Advanced Television

Tim Davie

MPs criticise BBC’s £1m legal fees

The BBC has disclosed it paid more than £1 million (€1.29m) to external barristers and solicitors to deal with tribunal claims brought by staff in equal pay and race discrimination cases. The BBC was unable to put a figure on additional costs of using in-house lawyers to deal with staff allegations concerning equal pay or […]

January 22, 2021By Colin Mann

BT, BBC zero rate mobile lockdown learning

BT and the BBC have announced plans to zero rate the hugely-popular online education strand BBC Bitesize for all EE, BT Mobile, and Plusnet Mobile customers, while UK schools remain closed. The first of its kind agreement means that from the end of January 2021, customers of EE, BT Mobile and Plusnet Mobile accessing BBC […]

January 11, 2021By Colin Mann

BBC appoints Tavaziva as Group COO

The BBC has appointed Leigh Tavaziva as its Group Chief Operating Officer. She will take up her role on February 1st 2021. Tavaziva will take responsibility for critical functions including Design and Engineering, Finance, Legal, Commercial Rights and Business Affairs, Quality, Risk and Assurance, and Procurement. She will join both the BBC’s Executive Committee and […]

December 21, 2020

BBC accelerates diversity plans

The BBC has outlined further plans to better represent audiences, invest in diverse talent and lead change in the creative industry, whilst making impact in communities around the UK. The work builds on the Creative Diversity Commitments made earlier in the year, and will be supported by the Creative Diversity Unit, under June Sarpong, the […]

December 18, 2020

iPlayer sees 4.8bn requests in 12 months

The BBC’s annual report, covering April 2019 – March 2020, shows the BBC remains the most used media organisation in the UK, with 41 million people per day on average using it last year. The 90 per cent of the UK population using the BBC each week rose to 94 per cent in March this […]

September 16, 2020

DCMS Committee Chair ‘concerned’ at BBC pay

Julian Knight MP, Chair of the UK House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, has expressed concern at pay levels revealed in the BBC’s Annual Report. “Despite Gary Lineker’s pay cut, when millions of pensioners are having to find extra cash to pay for the BBC and services they depend on, it’s concerning […]

September 15, 2020By Colin Mann

BBC Three ‘disappears’ online

BBC Three’s audience has shrunk significantly since the channel went digital-only in 2016. Research service Enders Analysis charted viewing figures for the year before it went digital-only, with the year to November 2019. It said viewing of BBC Three content, including BBC Three programmes shown on other BBC linear TV channels, is down 72 per […]

September 9, 2020

New DG ‘BBC has no inalienable right to exist’

Tim Davie, the BBC’s new director general, has said he doesn’t support any switch from the licence fee to a subscription model. In his first speech since taking over, Davie said “For the avoidance of doubt, I do not want a subscription BBC that serves the few. We could make a decent business out of […]

September 4, 2020

Good luck, Tim

Many headlines rang out ‘New BBC DG against subscription model’ following Tim Davie’s first speech. If my memory of reporter school is right – it is a very long time ago – this is a classic ‘dog bites man’ headline. In other words, no news at all. The news would have been ‘New DG does […]

September 4, 2020

Fussell to act as BBC Studios’ interim CEO

BBC Studios has announced that CFO Tom Fussell will act as interim CEO from September 1st, when current CEO Tim Davie becomes BBC Director-General. Fussell will lead BBC Studios on a temporary basis until the next BBC Studios CEO takes up their position. An open recruitment process for the next CEO is underway, with the […]

July 29, 2020