Palace v Palace

The Daily Mail has wheeled out the Royal brains of Richard Kay and Geoffrey Levy to explain the background to the pulling of Steve Hewlett's two-part BBC documentary "Reinventing the Royals".

Basically their thesis is that it exposes old (and maybe continuing) antagonism between the spin teams at Buckingham Palace and Clarence House - and may allude to some briefings designed to lower reputations, rather than enhance them. They claim the Charles side was spooked when the title of the programmes was changed from "Monarchy and The Media", and say the apparent concern over the use of some archive footage may be a red herring, seized on by lawyers to get time for a re-think.

Honoured

There's a touch of ying and yang in the New Year Honours List  - CBE status for outgoing Radio 3 Controller and Director of the Proms, Roger Wright; and CBE for Alan Davey, incoming Controller of Radio 3, for his work at the Arts Council.

Elsewhere there's a rather poor haul for Auntie, with tangential claims of gongs for Esther Rantzen, Steve Cram, James Caan and perhaps Meera Syal. On the digital front, Tony Ageh, BBC Controller of Archive Development and a co-creator of the iPlayer, gets an OBE, and the revelation of his full name - Anthony Olusola Ademola Ageh.

In the north-west, presenter and producer Rob McLoughlin is the only person, amongst over 1,200, with "broadcasting" in their citation. Jamal Edwards, who set up the music video channel SBTV, is really a broadcaster. "Radio" brings up Mark Barber, Planning Director of the Radio Advertising Bureau. And Trevor Baylis' most famous invention was, of course, the clockwork radio.

BBC bargains

You can often judge the business acumen of a retailer by the stock they have remaindered and reduced at the end of a year. If you live in the States, there's still time to get online for the BBC Shop Boxing Day Sale - with up to 70% off selected items. Here's a sample - what these products have to do with "The Best of British TV and More" is anyone's guess. Let's hope, also, that the Tim Davie forthcoming BBC Store looks a little more modern.

Deference

It's pretty clear m'learned friends have been working over Christmas.

The Radio Times has a scoop; the BBC has pulled a two-part documentary, Reinventing The Royals, with the first episode originally slotted for this coming Sunday. The show has been hastily replaced by something called Racing Legends, with little detail.

The Radio Times looks likely to have acquired the scoop because its latest edition carries a preview feature by Steve Hewlett, writer and presenter of Reinventing The Royals. In careful language, it reports "Radio Times understands that the decision to postpone BBC2's transmission of Reinventing The Royals came after an intervention from lawyers known to represent senior members of the royal family, including the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall". The BBC's response is worthy of Mapp and Lucia; it says transmission has been delayed "until a number of issues including use of archive footage" has been resolved.

Steve, often active on Twitter, is strangely silent on the matter thus far.

Festive exclusives

In an exclusive interview for 5 Live, World of Warcraft creator Rob Pardo explains how he came up with one of the most popular games in the world.

Rob was clearly overwhelmed by the tenacity of the 5Live fixers.

I did a fun interview with @bbc5live yesterday. They just posted the podcast if anyone is interested http://t.co/T3MjVaNrTF
— Rob Pardo (@Rob_Pardo) December 25, 2014

Queen and Adam Lambert are performing an exclusive concert on New Year’s Eve from London, close to the iconic landmark of Big Ben, which will be broadcast live on BBC One.

I'd like the full list of other broadcasters who were refused this rare opportunity by Brian May.

Aung San Suu Kyi still fighting for change in Myanmar.... Our Myanmar correspondent Jonah Fisher was given exclusive access to the Nobel peace prize winner as she went back to her constituency in the rural township of Kaw Mhu in the Irrawaddy Delta.

Bloomin' woman is never off our tellies these days.

The Russian view

There was some anxiety at Broadcasting House ahead of the Christmas festivities, as anarchist hacktivists and "pranksters" Anonymous and co-conspirators Occupy planned a march on Auntie.

Entertainingly, the only report I can find of the event comes via Russia Today, which reports that "several dozen" protestors took part ("several" is generous if you watch the video), and then proceeds to have trouble finding a consistent spelling for "paedophile".

Understandable

A little festive sparring in the Gaelic community over the programming strategy on BBC Alba. The website Gaidhlig TV has accused operators MG-Alba of "astonishing complacency" over the amount of English spoken in a sample of programmes, producing an average ratio of 3 to 1 English to Gaelic. This is over and above this year's innovation on BBC Alba, whereby viewers can avoid Gaelic commentary altogether on live sport by hitting the Red Button. Gaidhlig TV has called for a full service of Gaelic subtitles on all shows, to help those learning the language.

Here's some of their language analysis of recent programmes.

70% English - Big John: Sgeulachd John Hartson - Avanti Media/MG ALBA - last broadcast December 2014

96% English - Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris: Real Live Roadrunning - Bees Nees Media/MG ALBA - last broadcast December 2014

78% English - Bainnsean (Weddings) Series 3 Programme 4 - PurpleTV (MNE Television)/MG ALBA - last broadcast December 2014

52% English - Trusadh (Searching) Series 7, Programme 5 - 48% Gaelic Trusadh - MacTV/MG ALBA - last broadcast November 2014

80% English - Lorgan Linda (Linda’s Story) - MacTV/MG ALBA - last broadcast November 2014

66% English - Honeyballers - PurpleTV (MNE Television)/MG ALBA - last broadcast November 2014

72% English - Opry an Iúir Series 2, Episode 6 - Bees Nees Media/MG ALBA - last broadcast December 2014

91% English - Ricky Ross - Bees Nees Media/MG ALBA - last broadcast November 2014

Outage schedule

For BBC insiders, one of the early anxieties of 2015 will be the revelation of  detailed "BBC Production Proposals". TV production teams will learn which of them are to be switched to "NewCo", the half-baked idea that you can have a BBC-created 'super-indie' which will maintain BBC employment and training standards in a commercial world, supplying both the BBC and allcomers.  The history of BBC sell-offs - OBs, costumes, studios and post-production - points to staff in NewCo finding few guarantees about contract terms, career development, location and pensions in the welcome pack.

The Executive have given themselves til the end of January to agree a scheme, with a view to putting it before the Trust in March. Delivering the plans is Anna Mallett, described as Director and Project Lead (pleonasm ?). Her salary in her previous role as Director of Studios and Post Production was undisclosed; for this project, she's on a healthy £240k.  She's joined Mark Freeland (£234,800) and Nathalie Humphreys (£210,000) in thinking things through, and has brought a communications manager with her from S&PP.

The timing of this manoeuvre couldn't be worse. The short term benefits of getting things "off the books" will weigh heavily with the cash-strapped Executive. The obvious endgame is a BBC that is simply a group of commissioners and schedulers, with a news department attached. That's not what makes public service broadcasting in this country great. The politicians won't care, so this represents a vital intellectual and strategic conundrum for Dame Rona Fairhead and The Trust.

Friends and relations

If the next two financial years look grim at the BBC, perhaps there's some schadenfreude to be had with prospects for the New York Times, where former BBC DG Mark Thompson is CEO.

A thoughtful piece in the New York Observer suggests Mark, having pruned the journalism side of the operation, will have to contemplate the business side of the business, and make senior management cuts in the year ahead. This mirrors his BBC decision to accept Mark Byford's offer to step down as Deputy DG - an offer, one suspects, Mark didn't really expect to be taken up.

