Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

Why does this surprise you?

Boris has had a lot longer to build up the team. I am sure that if the coalition lasts 5 years there will be many more supporting Cameron.

In the interests of balance maybe you should compare the number of public servants working for the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ earning over a Β£100K. As I recall their are loads of them in your HR function alone.

Are these full time salaries ?

yes it is a bit funny for bbc to not be transparent about their pay?

is that because it would cause an outrage?

for balance can you do a list of all the NN staff?

the good days should be over in the public sector including the bbc

London can afford it. The UK as a whole can't. Decentralization away from the SE of England will be crucial to our future.

Are Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ staff paid too much ? About 400 get over Β£100,000 a year.

How much did Ken Livingstone pay his political advisors ?

I have some trouble assessing the value, or lack of, such 'reporting' pieces when there is little else to base any judgement upon, such as what these folk are there to do, whether they do it well, and the public benefits more (over them not being there and paid, perked and pensioned).

Two wrongs (or several hundred, evidently) do not make a right, but as the other comments here have raised, these questions might be of value posed elsewhere first, in helping put many more established bloated houses in order.

So good job the headline only will inform the mainstream broadcast news, and tricky details (Ken is headed back, it seems... will he be bringing the past baggage too for another crack at the pay and pay-offs cherries?) will be restricted to the blog thread.

For the narrative, that is. Unique.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

pay peanuts...get monkeys

Monkeys can usually look after themselves.

"I have some trouble assessing the value, or lack of, such 'reporting' pieces when there is little else to base any judgement upon, "

JunkkMale. There's no need to struggle! All you need to do is remember the political bias of the 'reporter' and the corporation he works for. Simples!

Trout,

Well said !

Perhaps Johnson needs more expensive political advice since he is rather more likely to put his foot in it, historically that's been the case.
Or just that so much more advice (including I note a former Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ journalist, Guto Hari - who would not have changed job without a big salary rise), since when you are plotting to get the really big job, the top one, in politics, such advice is needed.
There is one man with a keen eye for any coalition collapse, with the likely subsequent failure of what would then be a minority Tory government.
Boris. He may not wish it directly, not yet anyway, but he won't just sit and watch if it does happen.

But no, was this considered by the previous responses?
Nope, just the usual endlessly recycled pub bore stuff.
If you hate the providers of this site (for free I might add), why spend so much time ranting here? Life not worked out as you planned? Won't be your fault will it? It will the English suburbs watered down version of the 'Elders Of Zion'.
But this time the cast of the grand plot to rule, is an imagined axis of Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ/Labour/the few remaining non Tory papers, plus a few health and safety workers in those high visibility jackets.

If you want super dumbed down reporting, Mr Murdoch's FOX News awaits across the pond.

I see the above was probably aimed at me mainly.

"If you want super dumbed down reporting, Mr Murdoch's FOX News awaits across the pond."

I don't want any degree of dumbed down reporting. However, from the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ I am entitled to receive balanced, impartial reporting. Anything else is a betrayal of the trust the licence payer puts in the corporation. Yes if I was a life-long supporter of the Conservatives I could have decided to pay my own money towards a daily subscription to a Conservative biased newspaper. If I was a Labour supporter I could have decided to invest in a daily delivery of the Daily Mirror.

The problem when it comes to the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ is that we are coerced into paying for it even if, in fact, we never even watch it or listen to it, but are merely in possession of equipment capable of receiving it whether we watch or listen or not.

This is, of course not a far cry from fascism in a way, but as long as the corporation is seen to be a reliable, objective, and above all, impartial reporter of events we British, renowned for not making a fuss, will accept it.

Whether you believe that people in the News and Current Affairs departments of the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ are using their positions to promote one party over another or not is beside the point. I myself believe it could be the case but to prove it would involve a very costly statistical analysis of all the material broadcast by the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ over say the last year using an agreed peer-endorsed formula to quantify bias e.g. the number of people interviewed during prime time radio shows like Today from each party and the ratio of words they were able to get out vs. those of the interviewer for instance.

However in this case, and it was not me who pointed it out, the above is irrelevant. This is clearly biased against the Conservative mayor because, if the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ operates a balanced, neutral political policy, Mr Crick should have supplied an equivalent account of the expenditure on advisers of the only man BJ can fairly be compared with, namely Labour's Ken Livingstone.

If he cares to do that, and indeed it suggests profligacy by the present mayor at a time when his party is preaching austerity I will be the first to condemn him.

Trout,

A very fair point.