The BBC has announced major cost-saving measures, revealing that the number of presenters on Radio 4’s Today programme will be reduced.
Newly appointed director general Matt Brittin announced the news on Wednesday (17 June), sharing his plans to slash BBC costs by £160m. The budget cuts will result in 550 job losses in BBC News, TV and radio, while a total of 1,800 to 2,000 jobs will be cut across the business.
Announcing plans for news coverage across TV and radio, the broadcaster said that it will be cancelling six shows on BBC Radio 4: The World Tonight, the Midnight News, Money Box Live, AntiSocial, The Law Show, and Crossing Continents.
Meanwhile, on TV, beginning in September, BBC One will no longer make a Sunday morning edition of BBC Breakfast. Instead, the BBC News Channel will be simulcast in its place.
As for changes to senior on-air roles, the BBC said that in order to “balance audience needs with best value for money”, the Today programme would have a roster of four permanent presenters rather than the existing five. Meanwhile, only one anchor will present the format on Saturday.
Today is currently hosted by Anna Foster, Emma Barnett, Justin Webb, Nick Robinson, and Amol Rajan. While it is yet to be announced which of the presenters will stay within the lineup, Rajan revealed in January that he would be leaving the show this summer after five years.
The BBC is also proposing to reduce the number of correspondents, producers, and reporters within its story teams and will be using fewer crews to film stories, instead “making greater use of mobile technology”.
The BBC has come under pressure to make significant cuts in recent years, with the broadcaster reporting that its income from the £180 annual licence fee has fallen by a quarter over the past decade. In March, the corporation warned that its current funding model was “not sustainable and needs reform”, committing to exploring options around reforming the licence fee.
Writing to staff in an email, Brittin said that the “scale of savings requires tough choices, careful work and won’t all be ready at once”.
“We are committed to letting you know as soon as we have plans in your area. All divisions will be making significant savings,” he said. “We live in very uncertain times. Our audiences rely on us every day to keep them informed, entertained and equipped to make sense of the world.
“Making savings while fulfilling our mission means a doubly difficult time for everyone. Do speak to your leaders and use the support that’s available. In the meantime, thank you for all you are doing.”
Entertainment and performing arts trade union Equity criticised the announced measures. “These are devastating cuts that will be felt across the creative industries and risk BBC audiences and our nation being poorer, with the BBC unable to live up to its aim to inform, educate and entertain,” Equity Head of TV and Film, Cathy Sweet, said in a statement.
She added that it’s “difficult to see how the BBC can fulfil its charter requirements” in light of the cuts. “The BBC is a cornerstone of the UK’s creative sector, serving as a training ground, a pipeline for young talent, an investor in local economies, and so much more,” said Sweet. “Far from facing cuts, it should be revitalised as the foundational civic institution that it is.”
The BBC’s dwindling licence fee income is also likely to have been a contributing factor in its World Cup pundits being based in the BBC’s Salford studio rather than the US this year, unlike those of its competitors at ITV and Netflix.
Brittin was announced as the director-general of the BBC in March, with the former Google executive taking over from Tim Davie.
Davie stepped down from the post in November last year, shortly after Panorama received backlash over an edited clip in a special that created the misleading impression that US president Donald Trump had encouraged his supporters to storm the Capitol building in 2021.
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