The problem at the New York Times is that the many of the executives are related to publisher Arthur Sulzberger. Still, Mark's own salary ($1m in basic, $1.5m in bonuses, $2m in shares and 450k in sundries) ought to keep his brain ticking over on solutions...

Not just thrown together....

And, as the video below shows, everything needs a floor manager...

Health alert

And, whatever you do, don't eat it.

Seasonal

Merry Christmas to all readers.

If you're off, stop reading now and go and help with the sprouts or something.

If you're at work, try to smile graciously at the bosses who come in with festive fodder, as t'were some sort of hospital visit. Remember they can't do your job. If they ever could...

Cartref newydd

BBC Wales has exchanged design contracts with development partners Rightacres and architects Foster for their new central Cardiff headquarters.  Wales Online says the Taffia haven't yet got full BBC approval for the terms of the lease, which seems an odd way to do business. And presumably the developers reckon it would make a nice Debenhams instead, if Charter Renewal goes pear-shaped.

The planning application is accompanied by the usual guff, if high quality guff. Try this...

“This building is underpinned by sustainable, cutting-edge design techniques and will provide a first class working environment for BBC Wales staff. The architectural approach draws inspiration from the organisation and this unique location, as well as the area’s creative heritage and grand civic centre. Our aim is to create a building that the BBC and Cardiff can be proud of.” Gedrard Evenden, Fosters.

“The new city centre location will put the BBC in the heart of Cardiff, bringing us closer to our audiences. The new building has been designed to meet the highest standards of environmental sustainability, ensuring low energy usage and incorporating industry leading materials" Alan Bainbridge, BBC Workplace

Elliptical

With expensive management support to the BBC Executive at record levels - Company Secretary Phil Harrold; Clare Sumner, Chief of Staff, DG's Office; and Matthew Godfrey, Head of Executive Business - the minutes of board meetings have become ever less helpful.  Today, we have minutes from October and November, and I can only highlight and annotate topics which may come back to bite in the future.

October:

5. Distinctiveness in TV Summary: The Board discussed the Executive’s response to BBC Trust queries about distinctiveness in BBC television. (Rude letter follows ?)

6. Sports Rights Summary: The Board approved a mandated budget to bid for sports rights. (Is this where "sharing" Wimbledon comes from ?)

7. Music Radio Summary: A number of minor service licence changes to music radio stations were discussed by the Board. (Let us decide what's minor, please)

November:

3. Production Strategy Summary: The Board discussed the reasons for making changes to the BBC’s supply strategy. It was decided that more detailed options would be discussed at a future meeting of the Board. (Too much or too little stock in hand ? Certainly some long-term Saturday night gaps, and maybe something financially amusing to be done with Worldwide owning more stuff)

5. Studios and Post Production Strategic Options Summary: the Board approved the Studios and Post Production Services division of S&PP, including drama operations, remaining as a separate commercial subsidiary.  (Presumably there was an option to bring it back to the mothership - so another way round its poor financial performance must have been found)

7. First Look Budget Summary: the first-look budget for the next financial year (15/16) and future financial projections were noted by the Board.  (16/17 is the problem - the final year under the Charter, when the BBC has to get its capital borrowing off the books, unless the DCMS bends the rules...)

8. Headcount & Restructuring Costs Summary: the Board discussed the report into the costs of restructuring and redundancy that had been requested by the BBC Trust. (No easy answers here - is this a request from Rona ?)

Joe Cocker

Joe Cocker had great taste - in choosing songs and fellow musicians. When Louis and Simon tell useless kid karaoke singers "you made that song your own", it's clear the two musical gurus have not listened to Joe.

Joe's live version of "The Lettter" from the Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour, featured another star we've lost - Bobby Keys on tenor. The Beatles enjoyed Joe's cover of With a Little Help From My Friends so much that they gifted him Something and She Came In Through the Bathroom Window.

Here are some other covers to enjoy - Hitchcock Railway, originally recorded by Jose Feliciano; Darling Be Home Soon (performed by John Sebastian at Woodstock on the Saturday; Joe opened the Sunday line-up); Jamaica Say You Will, written by Jackson Browne; and You Are So Beautiful, written by Billy Preston and Bruce Fisher, with uncredited support from Dennis Wilson of The Beachboys.

Reunited

Wiser heads with longer memories have noted that Peter Horrocks' move to the Open University as Vice Chancellor re-unites him with BBC News alumnus Lucian Hudson, now Director of Communications for the learning empire. Lucian first worked for Auntie in 1984, and may have overlapped with Peter at Newsnight in the Lime Grove days.

Lucian later moved to the Nine O'Clock News when it was run by Mark Thompson and Mark Damazer. An unproved theory of their recruitment strategy was that they preferred the -ian suffix in first names - Lucian, Adrian, Julian, Damian, Crispian, Vivian, Justinian etc. Others thought it was based on talent.

Known unknowns

I've held off as long as I can. But now I need lists to keep the blog going. Here's a weak one to start with.

Things we won't know in 2014.

The new director of the Proms. Edward Blakeman, acting chief, will have the 2015 season pretty much nailed down, before Alan Davey, new Controller of Radio 3, actually arrives at the BBC. He's currently in a festival of leaving events at the Arts Council. Left, Al surrounded by a huge crowd of well-wishers, cuts a cake in the form of a record-player.

The results of the Dame Janet Smith Review. Her inquiry, into the activities of Jimmy Savile and Stuart Hall, enters its third year in 2015, with Dame Janet now 74 years old. BBC bosses expect "severe turbulence" when it is finally published.

The number of people graded Band 11 at the BBC. Dubbed "SM3" by the unions, this growing band is either growing too fast for HR to count, or being paid too much for Auntie to reveal.

Afternoon

Former Five Liver Shelagh Fogarty has decided to settle down with LBC in the New Year. She departed Five in early September, and since then has sat behind the mike for LBC, PM on Radio 4, Newsday and World Have Your Say on World Service.

At the Leicester Square HQ of LBC, she'll cover weekdays from 1300 to 1600, taking over from Julia Hartley Brewer. Can't really remember who she'll be up against on Five Live...

Unhappy

BBC Director of Television  Danny Cohen has popped over to Jerusalem for the Comedy for a Change Festival.  He's been interviewed by Yonat Levi, news anchor on Channel 2, Israel's first commercial channel.

1/ BBC TV chief Danny Cohen: "I've never felt so uncomfortable being a jew in the UK as I've felt in the last 12 months"
— Yonit Levi (@LeviYonit) December 21, 2014

2/ We spoke at The Comedy for a Change Convention in Jerusalem
— Yonit Levi (@LeviYonit) December 21, 201 

Deal or no deal

The BBC has paid out an average of £17,000 to 49 people who brought unfair dismissal cases since 2005, avoiding tribunal hearings in nearly 55% of cases brought.

From a response to an FoI inquiry, the BBC reveals that

• 90 employment tribunal or industrial tribunal claims have been brought against the BBC since 1 April 2005
• 14 of the 90 claims were withdrawn
• 25 of these claims proceeded to tribunal of which 24 were dismissed (i.e. won by the BBC) or struck out and one was upheld. Two claims are still ongoing.
• the BBC settled 49 unfair dismissal claims without admission of liability and before a tribunal judgement and that the total figure paid to claimants in such cases over the ten year period of your request was £840,341
• the BBC is not charged for the time that is spent on each case by the BBC’s Employment Law Department

Dawning

Our local American digital guru Jason Seiken, of The Telegraph, seems to wear his heart on his sleeve, at least as far as retweets go...

