**king Wheel.
About £1.5m.
I disagree strongly that they should make this information publicly available. It is the thin end of the wedge and before too long will be expected in everyday life. Once again we are sleepwalking into accepting something that should be a private negotiation between an employer and an employee.
Many years ago I was being transferred between one branch of a company and another. The branch I was leaving needed to find my replacement. He was less experienced than me yet I had to train him up before I left. I found out to my horror that he was being paid quite a bit more than I was. My initial anger was to the employer before I accepted that it was me who had negotiated my deal and hadn’t done a very good job of it. Things changed thereafter.
My philosophy now is that I am not interested in how much other people earn as long as I am content with my own deal.
If Gary Linneker earns more for doing his job than the PM does its hardly any surprise given the complete mess she is making of running the country.
It’s nonsense, and clearly a politically motivated attempt to undermine the BBC’s role by those who think broadcasting in this country should be purely left to the marketplace. They hate the fact that for all it’s faults the BBC is popular, deeply embedded in our culture and largely very good at what it does. I think most people couldn’t give a stuff how much the stars earn, and in any event the figures are completely meaningless unless we also see what the BBC’s competitors earn – and that isn’t going to happen. In fact this gives Sky, ITV, Global Radio et al a huge advantage in conveniently telling them what the BBC pays and being able therefore to outbid them. As Michael Grade said in the radio this morning the one guarantee out of all this is not that TV stars pay will go down – it is that it will go up as people negotiate around the higher figures on this list. As I saw someone tweet, right now half the entertainment industry will be googling who Nick Knowles’ agent is.
But actually, overall, when I look at the numbers beyond a handful, I am genuinely surprised that some of the pay is so low. This list doesn’t read like an organisation wasting public money on outrageous and uncontrolled payment to stars to me.
That is pretty much my view on this and what I was about to write until you did
Here in Norway, the tax records are public, so anyone can see what everyone earns, both annual income and total worth (both net). We can also see how much tax was paid, what shares they hold (in Norway) and how much they bought their house for.
The sun still came up this morning (for a change)
Same in Sweden, which is why their society and economy has completely collapsed.
..er..
They are welcome to whatever they or their agent has negotiated. The BBC is the finest broadcaster on the planet.
The alternative? Fox, what a fucking joke.
Emilia is a honey.
Completely agree, Baron.
Who’s Emilia when she’s at home, Moose?
Emilia Fox. Not familiar to most AWers as she’s on BBC1, a channel watched by plebs.
(*vigorously rubs thighs while gurning suggestively*)
*smacks SR in the face with a huge frying pan*
Not that much. But realistically, I’d watch MOTD whoever was presenting it. I already do and Shearer is on it. I don’t watch it becasue Lineker is on it (although he is very good).
I am confused as to why some news presenters are paid so much though. John Humphries for £600k? I’m sure you could get 6 very good journalists for that.
Humphries. I hate the old bastard. He pretends to be a man of the people but he’s a snob, a primadonna and an egomaniac. He’s Ron Burgundy from Splott. And his book on grammar was ridiculous. Leave it to him and we’d have the English equivalent of Académie française – petrifying our language in a frozen imaginary past.
Every time he interrupts people he wants us to think that it’s because he’s nobly Trying To Get At The Truth. What he’s really saying to the interviewee is, “Don’t forget that this programme is about me”
Other opinions may be available, but some old c*** from Radio 4 will probably talk over them.
*applauds*
Humphrys is the living avatar of white male baby boomer entitlement and pomposity. Maybe there was a time when he was OK, but if he’s on the radio when I’m listening, I’m for the off switch before you can say “Mishal Hussain is 10 times better for a tenth of the money”. He enrages me.
Agreed. He is past his best and needs to be paid off.
£3million do?
I now have no teeth left from gnashing.
He was on TV last night with that usual querulous “How dare you question my brilliance?” look on his face saying, “I didn’t ask for a pay rise, I just kept getting them”.
No, you didn’t ask for money, you just told the press every single year for 20 years that you were thinking about retiring. And then the BBC gave you a pay rise. Hey, that almost looks like a strategy, doesn’t it Johnny boy!
Take your fucking cello and fuck off. Now.
Is Lineker really that good at what he does? And does the Beeb even need a 1.75 million man in the presenter’s chair? They’ve got a whole host of pros on the opposite side of the studio.
