Informed 05


News Update


Action at BBC threatened


A national meeting of over 90 BBC M/FoCs were told to go back to their chapels and prepare for industrial action over compulsory redundancies at the corporation. In the latest round of cuts, 2,000 people are set to leave the broadcaster. Paul Siegert, national broadcasting officer, said there were a couple of dozen people who had not been redeployed who face being made compulsorily redundant from January.


It is the union’s policy to take industrial action over compulsory redundancies at the BBC. Te meeting heard examples from many chapels of individuals who had been refused voluntary redundancy


and cases of botched redeployment. Michelle Stanistreet said: “Tis meeting offers full support and solidarity to all members facing compulsory redundancy and reaffirms its standing policy to take all action, including strike action if necessary, to defend that principle.” Te NEC gave contingency authority for industrial action. BBC members have voiced concerns that the sheer scale of the cuts – 450 jobs, one in six, are going in the English regions – will have a severe impact on the corporation’s remit as a public service broadcaster, and investigative journalism would be a casualty. One rep said: “We have lost some damn good journalists.”


Equality watchdog’s BBC report was “a whitewash”


When hundreds of women made unequal pay claims following publication of a 2017 list of top BBC earners showing two- thirds were men, the equal pay watchdog was called in to investigate. But there was disbelief, when the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) reported this month that the BBC was not guilty of unlawful discrimination. Its report said individual cases had been investigated and cited the importance of a tribunal’s finding in favour of the unequal pay claim brought by presenter Samira Ahmed, right with Michelle. Michelle Stanistreet said: “Tere will be many NUJ members who read


this report and feel it doesn’t address their lived experiences. Te fact that so many individual setlements, including Samira Ahmed’s NUJ- backed tribunal win, have taken place underlines the clear problems that have existed. And, where setlements have been agreed, it’s taken an


enormous amount of effort and persistence on the part of individuals determined to hold the BBC to account.” BBC reps echoed Carrie


Gracie, the former BBC China editor who won backpay aſter finding she was paid less than the male international editors, who said: “Te report feels like whitewash”. Te report concluded that the BBC’s recent pay structure reforms had resolved problems caused by its former complex and decentralised remuneration scheme where managers had too much discretion


over an individual’s


pay. Te corporation was criticised for the slowness of its complaints procedures and Caroline Waters, interim chair of the EHRC, said: “It is easy to see why trust


Te M/FoCs were also asked to discuss whether to challenge the BBC’s corporation-wide pay freeze with their chapels. Michelle Stanistreet said the unions had not been consulted over the BBC’s new social media guidelines, which had caused an outcry across chapels, and a forthcoming meeting was planned with director general Tim Davie. Following their publication the BBC was forced to insist that the DG had not meant people working for the BBC could not support Pride marches (see page 10). Meanwhile, consultation has started on the future of the cost of the TV licence following 2022.


between some women at the BBC and the organisation has broken down.” Women were not listened to and the process “took a heavy emotional toll”. Michelle Stanistreet said the BBC needed to heed the report and address outstanding issues such as pay progression, great transparency and the gaps and overlaps in the new pay bands, with the unions as a mater of urgency. Te ERHC said there should be equal pay audits every five years. Te result was a relief for BBC management, as it appointed former Court of Appeal president Lord Dyson to investigate allegations that religion editor Martin Bashir, currently unwell aſter contracting Covid-19, secured his famous Panorama interview with Princess Diana by subterfuge.


Tim Dawson


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