Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1260
- 1279)
THURSDAY 6 DECEMBER 2007
Mr Mark Thompson and Ms Caroline Thomson
Q1260 Chairman:
What is the issue in which you had 37 BBC journalists wanting
an interview?
Mr Thompson: It was a previous occasion when
we were announcing job reductions.
Q1261 Chairman:
If you had a bigger licence fee settlement, are you saying you
would still be making these changes and making these reductions?
Mr Thompson: I believe the target that we have
been asked to meet, although it is pretty challenging for us because
we have done so much in the way of looking for efficiencies in
the past, 3% of efficiencies for each year of the settlement is
not an unreasonable one and it will be impossible for the BBC
to achieve the 3% without significant post closures. Moreover,
because particularly over the last three years we focused very
hard on some of our overhead costs and we have also, in previous
efficiency rounds, looked hard at radio and at local services,
it would have been inevitable that a lot of the efficiencies would
have fallen on journalism and BBC television. If we had had a
bigger licence fee settlement, we would have been able to do more
of the things we talked about in our bid and, therefore, the numbers
of new jobs would have been greater. The post closures would have
been a similar figure but the net redundancies would have been
somewhat lower.
Q1262 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
When we were talking to your colleagues about sound broadcasting,
about sound radio, there was a lot of emphasis on the journalists
being appropriate to the particular part of the sound output.
Their operation was very much tailored to which type of sound
radio it was. You have been talking about the many different platforms
that are going to have to be taken account of increasingly and
I wonder what is your view on multi-skilling your journalists.
Mr Thompson: I talked about the need to keep
the character of different programmes and I would certainly add
different services. One of the balances we have to strike is between
the diversity of the tone of voice and also, to some extent, of
news agenda between different services across our radio networks
but also across radio, television and the web. We need to bear
that in mind at the same time recognising that where we can share
and pool resource we should do so. There is a very good real world
example of this which is in international reporting. When we are
reporting events in Darfur we cannot send a representative from
every BBC local radio station and every radio network and television
news programme. A very small number, typically often one correspondent,
will provide reporting for the whole BBC. What we have to do,
let us take radio, is try to find the right balance where we are
still trying to meet the needs of different audiences as well
as we can but we are working perhaps a little bit harder than
we do currently to make sure there is no unnecessary duplication
of effort.
Q1263 Bishop of Manchester:
Can I explore a bit further the issue about the global news gathering
and in particular the point you have just made about the sparser
use of people. There has been some criticism recently about the
feeling that the BBC ought to do more to protect employees working
in hostile environments. You will be aware that is being said
by the Public Accounts Committee of the Commons. Do you have a
comment on that?
Mr Thompson: I believe that we have the strongest
record in world journalism in considering the safety of our journalists,
in both preparing our journalists for work in dangerous environments
and also for the way in which we take decisions about the deployment
of journalists and, when they are deployed, regular formal consideration
about whether the continued deployment is safe. Many parts of
the world have become very dangerous for journalists but I would
reject the criticism that we do not take this seriously. I do
not know of any other journalistic organisation in the world which
takes it more seriously and if you doubt that you should talk
to them. Our courses in preparing journalists for work in hazardous
environments are regarded as world leading. I know how seriously
our news division takes these issues because I am personally involved
in them regularly. My colleague, Mark Byford, the deputy Director-General
and Head of Journalism, is involved at least once a week in assessing
critical deployments, for example the deployment in Iraq. Having
said that, we have many, many thousands of journalists, and hundreds
of journalists in dangerous of environments. The character of
work in some countries means that the work is intrinsically dangerous.
No matter how good your risk assessment and decision making is,
events like the abduction of Alan Johnson, our Gaza correspondent,
earlier this year, it is impossible to guarantee that there will
not be some incidents like that. Again, I would say, and people
around the world recognise this, that our response to Alan Johnson's
abduction far from being cavalier was very consistent over that
entire period until his release was secured.
Q1264 Bishop of Manchester:
As we are on this subject, can I follow on up with a quote from
The Times today in a paragraph which is dealing with that
very issue. It says: "A survey of BBC staff with risk management
responsibilities found that 29% had never looked at the BBC's
guidance."