Take a look at ITV4’s increasingly impressive cycling coverage. Hosted by pro-journalist Gary Imlach and ex-pro Chris Boardman. Races are commentated on by pro-journalist Ned Boulting and ex-pro David Miller. Both combos complement one another really well. They are more than the sum of their parts. The same could be said about Des Lynam/Alan Hansen, and I think their years together were a high water mark for MOD.
Lineker first started to appear alongside Hansen as a pundit, I think, and he was good. But I don’t think his promotion to the presenter’s chair has been an unqualified success. Certainly not a 1.75 million a year success. He still comes across a bit nervy and needy to me. He seems to spend a lot of his time gurning to camera after a telegraphed square ball, while incisive passes to team mates are rare. I’d much rather see the hugely knowledgable and entertaining Gary Imlach in the hot seat. But then he’s not a ‘name’, is he. And apparently, in the eyes of the BBC, that counts for a lot these days.
I think when Gary Lineker came to broadcasting, many armchair fans were of the opinion that most pundits/hosts were either wooden beyond belief, or they were journos and in the firing line of ‘what have you done in football’? Apparently GL was studying TV football coverage and talking to the right people years before he retired – he knew it wasn’t good enough to say ‘well, he’ll be disappointed with that…’ as a pundit, and schooled at the feet of Des Lynam as an anchor. I could be way off, but holding a live show together is hard, and you need a lot of preparation, and no little charm. GL doesn’t have the latter in spades, but enough – and having the experience gave him the startup that meant the old pros took his points seriously. MOTD still has a bit of the golf club bar about it, but less than it did – and it’s pertinent that a lot of the old guard have moved on, but Lineker remains. You don’t get that from the BBC that easily.
Also, he gives a shit about refugees/is a communist who wants millions of rapists flooding our shores (©The Sun), which gives him a bit of leeway in my book.
Yes, of course. I wasn’t trying to imply that it’s an easy job. Far from it. I think my wider point was that having an ex-pro. as presenter is a high risk manoeuvre that hasn’t necessarily paid off. For me, Lineker in the hot seat creates a mateyness in the studio that fatally compromises the show, and he comes across as master of platitudes. I don’t think the format of the show brings out the best in Lineker, or his guests.
Imagine ‘Soccer Saturday’ without Jeff Stelling. The horror!
I would assume that the likes of Neville, Henry, Carragher, the dread Merson et al are all receiving pay in and around, or possibly more, than the likes of Shearer or Lineker. I’ve read somewhere that Henry gets £4m for instance.
So why hasn’t The Sun been declaiming against this and saying the poor old punters should have their Sky Sports contracts much cheaper if only they’d stop paying these people so much money.
Oh. Yes, now I remember.
It’s all part of the fatuous, hypocritical bollocks that passes for press commentary in thus increasingly infantile culture that we live in, which is all created solely for the financial benefit of bastards like Murdoch and very much against the interests of the people they pretend to care so much about.
The BBC remains cheaper than any national newspaper. I don’t think it’s too taxing to work out which, if push came to shove, we’d be better without.
It’s a truth universally acknowledged that Piers Morgan is a first-class c***, but he trumped himself today by firstly breaking the embargo on the BBC salaries report [while scores of other journos honoured it and waited patiently for the 11am publication deadline], then brushing off the furore over his actions by telling critics they were just sore that he had scooped them because he was a better journalist. The guy is worse than a joke, he’s a malignant prick. Can we not launch a crowdfunding project to have him airdropped into Mosul?
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/bbc-pay-piers-morgan-embargo-break-scoop-woman-petal-earning-22-million-year-salaries-good-morning-a7848921.html
For giggles, if you’re on Twitter, check out Jolyon Maugham QC’s feed. He has some rather pointed and awkward questions for Piers about his own finances.
1.75 million a year. Blimey!
‘Course, if he was playing today, he’d make that in two months..
What, the crisps?
Would MOTD survive without him? Of course. Would it lose a single viewer if he left? I doubt it.
Not really, though there are some astonishing gender differences but my objections are more based around not liking them in the first place. I wouldn’t give Graham Norton or Chris Evans anything like that and if they buggered off, so much the better. People like Gary Lineker arguably are a bit unique based on their professional achievements, but Claudia Winkleman? Surely dyed hair, spray tan and lots eye makeup are pretty easy to find. Is “Strictly” that hard to compare. Dunno, never seen it, so I could be talking tosh. I don’t mind Humphries but I think Andrew Neil is a much better interviewer and the Daily/Weekly/Sunday Politics a much better show than Today, most of the time, other than that it is not actually news as such.