When to quit your journalism job http://t.co/OaFkIXtKum
— Jason Seiken (@jseiken) December 19, 2014

Qualified

I bet she didn't expect to be playing the Freedom of Information game so soon. The BBC has turned to "qualified person" Dame Rona Fairhead, Chairman of The Trust, to validate its refusal to release further correspondence and emails about the Dame Janet Smith Review.  She argues that, under Section 36 of the Freedom of Information Act, disclosure would be prejudicial to the effective conduct of public affairs.

This particular wrangle has gone on since August, with Dr T Jackson seeking to establish whether or nor any senior BBC staff members sought to exert any pressure on the review team to delay publication. The findings, into BBC behaviour around Jimmy Savile and Stuart Hall, are now expected in the New Year, and Rona has asked for Trustee volunteers to come forward, to form a sub-committee to deliver a Trust response.

Dr Jackson, meanwhile, is still pursuing the matter with the ICO.

Revelatory

Exclusivity a go-go, as the BBC News year sails to an end.

The tennis star Martina Navratilova has married her long-term partner Julia Lemigova in New York. In 1981 she revealed she was bi-sexual but in an exclusive interview with the BBC, shortly after her wedding on Monday, she told Katty Kay that gay sports men and women were still fearful of coming out.

Last week on the News at Ten, Nafiseh Kohnavard from the BBC Persian service was given exclusive access to the army operation taking in food and supplies to the Yazidi refugees on top of Mount Sinjar in northern Iraq, escaping from ‘Islamic State’  - James Harding speech at City University yesterday.

Hugh Bonneville reads exclusive short story by Paddington creator. Well actually, a letter. 350 words.

Looking ahead

Plenty for BBC News boss James Harding to mull over, after a 'future of news' conference at City University yesterday. Mr Harding was in bullish mood, but others had doubts.

Lord Birt said the BBC tv was not making enough space for weighty examinations of the big issues facing the UK - like wot he used to have. “I am not going to make James’s life a misery by going through his team of players,” he said, proceeding to make his life a misery by a side swipe and gentle threats indicating some people think the same as Birt.  “If you take current affairs as a whole it doesn’t have sufficient presence at the moment. I am not alone in thinking that.”

David Lloyd, who used to edit the Money Programme for Lord Birt, agreed, saying the Money Programme should come back. The bloke from Vice said BBC current affairs was "beige"; new current affairs boss Fiona Campbell said she could do cheaper shows for BBC1 and BBC2, as she had done on BBC3.

Ian Katz, editor of Newsnight said "The truth is that almost certainly BBC News has to do less. The output is vast.”  And it doesn't help when you blow your budget before the end of the financial year. James is right behind Katz - "Once again, if you miss Newsnight, you’re out of it."  Sadly, more and more people are out of it, preferring The Agenda, on ITV, or This Week on BBC1. Some recent editions have been returning overnights closer to 400k, so the Key Performance Indicator of cost per viewer needs a brilliant first quarter of 2015, with extra competition coming from an extended regional news bulletin on BBC1.

Accompanying James' speech comes a piece of work by researchers Mediatique. Here's a graph I can understand.


And here's one that's a little harder.




They note that the BBC is losing share in the online news market as competition increases, but that the likely future scenario for online news – Evolution – "is expected to render the BBC’s role as impartial and trusted provider of news of increasing rather than decreasing importance". So that's all good, then.

Receipts

BBC house organ Ariel is now doing a good job in its quarterly scrutiny of management expenses. But there's still plenty of little stuff left for me !

We welcome the Fleet Street skills of Keith Blackmore, this quarter. He's James Harding's sidekick, brought to keep him company from the Times.  Keith had some business at The Connaught on the 1st of May, and so took a taxi, at £5.50. He explains "The Connaught is in Mayfair.. not near a tube".

Google suggests it's 0.4 mile from Bond Street, 0.6 mile from Marble Arch, and a mighty 0.9 mile from Broadcasting House, which might have taken 17 minutes out of Keith's busy day.

The Mail has spotted that Danny Cohen and Charlotte Moore both made it to the Sunset Marquis in LA in May. Their top get-the-BBC-team missed drama boss Ben Stephenson checking in, too.

Northern Ireland boss Peter Johnston still shares details of his eating preferences. This quarter it's Giraffe at Heathrow and Nando's in Great Portland Street.

Director of Music Bob Shennan managed an August trip to Nashville, via JFK, for £1,762.25. And he charged his subscription to the Country Music Association, at £62.55. You'd have thought he did it for enjoyment.

Party on

Continuous re-invention may be the order of the day at Telegraph Towers - but the watchword doesn't extend to the Christmas Party, at the Cafe De Paris as ever.

However there was a morale-boosting pre-loading session at the office, with a range of Pillars presenting on progress. No sign of Jason Seiken, but a telling line from Chris Evans, current Editor of The Telegraph: "From now on we will be hiring people who can walk the walk as well as talk the talk".

For those interested in technology, Edwina Currie's brother, one Henry Windeler Cohen, has emerged as Interim Chief Information Officer....

Long time no see

You just about get those pesky production staff under control in the background of BBC News in London, then lose control around the world. Last night's Newsnight offered David Frum from the Washington office, oblivious to the festive hugs going on in the background.

Nip

Did we catch a little festive product placement on last night's episode of The Archers, as the shooters downed a stiffening snifter ?  Did they enjoy the bold, smoky taste of the Islay single malt, followed by a hint of seaweed and a surprising sweetness ? Did they know it's on special offer at Waitrose ?

How DAB works...

Happy to report that the travelling Green Button of DAB Roll-out has reached York for the latest technologically-complex activation of a local multiplex. In this shot, you can clearly see that the Button has been fearlessly connected to a power supply.  You've got to hand it to those radio boffins.

Hello and welcome

There were a few eyebrows raised when it was revealed that former BBC Chief Technology Officer John Linwood got a £140k joining bonus when he arrived at Auntie in March 2009.

Now it seems three other people were given signing on fees within 30 days of their employment with the BBC over the following year or so. The largest was £20k, the other two totalled £20k. The last payment was made in August 2010.

Xmas shelf scoopy

Still the exclusives come...

A shipyard in South Korea is building the biggest vessel the world has ever seen - a gas processing platform for the energy giant Shell..... BBC News was given exclusive access to the construction site and Science Editor David Shukman had the chance to look around.

...and the chance to fly to Korea, and mention Shell again in the piece. Not a job for some unskilled BBC correspondent already in the area.


Data taken from tens of millions of child abuse photos and videos will shortly be used as part of a new police system to aid investigations into suspected paedophiles across the UK..... BBC News was given exclusive access to the database while it was under development.

Police show off a new purchase, ahead of formal opening by the Prime Minister. 

Hats off to @jessbrammar for another exclusive on cut-throat practices in the food industry. Do you know about more? #newsnight
— Ian Katz (@iankatz1000) December 17, 2014

Who'd have thought late payments to suppliers by big companies were unusual ?

Street named

Congratulations to Jo Street, named acting Controller of BBC Daytime, after the elevation of Damian Kavanagh to Digital Controller BBC3.

She's got some twenty years of tv experience under her belt, most of it with daytime shows. She started with Countryfile and Animal Sanctuary, and then the Weakest Link, as assistant producer, producer and finally series producer. In 2008, she joined the daytime commissioning team, taking the high road to Glasgow under the dispersal tactics of the day - less traumatic, perhaps, for someone from Doncaster. Her current slate of commissions includes Homes under the Hammer, Antiques Road Trip, Eggheads, Countryside 999, Building Dream Homes and Holiday of My Lifetime. She has the company of her dog, Columbo.