Mr Thompson: This was not looking at the safety
of journalists. There is a completely separate system both for
assessing who should go into dangerous environments and also news
editors who are extensively briefed on the procedures for assessing
the safety of a particular deployment and then looking at the
people who might go to it. This was a broader questionnaire which
was done by the National Audit Office as part of their report
for the BBC Trust looking at the overall risk environment and
understanding of risk inside the BBC. You could not tell from
the PAC's press release but the National Audit Office report itself,
which I would commend to you, is broadly a very positive report
about the way the BBC looks at risk. It recognises that a few
years ago we started taking the topic of risk very seriously in
the BBC. We have systems in place and the process of getting every
single manager in the BBC familiar with the systems in their entirety
is still ongoing but I have to say I am satisfied. I would say
to you look at the National Audit Office report. This is an area
of improvement in the BBC over recent years and if you benchmark
the BBC's approach to risk with that of other public organisations,
although we would recognise we have more to do, we benchmark pretty
well.
Q1265 Bishop of Manchester:
Can I follow up Lord Fowler's questions with a few specific ones
to you? Can you tell us how many actual acceptances of voluntary
redundancy you have now received?
Mr Thompson: We have an ongoing process. I am
very happy to talk about the process but the stage we are at is
of having asked colleagues in divisions like BBC News to express
an interest in voluntary redundancy. We have a number of things
we need to do. We clearly are interested, if we can, in outcomes
that work for members of the staff as well as for the organisation
but we need to make sure we have the right people for the organisation
going forward and we are not losing critical skills. There is
a process of trying to match people, as far as we can, who would
like to go with the skills of those we will need to retain. We
cannot guarantee that everyone who expresses an interest will
necessarily have their formal offer of voluntary redundancy accepted.
Moreover, at this stage it is quite reasonable for a member of
staff to express interest in taking voluntary redundancy but later
on in the process to rescind that interest.
Q1266 Chairman:
It is still too early, is it?
Mr Thompson: In our news division we have currently
had around 380 expressions of interest for voluntary redundancy,
which is slightly in excess of the numbers we think we will have
to make redundant.
Q1267 Bishop of Manchester:
Can you tell us, if possible, in precise figures this time, the
balance between contracted staff and freelance staff in your news
division and will your proposals affect that balance?
Mr Thompson: The proportion is 85% of staff
in news division are on continuing contracts and the balance are
on short-term contracts or freelance basis. There is no intention
to shift that proportion as part of this exercise.
Q1268 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
The 85% are staff.
Mr Thompson: Yes, they are staff.
Q1269 Bishop of Manchester:
Can you tell us what programme areas in the BBC will lose the
most staff?
Mr Thompson: Across the BBC as a whole the biggest
staff reductions will happen in the London network television
factual production area. What is happening in this area is that
a number of different factors are at play. There is, although
it is not the most important factor, the issue of efficiencies
over the period. There is also, however, our policy about creating
a so-called window of creative competition so that independents
and in-house producers can both compete for commissions. To achieve
a credible window of greater competition we need to slightly reduce
the head count of long-term contracts inside our London factual
area. We also have a policy of shifting production out of London
to BBC centres in the nations and, in England, outside the south
east of England which is also structurally changing the numbers
of people we need to employ in factual programmes in London. It
does not mean that our commitment to high quality factual programmes
is reducing. We will produce somewhat fewer hours of factual programmes
for network than we do currently, but if you take peak time there
has been an enormous growth in factual programming in BBC television
over the last two years. It was something like 1,100 hours of
new programmes per year in peak time in the year 2000-01. That
has grown to 1,800 hours in the current year and we will take
it back to something like 1,400 or 1,500 hours, the level of factual
production at 2004/2005 levels. Critically within that we expect
the mix to favour landmark specialist factual programmes like
Planet Earth, the Michael Wood history of India will be another
recent example, our science and arts series, and religious programmes
like the landmark programme we are doing about the Bible for 2009.
We would expect some of the factual entertainment and leisure
programming to reduce.
Q1270 Chairman:
I am sure that London television factual production is a term
well-known inside the BBC but perhaps not so well known outside.