I wouldn’t give Chris Evans my proverbial steam. However, people like him for some reason – and his loyalty to the corporation is admirable, even if it may be informed by a considered observation that many folk who leave the BBC see their careers go down the dumpster (hello Des Lynam).
Amen on Brillo. Neil is a prick at times but he’s a real journo, a grafter. He’s on top of the detail in a way that his interviewees often aren’t.
As you say, Neil is proper, as it Laura Kuenssberg. They have to do analysis etc. But the TV news readers are effectively reading an autocue. Why is that more valuable?
Some write their own scripts, they also have to interview correspondents etc.
Toby Ziegler in The West Wing says “the problem is that, when the White House got demystified, the impression was left that anyone could do it”. Broadcasting is a bit like that: we see the gliding swan, and with no comprehension or appreciation of the power and skill of the frantically paddling feet – the talent, intelligence and hard work -beneath the surface, we think “that looks easy, the overpaid bastards”.
Agree with this completely.
A good mate of mine is a relatively famous TV presenter. Before I met him, I was of the “anyone could do that” school of thought. Then I spent some time with this guy, saw how he deals with/relates to other human beings, witnessed his capacity to be always “on” and realised exactly how highly trained he is and how specialised his skill set must be.
It’s nowhere near as easy as they make it look. Even for the naturally gifted ones.
I know Zag too – great guy. Not least because he has to put up with Zig’s atrocious ego.
Have to disagree with you on Claudia Winkleman. As the daughter of old fashioned journos, she knows what it is to graft, and she really does – look at her cv. She engages with the audience but with a light touch, and for hours and hours on live tv. This isn’t as easy as it looks: you have a producer yelling at you through an earpiece while trying to keep things lighthearted in a high stakes situation where things can, and do, go wrong – the idea of fronting Comic Relief for three hours would bring most ‘pros’, let alone me, out in a cold one. When the BBC made the decision to promote her to co-hosting Strictly (and making it, I think, the first show that big presented by two women), I was quietly pleased and my GLW cheered out loud.
To dismiss her as a haircut, a tan and some makeup is uncalled for. Other opinions etc.
Agreed. She’s a real pro, is CW.
There seems to be a tendency to think that the sparkly escapist shows wot the proles like must take no talent to front. They do, and tons of it. Andrew Neil couldn’t do Strictly any more than Tess Daly could do The Daily Politics.
I was once a cameraman on (live telly) Pebble Mill at One. It was effing terrifying.
If stuck in front of the camera, I fear I would turn to jelly and/or wet myself on air. Not for all the
tea in Chinavinyl in HMV.Fair enough Trip. You obviously know much more about her than I do. Just having asked a few people who watch it they can’t understand why she is paid so much more than the actual presenter.
I think this is due to her Radio 2 work, which Tess Daly doesn’t do. Looking at Graham Norton’s salary, this doesn’t include his TV chat show which means the figure quoted probably relates mostly to his radio work.
Incidentally, switched on the BBC News at 10, headline was the salary story. Wandered off for 10 minutes, came back and they were still on about it. 12 minutes of self-flagellation! I definitely don’t pay my licence fee for this masochistic nonsense. Surprised Newsnight’s not doing a two hour special.
Agreed re Winkleman and Norton who are brilliantly professional at what they do. But either way, these guys are paid not simply on their competence, but on their place in the market and whether or not the public like them. I’m neat a fan of Chris Evans or Steve Wright but I don’t begrudge them the money – they’re good at their jobs and a lot of people like them.
I used to bump into Chris Evans’ producer, Andy (he ran an acoustic night in the basement of a Greek restaurant in Shoreditch long before it was a trendy neighbourhood).
At that time, the BBC were actually paying Ginger Productions to produce all the shows with CE in them. So there were office staff, editors, producers, researchers, etc to come out of the big number. Not something which was made plain in the papers.
I imagine much the same goes on in many cases today, and – of course – the BBC pays the artist’s agent who then takes their cut before passing it on.
Nothing is ever quite as clear-cut as the tabloid press would like you to believe.
In the interests of editorial accuracy, I checked. It was Stoke Newington, not Shoreditch.
So, Vanessa Feltz gets paid 400 grand for delivering exactly the same show every day for the past 5 years, based on her value to the Corporation. They could just put her on a loop and save a fortune. Nice work if you can get it.