It's Shaz

Ofcom has confirmed that Sharon White (Mrs Robert Chote) is to be their new CEO, from March next year.

Her starting salary will be £275k; the departing Ed Richards is on £284k, plus, this year, a £30k bonus, plus pension contributions and various other benefits bringing his package to £381k.

Every staff member of the BBC Executive Board earns more than Sharon.

Late

Here's another thing we're not getting for Christmas - the Dame Janet Smith Review.

The Review continues to be approached by witnesses and to receive evidence that is material to its Terms of Reference. In the light of this, the Report is not expected to be finalised until early 2015. A further update will be provided when a publication date is known.

Style guide

The current BBC squeeze on correspondents with long experience of world affairs has produced at least one wrong target. The excellent Allan Little, just 55, is leaving at the end of this month. Newsgathering chief Jonathan Munro pays him an adjective-rich tribute in the house organ Ariel, including "iconic" - something Allan would have excised from any script in front of him.

Sheltered accommodation

Here's another chance for my senior media readers to nab an Oxbridge College residency. The Warden-ship of New College, Oxford falls vacant in September 2016, and the recruitment process for a successor to Professor Sir Curtis Price KBE requires applications by 16th January 2015.

There could be an interesting alumni field - Ian Katz, Michael Crick, Angus Deayton, Rachel Johnson and Rick Stein, for example.

The salary is c£100k, but you also get a part-time PA and two full-time housekeeping staff, plus the run of the Lodgings, valued at £20k pa for tax purposes.

The headhunters are Egon Zehnder (who helped Lord Patten identify George Entwistle when at the BBC). The contact is Mark Byford - no, not that one.

Ducal

For those who think errors in captions, graphics etc are a modern problem in BBC News, former newsmeister Mark Damazer has revealed his own mea culpa (to students in Oxford).

Producing a tv bulletin story in the last century, about a Russian spy, of whom there were no photographs, he suggested using a silhouette profile, to meet the requirement for an image over the newsreader's shoulder. Unfortunately, he didn't spot before broadcast that graphics had actually selected a profile shot of the Duke of Edinburgh to create the "anonymous" silhouette...

Hard sell

Some quality PR work in North Wales this week, working to making the extension of DAB radio broadcasting in the area memorable.

Thinking of both history and immediate impact, they set up a photocall in Caernarfon, with what cynics might say was a comedy green button, but surely must directly operate the two new transmitters, at Nebo and Conwy. From left to right, assured of their places in the 21st century radio archive, Welsh rock singer Bryn Fon, BBC Wales assistant editor Irfon Jones - and Martin Geraint.

No police were called, though apparently Martin is a children's entertainer.

Office politics

Ah, the selfless world of property developers. Revised plans for Television Centre, approved this week, increase office space across the site by 50%.

The old restaurant block will now be offices, not residential. The old Stage 4 and 5 buildings, once home to News and Post-production, are to be demolished and lose their brick facades, for upgraded offices. The original plan was to re-furbish the technical spaces and quirky levels of 4 and 5, in the hope of attractive trendy, start-up new media operations.

BBC Worldwide are set to move into Stage 6 in the New Year (unless timetable troubles are being concealed). I presume they're ok about the level of demolition and construction noise they'll now encounter right next to their new dream home.

Double busy

Anxious times at the BBC Trust, where new Chairman Rona Fairhead is experiencing supply chain problems. At time of writing, they've failed to replace Alison Hastings and David Liddiment, who used to help with editorial and production-type reviews - and the workload is piling up. Already Welsh trustee and cuddly academic Elan Closs Stephens has been dragooned into the review of speech radio; and I bet Nick Prettejohn, a banker, didn't expect to find himself on the Editorial Standards committee. 

The value of music

So, on the day the BBC announced how it was proposing to spend less on tv programming targeted at young people, the BBC Music Awards demonstrated some conspicuous consumption on our tvscreens  - and promised to do it again next year.

The live arena show was sold to America, Japan, Denmark and Ireland, which might have defrayed some of the confetti gun costs, but overall, I'd be entertained to learn where it stands in the BBC1 2014 league table of expensive telly, delivering an average tv audience of 3.94m.

And I mean total costing - the Concert Orchestra's time, the set costs, the graphics, the pre-production, the security, the hospitality (bean salad and soup), the free tickets, the giant choirs, the taxis and the rest. By my calculations, 52 minutes 15 seconds of live music across the two hours; the rest promos, trails and warm baths of how lovely the BBC is, and how lucky the music industry is, being able to do business with such lovely people.

Alan Yentob left just after Ed Sheeran's spot - around an hour in. Must have got the Yum-Yums...

Deceptive ?

Never mind the content - over the past four years, Nigel Farage has now made more appearances on a Question Time panel than any other individual. This makes it very hard to unpick a perception right round the country that the BBC is in some way in thrall to UKIP and its leader.  Could someone provide me with the arguments to contradict that ?

Postbag 3

And another from the postbag.

Dear Trading,

I'm think I'm really finding my feet on Twitter. Licence fee payers can only be impressed by understanding the man at the heart of BBC Television is just an ordinary sort of guy, having chocolate cake cooked for him by Nigella Lawson, chatting football tactics with Danny Savage and Gary Lineker, and discussing the merits of the iPhone 6 with Michael Vaughan. 

But sometimes I send messages to employees talent, and nothing comes back. What's the problem ?

.@radioleary How are you Dermot? Hope all good x
— Danny Cohen (@DannyCohen) December 7, 2014

.@carolineflack1 Amazing Carrie! X
— Danny Cohen (@DannyCohen) December 6, 2014

.@Harry_Styles Thanks for doing the show Harry. Hope you're good.
— Danny Cohen (@DannyCohen) December 5, 2014

Dear D,

Sometimes people on Twitter have so many followers that they couldn't possibly read through all open tweets directed at them. If these people are your friends, send them private messages. If not, stop it.

Postbag 2

More from the Tradingaswdr postbag..

Dear Trading, 

I'm at an early stage in mapping out my life plan, but am fairly certain I'd like to end up in a fully-serviced house in one of our great university towns. I don't mind toasting the odd muffin myself, or indeed pouring a pre-prandial fino, but I'd expect nice on site-catering, with good, regular, five-course evenings meals. I'm not averse to a little light dressing-up, and quite enjoy the intellectual challenge offered by young, largely unformed minds.  Any thoughts ?

Yrs

D

Dear D, I see from your address you're already well into a media career. It's the right thing to do. From the Guardian, we have Rusbridger to Lady Margaret Hall, Will Hutton at Hertford, and Jackie Ashley at Lucy Cavendish Colleger. From the BBC, we have Tim Gardam at St Anne's, Mark Damazer at St Peter's and Roger Mosey at Selwyn. Keep practising on the unformed minds where you are, and all will come good.

Of course, if you can manage without the historic house, there's the Open University - where Martin Bean earned £407,000 in salary, pension contributions and other benefits in 2012/13.  This gives tghe BBC's outgoing Director of Global News Peter Horrocks a chance to improve on his £240,759 from Auntie when he arrrives in post.

Postbag 1

Ah Friday ! Time for a rummage in the Tradingaswdr postbag. First out, the winning entry in our competition to find the longest, half-credible job title in BBC News, created from a selection of buzz words....

