BBC

[superfrank]

George Entwistle... 54 days in the job, and resigned of his own free will because he was not up to it, but is in line for a pay-off of £450,000 from a taxpayer-funded organisation.

imho the BBC should be reduced to a news organisation only - one TV channel and one radio station funded directly from taxation and the licence fee abolished.

the present situation is a joke where we have no choice whether we want to fund this highly political, overpaid bunch of self-important *******.

[PeterLe]

Crazy isn't it?
I just cant see how that would happen in a normal company. In my company if you dont perform you're out the door..

Having said that; I still think the licence fee is good value!
regards
Peter

[fuzzer54]

Frank, you are far from super and I don't agree with a single world you say.
And the tax payer does not fund the BBC by the way; it's funded by licence payers - a fact which has obviously passed you by.

[superfrank]

Frank, you are far from super and I don't agree with a single world you say.
And the tax payer does not fund the BBC by the way; it's funded by licence payers - a fact which has obviously passed you by.

i don't claim to be super in anyway - my username is named after a horse http://www.racingpost.com/horses/horse_ ... horse_form, but you're right re the taxpayer thing - it's even worse - everyone with a TV has to pay, taxpayer or not. i don't care if you agree me or not, that's kinda the point of a forum.

[sunnydevon]

Tax payer or licence payer it surely makes no difference, the people who are funding it have no option but to pay and then have to see their money being given away like this.

[CaerMyrddin]

That pay-off story is ridiculous, but the BBC is an important british asset. It influences the world and makes lots of tv shows that have good quality and aired by other channels all around the world.

[andyfuller]

People do and at the same time don't have an option to pay the licence fee.

If you don't want to pay it just don't get a TV etc and you won't have to pay it. I know of one person who doesn't.

But at the same time if you want to only watch/listen to non BBC related and things you don't have an option but to pay for it.

So you do and at the same time don't have an option to pay it. But it is not a tax either way.

As for the pay off I find it crazy and no doubt the ones who left today will also get a pay off.

I would guess it will eventually end up with it being a much reduced pay off.

As for the License fee I think it is an absolute bargin. One of the best value things you can buy these days. If we lost the BBC and everything it does I think we would live to regret it and wish we had it back.

You just can't compare the value you get from it with say Sky TV imo where you still have to put up with ads.

Try going for a month SuperFrank not using ANY BBC products and still see if you think the same....

[andyfuller]

Almost everything you recommend on the Stuff To Watch thread SuperFrank are BBC programs. The vast majority of News stories you and everyone else, me included, who put the links up to on this forum are from the BBC....

[superfrank]

Try going for a month SuperFrank not using ANY BBC products and still see if you think the same....

ironically the only programme i watch regularly on the BBC is Newsnight!, other than that the odd documentary as on "Stuff to watch".

i'm not against a public broadcaster, i just think that it should be funded directly from taxation and drastically slimmed down (like the rest of the public sector).

having a licence fee would make sense if it was truly optional, but it's not, and it must cost tens of millions in needless bureaucracy every year to collect it.

[Mr Undercover]

I only wish we got value returned from the government as we do the bbc. I sometimes find myself thinking the license fee represents "value" even if they do provide good career opportunities for kiddy fiddlers and dysfunctional over paid management. Despite this they have managed to innovate, iplayer is a world class product, and news and arts programmes are equally up there...

If i could make comparison to other government departments (which is effectively what the BBC is after all), most are FUBAR to the extent one can only stand in awe at the spectacular level of multi-$billion waste and incompetance. There are notable exceptions of course like the miltary, given the level of sacrifice one could almost forgive everything else.

I'm simply staggered to see an MP this week feels it is perfectly acceptable for tax payers to cover her wages while she builds her TV persona in Australia... presumable we are picking up the tab for acceptable out of pocket living expenses as well. This is indicative of the whole monsterously dreadful waste of money that is central government - and lets not mention the euro gravy train.

So sadly although the BBC is slightly criminally incompetent and grossly wasteful it is one of the best value for money organisations we have, imho, compared to the rest of the out of touch bureaucratic nightmare that is the british tax payers burden.

[EyePeaSea]

Crazy isn't it?
I just cant see how that would happen in a normal company.

Have to say, that isn't my experience.

And besides, aren't we in danger of missing the point? The problem *isn't* with the pay-off, it's with the T&Cs of the employment contract. Both he and his employer signed a contractual document and I'd guess that it didn't have any break clause relating to performance (or at least, no break clause if he jumped before being pushed).

So, just like the Bob Diamond - by the time we get to hear about it, it's too late. I'm not a fan of my License Fee going to someone who was at the helm (or at the *LA-Confidential in Ealing...) as the BBC blundered from one iceberg to the next, but the root cause is the contract. I think that the severance packages of most board members of most FTSE 250 companies would keep us in BetAngel renewal fees for a loooong time


And so with talk of our friend Bob, I've come back to my first point, in a Excel-circular-reference kind of way.

Ian

*A completely unprovable allegation as my current situation prevents me from admitting to seeing him there last June

[andyfuller]

If i could make comparison to other government departments (which is effectively what the BBC is after all), most are FUBAR to the extent one can only stand in awe at the spectacular level of multi-$billion waste and incompetance.

Like this:

http://pbs.twimg.com/media/A7gXXKICQAAYXi4.jpg:large

[Photon]

If BBC is ever to be government funded then we're all in trouble as this would put a powerful media organisation in direct control by a governing body which is I don't would be anybody's interest and its something I would oppose to the bitter end.

We all know what is state funded media are like as we just have to look at Russia, China etc. You will end up with dictetorial or One Party regime that will want to control what you watch, what you think, when you sleep, who you sleep with.

I think BBC has made a lapse in the Newsnighter report about child abuse in Welsh but I think we're in danger of throwing baby with the bathwater. Surely everybody, including BBC, should be allowed to make mistake but as long as they learn from it?

[to75ne]

photon, it is not that they made a mistake or that they should be allowed to make mistakes that is the problem. its the fact that they carried out no basic editorial checks on their report concerning the peer, and that there is no clear line of editorial responsibility. nobody seems to know who is responsible for what in the bbc news output.

[superfrank]

If BBC is ever to be government funded then we're all in trouble as this would put a powerful media organisation in direct control by a governing body which is I don't would be anybody's interest and its something I would oppose to the bitter end.

We all know what is state funded media are like as we just have to look at Russia, China etc. You will end up with dictetorial or One Party regime that will want to control what you watch, what you think, when you sleep, who you sleep with.

I think BBC has made a lapse in the Newsnighter report about child abuse in Welsh but I think we're in danger of throwing baby with the bathwater. Surely everybody, including BBC, should be allowed to make mistake but as long as they learn from it?

making the BBC funded from taxation rather than a licence fee, that is essentially compulsory, would make no difference whatsoever. the BBC charter, i.e. their right to collect the licence fee, has to be renewed by the government anyway which sets the level of the fee.

you're making the mistake of confusing a state broadcaster, of a non-democracy, with a public service broadcaster.

the BBC has a charter obligation to provide unbiased news coverage, not that they stick to it because they have a left-wing bias regardless of who is in power (probably because they recruit almost exclusively from ads in The Guardian).