The Army game

BBC News boss Helen Boaden seems to have split up the bits that made up her departing No 2's portfolio of interests. Steve Mitchell, who resigned on the day of Pollard publication, was styled Deputy Director.

A large part of his job was also Head of News Programmes - and that vacancy has been advertised. The department includes, amongst others, Today, File on 4 and Assignment on radio; Panorama, Newsnight and HARDtalk on television. It also runs the news output for Radio 5Live, Radio One and the Asian Network, with around 700 staff and an annual budget of £80m.

Part of the job spec: Recruiting, developing and managing a cadre [a tad military ? Ed] of more than twenty editors. And most people guess that Ceri Thomas will get the job - so he'll have to recruit a new Editor for Today into his cadre.