Dear Trading, 

There's Deputy Co-ordinating Controller, Head Change Executive. I happen to occupy this post, but it's unpaid and they don't often call me in. 

Yrs 

Moll Teaser

Open goal

Peter Horrocks, who only left the warm embrace of Auntie at the end of last week, has revealed he's to be the next Vice Chancellor of The Open University.

The former Director of Global News/World Service Group takes up the reins in May - and then gets a chance to play tv again, funding those BBC co-productions.

Guru loses guru

The Telegraph has parted company with Chief Information Officer Jon Brendsel. Jon only arrived on these shores in January, following Jason Seiken from PBS in America.  He'd previously worked for AOL and VeriSign.

Did he see it coming ?  This was his first tweet since January, shared with the world last Friday...

Jeff Bezos Explains Why Failure is a Great Thing @businessinsider http://t.co/nnYCRmsuCh via @Inc
— Jon Brendsel (@jbrendsel) December 5, 2014

Institutional failure

Less than a week after inducting Vanessa Feltz and Alan Brazil as "fellows", the Radio Academy seems to be falling apart at a meeting in Broadcasting House this evening. James Cridland, a former trustee, has been tweeting - JM is John Myers (whose financial acumen was applied to reviews of Radio 1 and 2 by Bob Shennan, last but one chair of the Academy); BC is Ben Cooper (Controller of Radio 1 and 1Xtra, current chair of the Academy, successor to Ashley Tabor, of Global Radio).

Continuing coverage, if your social media skills are up to it, by following James' Twitter feed.

JM: Bad luck and bad timing that Festival *and* Awards both lost money this year. Awards hugely important and must continue. #radacad
— James Cridland (@JamesCridland) December 10, 2014

BC: "We need to unchain ourselves from governance which has allowed Academy people to use it for their own ends." #radacad
— James Cridland (@JamesCridland) December 10, 2014

BC: "I feel as if I was given a hospital pass by the previous chairman". (Not entirely sure what he means). #radacad
— James Cridland (@JamesCridland) December 10, 2014

BC: it is not my ambition to bring the @radioacademy to an end. #radacad
— James Cridland (@JamesCridland) December 10, 2014

Money trail

The BBC's lead man on moving BBC3 online, Damien Kavanagh, makes a brave case in a blog today - building a future round a prescription of 80% spend on long-form content, to be available through "ordinary" telly as well as "on-demand" and "online", plus 20% on new, shorter, perhaps more topical content aimed at social media platforms.  The second half of the prescription divides the content into stuff that "makes me laugh" and stuff that "makes me think" - no word on proportions here.

But today's announcements are vague about the money. My best guess is £20-25m per annum available for content - down to a third of the spending predicted for 2015/16.

In other moves, I'm slightly puzzled by extending CBBC hours to 9pm, presumably with repeats rather than new content. If it costs anything, shouldn't that be spent on content for the struggling channel ?

Hours of fun

Here's a Christmas game idea-in-development - "Name That News Job".

A Freedom of Information inquiry asked about the recurrence of certain words in BBC News job titles. The answer reveals that, at the end of October, there were 7,598 staff in the division on continuing or fixed term contracts - and this chart shows the distribution of those words. Note - many will have more than one - e.g. Assistant Editor, Executive Producer.

OK, the game is to make the longest, half-credible job title you can.

I'll offer Assistant Head, Strategic Change Co-ordination.

Political insight

Spent the afternoon getting tanked up with a number of movers and shakers from The Media Society massive, who were pre-loading ahead of their Yentob dinner at the Millennium Hotel, Mayfair (bottled beers £6.50 a pop).

Got mixed messages - first told it was a sell out, then "I could get you in, even at this late stage....."

Meanwhile, presumably without the support of the BBC's Chief Adviser, Politics, Alan has been explaining to the Independent how Jeremy Clarkson contributes to impartiality. Car crash.

Floury

This blog is as guilty as anyone of typos/literals etc, but then I'm old and there's only one of me.

Dear Jonny Zeff, vibrant new Director of The BBC Trust, will have to have stern words before festive drink is taken in 180 Great Portland Street, served with turkey sandwiches presumably made with the Bread of Opinion. Is it half and half or soft white, I wonder ?

Add caption

11.00 Update: now corrected

Only rock'n'roll

A Vice writer, Emma Garland, has noticed that the nominees for British Artist of the Year at the inaugural BBC Music Awards are all blokes - and she's not happy. The winners, "as voted for by a BBC Music panel as well as leading music journalists" will be announced live on Thursday night.

Her last para is pretty feisty - the whole thing is worth a read.

The sad thing is, 2014 has actually been a great year for British music, and it’s a shame that it never gets the proper representation it deserves. With women completely erased from the musical landscape, The BBC Music Awards will be the funeral of mainstream British culture; with an elegy read by Chris Evans as panels of critics and tastemakers slowly lower the body deeper into the ground to be pissed on by Catfish and the Bottlemen.

I was reminiscing the other day about the seminal and transparent NME Poll Winners shows at Wembley Arena, which featured the Beatles in 1963. 1964 and 1965. They were hosted by Keith Fordyce (Lincoln School and Emmanuel, Cambridge) who seemed old to me as I watched on tv. He was mid thirties then. Chris Evans is 48.

Feel the width

BBC Director of News James Harding is putting his English regional news teams on an election footing from January. The 10.25 bulletins that follow the 10 o'clock BBC1 news, will double - from 7 and half minutes to 15.

Staff and union negotiators will be interested to discover the scale, if any, of extra funding. Cynics will note that, alongside this move, the lunchtime regional bulletin will be cut from 15 minutes to 5 (a net loss by my maths).  I wouldn't mind betting that regional output gets squeezed in the campaign proper, as network news usually seeks to extend its 6pm offering.  Plans for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will come later.

Newsnight editors will be interested to see what it does to their figures - the current late regional news averages 4 million viewers; Newsnight figures are largely secret unless they're good.

Shaz

We are told that the name of Sharon White, currently Second Permanent Secretary to The Treasury, has been put forward as the next Chief Executive of Ofcom.

Sharon was born in East London, went to an all-girl school in Leyton, and was encouraged to apply to Fitzwilliam, Cambridge by her economics teacher Gerald O'Connell, a Fitzbilly alumnus. He also persuaded Sonita Alleyne, now a BBC Trustee, to go - she chose philosophy. Now, all things being equal, both will have responsibility for controlling Auntie.

Sharon met her husband-to-be Robert Chote at Cambridge - he was at Queen's and had the taxing role of leading the student Liberal Democrat group. It looks like their paths went separate ways after graduation, but they caught up again when he was a hack covering various Commons finance committees and she was in The Treasury. They married in 1997, and he's now Director of the Office for Budget Responsibility.

Robert lived in some interesting places when he first moved to London, sharing a Finsbury Park flat "with the showbiz editor of The Sun and the drummer from Primal Scream", then a gaff above dress shop Jane & Dada in Hampstead High Street. and a sojourn in Baker's Passage.  At one stage, with Sharon expecting their second child, they were living above a Thai restaurant in Soho.

Robert and @ShazCho are believed now to be in Tufnell Park, sometimes called Upper Holloway, but if Robert's term is renewed in 2015, and Shaz gets Ofcom, one presumes a return to Hampstead is on the cards. Once they've both checked the figures.

P.S. If you want a haircut like Robert, it's a number 3 across the top, and number 2 down the sides. And here's a report by Sharon that shows her calibre.