She’s not my favourite broadcaster by any stretch, but to be fair, she does do a daily morning show on the BBC’s London local station as well, I believe.
probably in a minority of one here but I like Vanessa Feltz, she steers the show through the early morning with a light hand on the tiller to ease you into the day. Then CE comes on to slap you out of your doze and remind you to get to work – or Sara Cox if you’re lucky, but then I tend to not be in such a rush to get out the door.
She spilled my pint once and didn’t offer to buy a replacement. So she’s in the ‘famous people who are tits’ club.
Some more numbers, Steve Wright 500K a year! John McEnroe 150K+ for two weeks work (while also employed by another broadcaster). Crazy!
Not crazy. Just what the employment market in that industry dictates, minus about 30%.
I really thought that someone like McEnroe would probably pick up 20-30K for his annual 2 week visit to London (plus expenses?). It’s the only time of the year that the sport has any viewers in the UK so not sure how the amount can be dictated. You will also notice that he doesn’t commentate on all big men’s matches as he is working for ESPN too, so he’s not even available for the whole period.
I can’t get exercised about it. Any of these folks could make tons more working elsewhere. The Beeb makes better content than most while paying its talent a lot less, which to me is the very definition of public service broadcasting.
Would you rather pay around 150 quid for the licence fee or (say) 120?
I’m fine with £150. It’s 40p a day. People pay four times that for their phone contracts without blinking. It’s insanely good value for money, even if you’re me and watch relatively little TV.
Disagree. Let’s take McEnroe.
He does work on stations that have THE audience. The ones, like me, who will tune in to TMS while living abroad.
If he didn’t do it and went to, say, talksport, do you think the entire audience would decamp and go with him? No. They’d lose people at the fringes and keep the core of the audience.
He – and others, are getting paid for the last 15% of the audience that they bring in. I mean this in the sense of sports/ex players.
Lineker leaves MOTD – what does the audience drop by?
There are teenagers on YouTube channels who can earn that McEnroe money for an hour’s work. Source: I draft contracts for the little buggers.
Who else would pay Steve Wright £500,000 pa ( plus 30%). Who else would pay Eddie Mair £300,000 ( with or without a 30% premium) was the question posed in the Telegraph. Politically driven, no doubt, but an interesting question.
Anyway, whilst it is hardly the most pressing issue, as someone who has to pay the licence fee although I never watch BBC television, it is informative to see what is paid, for example, to soap actors who, one suspects, would in many cases be lucky to land any other roles, let alone increase their earnings.
Meanwhile, Colin H will doubtless have been thrilled to learn that Stephen Nolan earns about £400,000 a year.
Commercial stations would kill for Wright or (especially) Mair. They’re incredibly good at what they do, regardless of our taste.
I am sure they would be delighted to get them. The question is whether they would pay them as much or more. I doubt it, but if anyone can demonstrate that LBC, for example, would pay Eddie Mair more than the BBC then I would be happy to concede the point. ( And if not LBC, then who else ?)
Peston’s move to ITV shows just how much some BBC talent is coveted by the ad pushers.
Peston works on tv. Big difference.
I would gladly pay a much higher license fee to keep Peston off the BBC and therefore my telly and radio.
Ooooooooother
opeeeeeeeeeeeeenions
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AREAVAILBLE
There’s always a second act in these stories. I think a few journalists might puzzle over why some personalities are in this list and others who work alongside them aren’t. And then they might go to the Companies House website and see which of them are directors of small companies of the kind which are set up to reduce the amount of tax you might pay as an employee. I don’t object too much to this, but a few reputations could be tarnished.
I’ve only scanned through the news article. One thing that strikes me is that the overall pay is given for a year. It doesn’t give their hourly rate, nor does it say what is included. It stands to reason that Chris Evans gets more than someone who only works for a few weeks in a year, since he’s on every day. Also are they paying that amount to the person or to the production company (as per Graham Norton)?
It feels like manufactured outrage with very little actual investigation to me.
The figures quoted don’t include the sums paid to production companies.
Manufactured outrage ? Possibly so, but then it is interesting to note that a lot of people get very worked up about the money some people in, say, finance earn, notwithstanding that their employers presumably think they are worth the money and have to compete in the labour market.
Also interesting to note that over in the Guardian more than one columnist is very interested in the gender pay gap revealed by the figures. A gap that seems pretty clear even when allowing for the number of shifts worked, or whatever.