What programmes are you actually talking about? To follow up what
the Bishop of Manchester was asking, where are the reductions
going to most hit, what kind of programmes that we would instantly
recognise?
Mr Thompson: The reason it is hard to answer
that question is it may be that programmes of exactly the same
kind would be commissioned but they would be produced by BBC programme
makers in BBC Scotland or from the independent sector. The fact
that we are shifting the balance of in-house and independent production
does not mean we are reducing our commitment to a particular genre,
it is simply that we are saying we believe, and this is absolutely
congruent with the government's White Paper about the BBC and
our Charter and agreement, the structure of supply in these programmes
needs to shift both out of London and, to some extent, from in-house
to independent, or at least to open up this so-called window of
creative competition. I would expect our commitment to all the
critical areas of factual programming in natural history, history,
science and arts to be maintained.
Q1271 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
You mentioned Planet Earth and your continuing support for programmes
like that and indeed moving production out of London but, as I
understand it, BBC Bristol are expressing considerable pain at
what is happening to them.
Mr Thompson: I think the Natural History Unit
is a really interesting microcosm of many of the threats I have
been talking about. We are totally committed to having a really
strong base of natural history. We think the NHU is the world's
greatest centre of expertise in making this kind of programming.
Over the last couple of years there has been a very big spike
in natural history production, quite a lot of it made with very
high levels of co-production money from other markets. That co-production
market will not be as strong, we believe, in coming years and
the amount of natural history programming we can make is going
to reduce. It will not reduce to some new historic low but it
will go to the normal for the last ten years. Within natural history
we want to make a particular focus on the programmes which have
the greatest impact and which we know the public like most, i.e.
the major landmark series. We currently have in production the
next programme in the sequence of Blue Planet and Planet Earth
and we have David Attenborough with a major series arriving in
the next few months. The core of what the public expect from the
Natural History Unit we are going to absolutely defend and maintain
but some of the programming which has been partly supported by
international co-producers, half hour formats, such as a programme
we have been broadcasting called Wild on BBC2, which is not a
particularly well-known programme in the UK but very successful
in America and elsewhere, we will not make any more, but the Natural
World, which is the blue chip BBC2 natural history programme,
of course we will go on making.
Q1272 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
I wanted to follow up on this particular point. On the Bristol
point and the huge value of Attenborough and other programmes
that are being made, particularly the use of high definition television,
are we certain that there is going to be enough to take full advantage
of the specialities that they have achieved by the use of high
definition?
Mr Thompson: Absolutely. You will see in the
Natural History Unit, as you will see in almost every part of
the BBC, that we want to try and concentrate investment where
we can on the most valuable pieces: Planet Earth, Cranford, we
have Sense and Sensibility arriving, Lark Rise to Camdleford,
Oliver Twist. We want to concentrate our effort on the most distinctive
most engaging pieces. To be honest, that is what most members
of the public tell us they want so a slight reduction in the number
of hours we make but hopefully an increase in impact and perceived
quality.
Q1273 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
What difference will the cuts make to the BBC's presence as a
major force in investigative journalism and will that be hard
hit?
Mr Thompson: I want to be slightly churlish.
I do not really accept that what we are engaged in is cuts in
the sense that I believe across the BBC the programmes and services
we offer the public will not diminish in quality. In other words,
I believe that we need to strive to achieve genuine efficiencies,
the same or better programme delivered for a lower input of resource
of manpower and so forth. As we have looked across our news and
current affairs output, we have taken particular care to protect
the investment we make in investigative journalism. We put money
into investigative journalism, in Panorama, File on 4 and elsewhere
but again there are some shifts. We believe that BBC Northern
Ireland in Belfast has a fantastically strong tradition of investigative
journalism and that our colleagues in Northern Ireland should
have more opportunities to get their work and their skills on
the network. You are seeing some shift out of London, Manchester
and Belfast in terms of the number of jobs and opportunities but
overall investigations, particularly as other broadcasters and
as newspapers find they have less resource available for it, is
very, very important for the BBC to invest in and we will maintain
our investment in it.