Packed diary

So many excitements this week.

Tuesday sees Alan Yentob's dinner at the Media Society's Annual Awards. They haven't tweeted about ticket availability for a week, so I presume they've sold around 400 seats at £125 each. Or moved to a smaller room.

Wednesday sees Michael Buerk back on The Moral Maze on Radio 4, wrangling with the ethical problems of exploiting a tv appearance on an exploitative television 'reality' show with a follow-up exploitative 'inside-story' book.

Thursday sees the first BBC Music Awards, live from Earls Court. In the USA, you can watch live on Palladia TV, a subsidiary of MTV, in itself a subsidiary of Viacom. This is, apparently, a triumph, and clearly distinctive.

Heroes to zeros

BBC Radio has suffered some losses at the hands of the judging panel for this year's MediaGuardian 100. Dropping out are Ben Cooper, Controller of Radio 1 and 1Xtra, and, perhaps more surprisingly, Chris Evans, Radio 2 breakfast host.

Also out are Robert Peston - maybe the judges didn't recognise him with his new hair - and Clare Balding. There are six faces out of 100 that seem to represent black and Asian contribution; poor, but at least up from two last year, and probably due to the arrival of Pat Younge on the judging panel.

Eyeliners

The House of Commons Administration Committee has approved a trial of some new camera positions for broadcasting - but will wait to see the results before agreeing to any permanent installation. This is long overdue - and it was a surprise to me that Keith Vaz is a member of the committee, a man who likes to be seen in the best light on television, long and often.

Here's the official minute, showing the MPs remain nervous ninnies about the whole thing.

4. House of Commons Chamber camera trial 

John Angeli, Director of Parliamentary Broadcasting, and Lorraine Sutherland, Editor of the Official Report, briefed the Committee in private. 

Resolved, That the Committee support the “off-air” trial of additional camera angles in the Chamber early in 2015.

Brainy

There should be some amusement for BBC people in the Christmas series of University Challenge. Noreena Hertz aka Mrs Danny Cohen looks to be on a hiding to nothing as captain of the King’s College, Cambridge team, with no less than three professorships under her belt.

Ubiquitous travel expert Simon Calder captains Warwick.  Dame Jenni Murray of Woman's Hour leads the Hull team, with support from erstwhile BBC Arts correspondent Rosie Millard. Corrie Corfield, newsreader and announcer on Radio 4 skippers Goldsmiths, and Radio 4 boffin Jim Al-Khalili takes the hot seat for Surrey.  Kate Adie, hostess of From Our Own Correspondent, makes it a trio of Radio 4 captains, leading out Newcastle. Allan Little, BBC News correspondent is on the Edinburgh team.

Other broadcasters are available: James Mates of ITV captains Leeds, with support from BBC commentator Jacqui Oatley. Cathy Newman of Channel 4 News heads the Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford contingent.

All purpose

Here's a protest slightly lacking in focus, as reported on BBC Look East.

Prove it

BBC war horse John Simpson reflects on his most recent birthday party in his regular column for BA's Highlife magazine, revealing he was boogie-ing til nearly 3am at the Garrick Club.

"Only four nights ago around this time in London, dressed up as an Afghan warlord, I was still dancing at a party to celebrate my 70th birthday. Around me during the course of the evening were people dressed as Arab sheikhs, showgirls, Indian princes, Zorro, John McEnroe in his 'You cannot be serious' days, and a vicar."

Photographic evidence would be useful.

Size doesn't matter

From the Manchester Evening News report of the Manchester Tourism Awards: "BBC Tours at MediaCityUK was applauded for its impressive staff training programme and collected the Small Visitor Attraction award - to the huge delight of their team who were certainly the most excited winners of the night."   And the biggest party to take the stage.

Non-volatile

Without wishing to give the BBC's enemies more ammo, you have to say that the handling of the process aimed at taking BBC3 off-air next August lacks agility.

The idea became public in March, and it's taken nine months to get the fag-packet calculations into a plan to put before The Trust. Staff will get a presentation on Wednesday (when presumably the public will get some details); then the full Trust meeting on December 17 discusses it. We have to wait til January to understand what form the public consultation will take, whilst Ofcom lurches into a Public Value Test.

Heaven forfend anyone should work over Christmas, put the pdf of the report out there and invite online comments - let's leave that to the court of public opinion, already ready to flex in papers, social media and online forums. We might just get a decision before the end of the financial year, leaving staff working for the network in limbo, losing out on current redundancy packages, and poor old Anne Bulford strapped for £50m (and the rest) in 2015/6.

It took just six months for the BBC to announce plans to close 6Music and the BBC Trust to reject the idea.

Downsizing

Property Week says the BBC is moving closer to a deal to flog off its White City interests. White City 1 is mothballed; BBC Worldwide are set to move to Television Centre in a year or so, and the remaining staff in the Media and Broadcast Centre are earmarked for dispersal around the country, moves to NewCo, or the exit door, by 2017.

It won't make the BBC rich, but it will reduce costs - by £67m a year. In capital terms, it looks like a fire sale - the BBC bought the White City site in the mid-80s for £26m, and paid more (£320m) to buy back the freehold in 2005, thus funding more building through a joint venture and bond sales. Any buyer will have to pick up rental costs through to 2035.

The campus feels cold and unloved; old Children in Need posters flutter from lamp-posts, grass is growing up through car park tarmac, and the white buses offering escape to W1 idle ominously outside the grim Phase 1 building. A new owner might cheer things up along Wood Lane.

Godfathers

Is the current squaring up of newspapers and the BBC the sort of spat we all have over the remote control over Christmas - or a more serious Godfather-style falling out of Families ?

You could certainly script the latter. Imagine Chancellor George Osborne yesterday morning travelling in his ministerial car to the Bentley factory in Crewe, chosen by his team as an apposite tv background for his Autumn Statement/Election interviews, which are going to be brilliant even if he hasn't had much sleep. Let's catch up with Today on the car radio. Whoah, it appears we're on the road to Wigan Pier. George, who's been a little wired recently, is furious.

Special Assistant Thea Rogers, ex-producer of BBC Political Editor Nick Robinson, ex-girlfriend of BBC Director of Strategy and Digital James Purnell, and late night confidant of Craig Oliver, former BBC editor-turned-No 10 adviser, suggests George should just get through the warm-up tv interviews, and save his thunder for the one that matters - John Humphrys on Today.

Meanwhile, back at the Broadcasting House Bunker, newly-bearded BBC Director of Communications John Shield has decided the fightback starts here. With skills acquired at the feet of Alastair Campbell in No 10 and Iain Duncan Smith in the Department of Work and Pensions, John and his head of Press Jon Reed put on the tin hats and produce .... a graphic, duly re-tweeted by the Beeb's Twitter army. There. that feels better.

Director of Television Danny Cohen puts his head round the door. Have you seen what The Mirror did to my big tv speech ?  Ignored it, that's what. And worse than that, put a story about Christmas repeats on the front page.  I've already tweeted the so-and-so's a lesson or two about journalism. Noreena helped me write them.

Director of News James Harding is right behind. My mate George has been on the phone - not happy, says there was something on the radio he didn't like, quite early. Has anyone got a transcript ?

What a day.

Today it goes on. Neil Midgley in The Telegraph isn't sure that the graphic is a success. At least one point in the rebuttal is off target. The BBC has increased the number of staff paid more than the Prime Minister since the start of the year.  The Sun, irritated by yesterday's BBC paper review, manages to tweak its editorial on the preposterousness of Russell Brand, into another attack on Auntie.