Your point about the finance industry is the key one here. The Mail et al will go around trumpeting the importance of the free market and people earning what they are worth and what they can negotiate but seemingly this doesn’t apply to BBC employees for some reason. You might even think they have some kind of agenda here,
On Another wage tack, I can guarantee you that at least 50%- probably more – of regular Premier League footballers earn more than Evans, thanks entirely to the fact that they kept Murdich’s empire afloat. The simple truth is that we live in a time and in a culture when we put a monumental premium in people who entertain us in various ways. Bread and circuses anyone?
I quite agree on the point about the Mail’s hypocrisy. My point is that many of the critics of the publication of this info are also hypocritical in that they don’t like the free market when it applies to bankers, but think it’s ok in relation to entertainers and sports people.
Agreed. If we live in a free market, them’s the rules.
It appears that the diversion worked though. We have no credible government, a cabinet that’s tearing itself apart, the Brexit negotiations are a shambles, we have people like Liam Fox spouting absolute nonsense 24/7 but every front page is taken up today by this drivel about BBC pay.
As I said earlier, let’s see how much scrutiny pay levels would survive if the Mail, the Sun or the Guardian printed theirs.
And while we are at it, shouldn’t every MPs profile page include full details if all earnings, all expenses and all benefits in kind, seeing as they are so fascinated in What everyone else earns?
As I observed earlier, a number of left leaning commentators are very interested in the gender pay difference, presumably for reasons beyond mere curiosity.
Well perhaps those well meaning lefties could start by getting after their own organizations whereby the (male)Alan Rusbridger got paid c. GBP90,000 (at least) more than his (female) successor.
Or do we only apply these rules to the BBC?
Theresa May complaining about the gender gap? Take a look at your cabinet composition you hypocritical so ‘n so
Surely the difference between the finance sector and BBC employees is that one is private sector and the other public. BBC staff would be better compared to MPs, whose pay and benefits are endlessly scrutinised. In fact you could make the case that publicly-funded news analysts should have to make the same declarations of interests as lawmakers.
Yeah, but there’s always someone making a daft, hypocritical argument, isn’t there?
I believe in markets and I’ve defended bankers’ salaries (*ducks flying veg*). I think this publication is hypocritical bullshit, because it is. The fact that others are hypocritical in their objections doesn’t make it any less so.
Helpfully overlooked in this is the two free flats / houses the PM gets and a £148k pension.
Clare Balding is in the A list of after dinner speakers and conference hosts for corporate events. She (and her agent) get £10-25k for an evening’s work. I doubt she’d get anything like that without BBC exposure, and it’s corporate money not public. She ain’t suffering and neither are taxpayers.
And the exposure she gets on Channel 4. And the exposure she gets on BT Sport.
She – and most other well-known TV faces – gets the the Sky and BT exposure due to her BBC exposure, surely.
This entire story is utter bollocks.
Fair enough if you don’t like the BBC or want to pay the license fee, but what the government have done to them here is utterly cynical and entirely politically motivated.
Are there really people who, in 2017, are shocked to discover that the folks on TV earn quite a lot of money? Do the Conservatives not believe in market forces now? Is there any public interest value in publishing these figures without showing us what the equivalents to these folks are earning at Channel 4 or, god forbid Sky?
I know numerous people who work at the BBC, in various fields. Some of them earn quite a lot. Every single one of them could be earning more elsewhere.
Utter nonsense, all of it.
I suppose we all have different experiences. I know a number of people who used to work for the BBC and left when their jobs were sent to Salford. Very talented people, but not lawyers, accountants or HR people who might readily find work elsewhere. They now earn substantially less than they did.
I had an interview with the BBC for an engineering position many years ago (didn’t get it), I do recall that they offered very good salaries, however they were looking for really talented people (hence not me!)
I’m a pay and benefits specialist and was interviewed for a BBC management role about 8 years ago. I wasn’t earning great money but their offer was well below going rate. They knew they were an aspirational place to work (for some) and exploited it.
It’s funny – a few years ago I had a really terrible working life, sucked in by a huge corporate and all its attaching bollockery. On one of the training days, we were given an exercise to align ourselves to a brand and then report back what it is you like about that brand and why you align yourself to it.
People said things like “Nike…because I like the shoes and I think, yeah, you should Just Do It.” That kind of thing.
