Male presenters at the BBC are twice as likely as their female colleagues to earn more than £150,000 a year, the corporation will admit today.
Salaries of the broadcaster’s highest-earning staff will be revealed for the first time after its attempt to keep the details secret was blocked by ministers.
Gary Lineker, Graham Norton and Fiona Bruce will be among about 100 journalists and celebrity presenters to have their pay published. Lord Hall of Birkenhead, the BBC director-general, has warned staff to be wary of comparing their own pay with that of the top earners. A former senior executive said that some presenters would be “mortified” and viewers left shocked.
Lineker, the Match of the Day presenter, tweeted this morning: “Happy BBC salary day. I blame my agent and the other TV channels that pay more. Now where did I put my tin helmet?”
In a recorded message sent to staff last night, Lord Hall said: “A word of warning: comparing people’s pay is not straightforward. Very few people do exactly the same thing.” He admitted that the disclosure would highlight the need for the broadcaster to “go faster on issues of gender and diversity”.
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“At the moment, of the talent earning over £150,000, two thirds are men and one third are women,” he said. “Is it where we want to be? No.”
Women account for 60 per cent of the top-earning employees hired or promoted within the past four years. They include Laura Kuenssberg, the political editor, and Mishal Husain, a presenter on Radio 4’s Today programme. The broadcaster wants all lead and presenting roles to be divided equally between men and women within three years, Lord Hall said. “It’s great to listen to the Today programme some mornings presented entirely by women. The broader target will have a profound impact not just at the BBC but on the whole media industry. It’s going to change the market for talent in this country.”
Lord Hall said that the corporation had objected to the government order on releasing the salary details because it would drive up wage demands, but claimed that the BBC “always tries to pay people at a discount to the market rate”. The broadcaster’s bill for the best-paid talent had fallen by a tenth in the past year and by a quarter since 2012. This morning he defended the salaries of all employees on the list to be published at 11am. “I’m satisfied with all of the people on the list and what they are being paid,” he said. “All I would say is be careful because trying to compare all those people with what they are being paid is actually very difficult.”
In an interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, he added: “The reason we were against this is that we thought it is going to be inflationary and would tempt others with deep pockets to poach our talent.”
Lord Grade, the former chairman of the BBC, told the programme: “There is only one way this can go and that is that the salaries and wages will go up, not down. If the government wanted to save money they should have cut the licence fee and not intervened in people’s privacy or their private affairs. I think it is shocking.”
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John Whittingdale, the former culture secretary, who introduced legislation forcing the BBC to reveal the salaries, said that it was matter of public interest. “I would say there is a very strong feeling that where there are individuals receiveing a very substantial amount of public money then the public are entitled to know that,” he told the programme.
The pay deals will be viewed with interest in the City and wider business world as evidence of what stars can earn. They will also be scrutinised in the public sector, where pay rises have been capped at 1 per cent since 2012. Lord Hall said that online broadcasters, including Netflix, Amazon and Apple, had joined ITV and Sky in the competition for stars. BBC research had found that licence-fee payers wanted the corporation to employ the highest quality presenters, actors and reporters “even if it means paying the market rate”, he added. “We need to employ the best. They help make the BBC what it is.”
Craig Oliver, a former editor of BBC One’s news bulletins who went on to be David Cameron’s director of communications, said that the pay announcement would be deeply embarrassing for some stars. “Some presenters will find it mortifying, not least because many viewers and listeners will be shocked by what they earn,” he tweeted. “Some staff presenters have salaries equivalent to the private sector while also getting the benefits of being in the public sector.”
Andrew Marr, host of the BBC’s Sunday political show, said last month that the publication of presenters’ pay would be “uncomfortable for all of us”. The BBC will also be scrutinised over the ethnicity of top earners after Sir Lenny Henry, one of its best-known black stars, criticised “fake diversity” claims by media groups that could create a misleading idea of off-screen workforces. The corporation said: “Fourteen and a half per cent of the BBC’s UK-based staff are from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds.”
This morning Bectu, the union representing low-paid production workers at the BBC, repeated its demands for a minimum salary of £20,000.
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Gerry Morrissey, leader of Bectu — now part of the Prospect union — said that more than 2,500 production staff were paid less than £20,000. “It is totally unacceptable that the BBC is prepared to pay senior management and others many times that amount,” he said. “There should be a lot more focus on giving low-paid staff a decent living wage.”