It's always nasty between politicians, the press and the BBC before an election. It is, I think worse, now we've got a fixed term parliament. If I were Lord Hall, I'd put the BBC on an election footing in all its coverage from today, and start all that boring counting. And get Danny Cohen off Twitter and onto a course about the current economic plight of newspapers and their employees.

Guid-ish New Year

Never mind them pesky Christmas schedules - what matters is Hogmanay, and whilst the rest of the UK watches Brian May grimace through 1970s guitar licks with the sound turned down, BBC1 Scotland are offering Jackie Bird, at an-unspecified-location-likely-to-be-Edinburgh, and, once again Phil Cunningham and Aly Bain at the Old Fruitmarket in Glasgow. It'll just look like a repeat.

Meanwhile, do I detect a slight tightening of kilt belts and buckles at BBC Alba ? Last December they saw the New Year in from the grandeur of the Patrick Burgh Hall in Glasgow - this year, they'll have to hide the badminton court at the Kilmallie Hall in Lochaber.

Mixed messages

A number of Westminster observers, in print and broadcasting, were surprised by the scale of the BBC's operation on College Green for the Autumn statement. The temporary set-in-a-glass-box provided to Andrew Neil looked shiny, expensive and new. In these straitened times, with real studios less than 100 yds away, this was an indulgence for a view that no other broadcaster bothered with yesterday. Compared with Andrew's jokes about his tiny This Week set, and the economical use of The One Show studio for the most recent by-election, it sat oddly with a news organisation seeking to cut £48m and 415 posts next year. Especially when the begging bowl for foreign news coverage  - ebola, Syria, Ferguson and more - is already out.

Meanwhile at Newsnight, Ian Katz has decided that, despite its title, the programme is now a 24-hour brand - offering an "instant" YouTube analysis of the statement from his own shadow newsgathering team. I'm all for plurality of opinions from Auntie, but is this best use of organisational effort, punted out at 2.15pm, when the BBC2 coverage is still going ?.  Next, the Newsnight News Channel - that'll save a fortune.

.

Re-gifting

A frustrating evening for BBC Director of Television Danny Cohen. In his new role as Ivanhoe to Lord Hall's Lionheart, he made an impassioned plea to the squires and varlets of the Press, while dispensing Christmas mead, for support in the run-up to Charter renewal - and then got the social media hump when he saw the front page on the left.

I offer below some of the tweets between Danny and the Mirror's deputy TV editor, Mark Jefferies, with interventions from showbusiness editor Tom Bryant. Mark missed out on the mead, and filed his story from Down Under, where he is a guest of ITV's I'm a Celebrity. Please scan through - and stay with me...

From my point of view, this is not a way to move forward with one of the few papers that will generally back the BBC, and Danny needs to calm down. It is, as he says, an annual chestnut from Fleet Street, but a good press team would have a better rebuttal than "lazy" and "poor".

And actually, the BBC story isn't that bad. The headline figure is a total for repeats across the four big channels - BBC1, BBC2, ITV and Channel 4.

The Mirror's stats show BBC1 at 47% repeats, up from 30% last year - but ITV is up from 28% to 57%, and Channel 4 is up from 59% to 72%, with BBC2 stable at 72%.

My issue is not enough repeats. No sign in my schedule of the odd Marx Brothers or Fred and Ginger movie to aid a festive doze.

Packages

Seeing as The Sun, Mail and Evening Standard are having pre-Christmas fun baiting the BBC, here's some other people paid more than the Prime Minister's artificially depressed salary of £142,500.

2,600 NHS staff earned more than the Prime Minister in 2012/3.

3,620 GPs cleared £150k in 2012/3.

12 people in the ODA were paid more than the PM in 2012/13.

The Director of HS2 intends to pay 30 people more than the PM.

141 Vice-Chancellors or Chief Executives of universities and similar educational establishments earned more than the Prime Minister in 2012/3.

636 council chief executives were paid more than the Prime Minister in 2012/3, including the CEOs of all 32 London Boroughs.

Around 300,000 people paid tax at 45% because they were earning over £150k in 2012/13. You can probably add another 700,000 who managed to make it look less, with the help of interesting accounting. And some 110,000 non-doms.

Royalty

The cheapest tickets for the BBC1 New Year's Eve show featuring Queen and Adam Lambert are £109.50 - that's for either standing or a restricted view from the balcony of the Central Hall, Westminster. With the accredited agents, you can add a £9 "booking fee" and a £7 "service charge". Each ticket comes with two vouchers, and each voucher entitles you to a 175ml glass of wine, or a bottle of beer, or two soft drinks.  So that's all good, then.

Golden

Spooky. Just as BBC Director of Radio Helen Boaden tells the third birthday party of Sound Women that local radio is about to deliver on the target of 50% women breakfast presenters, Radio Devon signs Simon Bates.

Simon was "let go" by Smooth Radio in February, when Global Radio took over and replaced him with Andrew Castle. The move to Radio Devon's Exeter studios will be an nice early 68th birthday presenter for Simes - and makes for a shorter journey to work. It's just over 17 miles from Simon's stud farm near the village of Witheridge. (Frozen semen from Jumbo, a renowned show jumping sire, still available at £850 a shot).

There's some re-organising of the Devon schedule to do - Simon will run from 0700 to 1000, with a return for The Golden Hour at 0900. This shaves an hour off Devon's Grande Dame, Judi Spiers, but I'm sure the management won't short change her.  Devon's latest RAJAR audience figures are at something of a low point - reaching 197,000 listeners a week.

Claire Prosser

There'll be real shock and sadness around many BBC newsrooms and production teams this morning, as people come to terms with the death of Claire Prosser, who didn't make it through heart surgery.

It's too soon for a full, proper tribute to a woman who was a real life force, friend and mentor to many, but here are some basics. She started in journalism with the Surrey Herald group, then joined the radio newsroom at Broadcasting House in 1986, and was quickly promoted to Assistant Editor. She then ran CEEFAX, and joined Radio 5Live in the second year wave of 1995. There she worked on Drive, Nicky Campbell and Breakfast.

But perhaps her widest impact and greatest legacy comes from her work reviving the BBC's direct entry journalist training scheme, with a mission to improve Auntie's diversity. Seven years' worth of trainees will remember and thank Claire for her guidance, support - and fun.

Tomorrow never comes

Top job ad for a senior journalist to join BBC Radio York (sadly now closed). "An important part of your duties will be to supervise work on other platforms - namely Facebook, Twitter and Audioboom, and not to embrace with the future". Nor to read through what you've written a couple of times.

Samantha fully supported

The big nobs of the BBC Trust say Samantha can carry on scoring, and the "older men" of Radio 4's panel game I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue will not be left pulling together their own tallies.

In a 7,000 word judgement - dealing with UN rapporteurs, alleged promises of new female panellists, "institutionally sexist environments" and more - the Trust's Editorial Standards Committee backed its own Senior Editorial Adviser (a woman) in saying that a complaint shouldn't be heard, because it was unlikely to succeed. Nonetheless, the complaint, that the portrayal of Samantha (she doesn't really exist) was merely a vehicle for offensive and harmful jokes, gets a pretty good examination in the course of this rejection.  Andrew Mitchell got a shorter judgement in a real court.

Here are some examples considered in the Trust's ruminations.

“Samantha has to nip out now as she’s off to the pictures with a couple of gentlemen friends who are horror movie enthusiasts. Samantha says she enjoys nothing better than sitting in the back row and being given the willies for 90 minutes.”