Although I am not a fan of these things, I am not disrespectful to the facilitator so I take the exercises seriously. I came back with The BBC because in my role I want clients and colleagues to see me as a credible source of information and whose output is of a very high standard.
Now, it may be my natural sunny disposition that did for me – but a senior colleague really laughed at this and assumed I was taking the piss. He kept asking if I was serious. At subsequent meetings he would refer to it. “Everyone else said Nike, Apple, Google – but he said “the BBC!” and everyone laughed. It became the thing he said about me.
I wouldn’t mind if I had actually meant it to be funny and was playing it for laughs. That would have been fine.
He sounds like an absolute wanker.
A company with all “Nike” and no “BBC” employees is going nowhere fast.
Just Do What? Talk bollocks and run away at the first sight of actual work, probably.
In a similar exercise me and my colleagues were shown a drawing of a hot air balloon and asked where we saw ourselves on this balloon, if the balloon was our company? People were placing themselves higher and higher on top of the balloon itself, my boss even levitating above it…when it was my turn I said that I would be placed in the basket actually designed for sitting in and driving the blasted thing from, without risking life and limb. Everyone looked like I was spoiling their party. I hope I was. 😀
Oh this is a whole other thread. Last September me and about 40 incredulous colleagues were asked to split into teams and build a paper tower. Yes that! FFS!!
I asked if the last 20 years had actually happened. I’m regarded as a joker at work. As usual, I was not actually fucking joking.
Ooh, I have an unaccountable craving for a slice of Nimble*
(*trust me to try that gag on the last person on the site who will get it…)
Bloody hell, you’re living on the limit…
(or is that Limits?)
I am now! I looked for the old Nimble balloon ad to post for clarification and discovered there was an earlier one featuring Joanna Lumley in a bikini. Just before bedtime – I won’t be able to sleep a wink!
Sleep a what…? Sorry, I’m not wearing me appliance…
Questions should be getting asked not about the talent but about senior management.
Have a look at james Purnell’s background and tell me what qualifies him for the job he’s got?
(Answer: Nothing. He also happens to be a colossal prick. I speak as someone who went to the same school as him)
When he was Work & Pensions Secretary he tried to impose an interest rate of 24% on crisis loans issued people on benefits – an idea so offensive that Gordon Brown (Gordon Brown!) blanched. No wonder he’s chosen to disguise himself with a comedy beard and glasses (“Former cabinet minister? Me? No! You’re thinking of somebody else….er… Look! Squirrel!”)
I don’t blame the stars for taking the money but I do believe that the BBC sells itself short by offering those kind of salaries in the first place. They don’t need to: they’re the BBC. Brands like Match Of The Day and the Radio 2 Breakfast Show are bigger than those who present them, and in the long term that reflected glory is worth as much, if not more, to the people who present them than an inflated pay packet.
Paying Chris Evans over £2m is ridiculous. He should be paying them for his public rehabilitation after making a dick of himself in the 1990s. He’s a good broadcaster — as long you don’t listen to his annual Children In Need auction, which is radio at its worst — but he’s not *brilliant*. Nobody turns off when he goes on holiday and Sara Cox takes over.
Same with Gary Lineker. He says he could earn more elsewhere, but he also knows that it would come with an extra helping of tedious sponsor events and boring commercial responsibilities. He’s well aware that a commercial entity paying him the really big bucks owns him in a way that BBC never will. No doubt he’s also looking at how ex-BBC household names Des Lynam and Barry Norman fared when they left. That’s why he doesn’t bugger off, not out of loyalty to the BBC, like we should all admire him for it. He knows that there’d be bigger outcry if they changed the theme tune than if he left.
Gary Lineker almost certainly DOES earn more elsewhere. He fronts BT’s European football coverage, which rather suggests there’s a market for him out there beyond the BBC, tedious sponsor events and all.
What the BBC are doing with presenter salaries is a slightly cheaper version of what their non-publicly funded competitors are also doing. If presenters don’t have any value-add then this news has yet to reach the likes of Sky, ITV and Channel 4. It also hasn’t reached the advertising industry, where companies pay vast sums to have a familiar voice advertise their baked beans, even though I’m fairly sure the beans sell themselves just as much as MOTD does.
Sky, ITV, and Channel 4 are not the BBC. That’s their biggest problem. Maybe they think that by poaching presenters and formats it will make them more like the BBC.
Beans? You mean like Beanz Meanz Heinz?