Q1274 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
Following up to that point, how much do you currently use agency
information when you are putting together a story? As a result
of cuts, will the news become more reliant on news agencies?
Mr Thompson: No, I do not believe we will. We
have kept the investment in news gathering very strong in this
plan for the reasons I mentioned to the Chairman. Some BBC services,
BBC World, our global 24 hour news service, already use a fairly
high proportion of agency pictures, pictures from Reuters and
others, as it covers global events. We have journalists based
around the world but we nonetheless, like every other news organisation,
rely on some agency work. Again there is no expectation anywhere
in the BBC of a major shift out of our own news gather resources,
our own pictures, our own information into the agencies. I have
to say, talking to my colleagues in North America, one very senior
American network news executive said to me "Fairly soon international
news gathering will be you, Reuters and AP. We will not be able
to able to afford it any more."
Q1275 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
Finally, am I right in thinking that from your perspective the
cuts and the new appointments being made are going to all improve
performance and there will be no real cuts in quality?
Mr Thompson: Absolutely not. An efficiency which
leads to a loss in quality is not an efficiency. One thing I am
completely clear about is the public want quality from the BBC
and anything that reduces quality is a very bad idea. The whole
exercise is designed to use the licence fee to get the best quality
services we can to the public and also to find a resource to pay
for the services for the future so the BBC continues to offer
a broad range of quality services for the public five or ten years
from now. That is the point of the exercise.
Q1276 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
You mentioned on a couple of occasions today that head count is
not everything where quality is concerned.
Mr Thompson: It is not the only criteria you
should use. It is a slightly mad world where you count the people
you have and say look how good we are.
Q1277 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
We all appreciate your duplication argument; equally, diversity
between the different programmes, which you acknowledged, is important.
Speaking as someone who was a producer on Newsnight I was interested
by what Jeremy Paxman said in the MacTaggart lecture that if more
cuts continue then it can no longer remain the type of different
programme that it is. I wonder what your response is to that?
Mr Thompson: The first thing to say is Jeremy
gave the MacTaggart lecture at a point some months before we actually
announced what we were going to do and at a time when any number
of wild rumours about figures were being bandied about in the
press. The actual numbers which were announced by me in October
were much less than was being talked about in the summer. All
sorts of wild numbers were coming out. The reality is substantially
perhaps less. It is hard to get into the mind of Jeremy Paxman
but it is less than Jeremy feared. Firstly, I worked on Newsnight
as well. Newsnight has far more resources today than it had when
I was working on it in the 1980s, in what some people would regard
as the golden age of Newsnight. I do anyway.
Q1278 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
I do not think it does from when I was working on it in the 1990s.
Mr Thompson: Perhaps it did not but believe
me the Newsnight of 2007 compared with the Newsnight of 1986 when
I was working on it is a very, very well resourced programme and
it should be; it is an outstanding programme. It is full of great
journalism and it should keep its distinctive character. I also
want to say as these amazing technologies come in and our ability
to make the creation of television almost as seamless as the creation
of radio became many years ago, no part of the BBC should not
look at what it does and figure out whether there is a better
way of doing it. I said 3% will be tough for the BBC because we
have actually spent the last three years, and many years before
that, trying to improve what we do and finding ways of doing it
more efficiently. I would say to all of my colleagues I recognise
that this is a very challenging process but again I think the
public would say, in matters of efficiency, you should be challenged.
The BBC should be challenged to get every bit of value it can
out of the licence fee and not to waste anything.
Q1279 Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury:
It is important in the area of news you have a variety of voices.
Mr Thompson: Of course it is. I was talking
about 37 interviews. I do not believe that the right answer to
how many interviews I or anybody else should give is one. I normally
end up at about 12 but you can pick your own number. I do think
that Radio 1 is different from the Six o'clock News on Radio 4,
it is different from the Today programme, it is different from
Newsnight, it is different from local radio and so on. The diversity,
the plurality, that the licence fee buys the public is very important.
What we are trying to do is not some sort of mad ideological thing,
we are trying to find practical responsive ways of getting the
allocation of resources and our creative energy right. If we make
a mistake and if any of you or a member of the public think we
have made a mistake, we will look at and if we have to adjust
things we will adjust it.
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