“Samantha has to nip off now to meet the Hairy Bikers ... They’ll light the candle then Samantha will blow them out in the garden.”

Here's some of the Editorial Standard Committee's conclusions...

The Committee could understand why some listeners believed that this type of humour was outdated. It had grown out of a uniquely British tradition reflecting social attitudes to sex during a time of strict censorship. The Committee recognised that for some it could be viewed as offensive to women and for some, like the complainant the material was also seen as harmful.

In this case, though, the Committee agreed with the Adviser that due to the show’s heritage the majority of listeners were familiar with the content of the show and enjoyed the wordplay associated with the innuendo. The Committee weighed carefully the audience’s familiarity with the show and its long tradition with its content. It took into account society’s wider concern about sexism. 

The Committee considered that the audience understood that much of the comedy relied on: 
• their familiarity with the panellists as older men 
• the fact that Samantha was an imaginary and fictional character
• the pastiche of sexist culture based on television panel games which had traditionally relied on stereotypical role models (an older man as compere and a glamorous younger woman as his assistant). 

The editorial justification for this content, in the Trustees’ view, was the fact that this content was a skit on both the misogynist and sexist programmes which were predominantly popular some years ago and the attitudes that led to them which still exist today. 

The Committee further considered that the portrayal of the imaginary character of Samantha had been exaggerated for comic effect within audience expectations. The Committee took the view that portrayal of Samantha avoided careless or stereotypical assumptions because the audience understood the context and editorial justification for the content.

The Committee appreciated that many of the lines taken out of the context of the show would be considered sexist. But the Trustees did not accept that the impact of the show was to perpetuate prejudice or disadvantage. They believed that the Radio 4 audience had a much more nuanced relationship with the programme than that.

The Committee concluded that if it were to take this matter on appeal it would consider that the portrayal of Samantha and the delivery of lines met generally accepted standards because of the context, the fact that the portrayal did not exceed audience expectations and the editorial justification. 

The Committee further considered that it would be likely to conclude that the content did not breach the Guidelines on portrayal because the fictional Samantha character was exaggerated for comic effect within audience expectations. The Committee would also be likely to conclude that the content did not seek to perpetuate prejudice or disadvantage.

I'd love to get an estimate of the cost of not hearing this complaint.

McCharter

The BBC will have to bend the knee to the Scottish Parliament, if the full Smith Commission report on more powers for Scotland gets implemented. Here's the key recommendation.

There will be a formal consultative role for the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament in the process of reviewing the BBC’s Charter. The BBC will lay its annual report and accounts before the Scottish Parliament and submit reports to, and appear before, committees of the Scottish Parliament in relation to matters relating to Scotland in the same way as it does in the UK Parliament.

There was a wee stooshie involving a Holyrood Committee and BBC Scotland bosses in March this year, and it clearly still rankles that Auntie doesn't skip to attend when called.

Meanwhile, back at Pacific Quay, extra graphic effort has been ordered to rebrand the woeful "Scotland 2014" post-Hogmanay. And on Radio Scotland, the waters that parted for the insights of Jim Naughtie are back in place, with Good Morning Scotland soldiering on with Gary Robertson, Hayley Millar, and Bill Whiteford. Perhaps they call London when they're struggling with questions that are too short...  

Bilious

Never prone to understatement, Nick Cohen (Altrincham Grammar and Hertford, Oxford) continues to lay into the current regime at BBC News, in a Spectator blog to follow a recent Standpoint article.

Hacks have always been dyspeptic, as my regular readers will have spotted, but the alarming headline, "A Putinesque world of cronyism and fear", has only one quoted, anonymous, source to back it up. A better judgement of morale will come if BBC News can move to the next financial year without a strike.

• Today is deadline day for those wishing to take a redundancy deal in the New York Times newsroom (CEO former BBC DG Mark Thompson). Current estimates suggest south of 40 volunteers for the package - short by 60 of the number sought. Compulsories - a problem for the BBC, too - look likely. 

How showbiz works

I was puzzled as to why BBC Director of Television Danny Cohen copied Ant and Dec's management into this herogram last night.

.@antanddec Just catching up with the jungle show. Congrats on another superb presenting performance. Very funny. .@JAMESGRANTPR
— Danny Cohen (@DannyCohen) November 30, 2014

James Grant in London represent a number of people in current employment with the BBC. Clare Balding, Dick and Dom, Breakfast's Dr Rosemary Leonard, Emma Willis, Fearne Cotton, Greg James, The Hairy Bikers, Helen Skelton, Julia Bradbury, Lorraine Pascale, Mark Chapman, Matt Allwright, Patrick Kielty and Tess Daly. They can all expect public Tweets on the quality of their performances, presumably.

Even more scoopy do

"In an exclusive interview with BBC News, Prof Wright explained that Ptolemy had gathered huge amounts of scientific data." Yes, Philae, that secret expedition to a comet, has produced data. And we're not telling anybody but the BBC about it.

"When the F-35 Lightning II fighter jet comes into service, it'll be among the most advanced in the world.... BBC Click's Dave Lee was granted exclusive access to the BAE Systems' simulator being used to train pilots and iron out any complications before the jet comes into full service." BAE shares are widely available through your broker, wherever in the world you live...

On tonight's show - @markurban01 has an exclusive on delays for F35 fighter jet.
— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) November 26, 2014

One plane, two reporters, two exclusives. BBC Value.

Boyle's law

It's either dumbing down, or a continuing problem with the algorithms that build the BBC Music website. Subo "classical" ?

Back to the Future

In the eighties, all sorts of entities now long gone came together to produce the BBC Micro. It sprang from ideas in BBC Further Education, BBC Engineering, The Enterprise Board, The Department of Industry and The Department of Education and Science. Designed to get Britain on the front foot in computer literacy, the Acorn Micro B cost around £399 in 1983 (Acorn was apparently chosen because it would come in front of Apple in the phone book). Eventually more than 1.5 million were sold.

Now the BBC says it wants to capture the spirit of the Micro in 2015, by creating "a hands-on learning experience that allows any level of young coder from absolute beginner to advanced maker to get involved".  And Auntie wants to find new "Acorns", with an invitation  "looking for partners, large and small, who are both willing and able to contribute services and/or funding to the delivery of this project alongside the BBC".

Paper weight

Ah, the papers. Enough to turn a busy Director of Television into a one-man press office and rebuttal team.

Just spoke to Jeremy Paxman. Story in today's papers very overblown. No plan to be Mayor of London either!
— Danny Cohen (@DannyCohen) November 30, 2014

Meanwhile Peter Preston in The Observer expresses his appreciation for BBC drama, and Lord Hall's investment. In the Sunday Times (paywall) Bryan Appleyard expresses his love for Radio 3. (On Twitter, the incoming Controller of Radio 3 expresses his enjoyment of ambient Icelandic music, which might alarm Mr Appleyard).  In the FT, Director of Radio Helen Boaden is criticised by a letter-writing professor for saying Radio 3 is "incredibly" different from Classic FM, when she should say "very".

In other news, staff in the Crypt of News at Broadcasting House have been warned of a continuing problem with newspapers; the plastic strips used to bind the bundles that feed the news machine are being carelessly discarded, and have become a trip hazard.  

Brown study

Nothing says Christmas on BBC1 quite as much as Mrs Brown's Boys. The cross-dressing Irish comedian's sophisticated sitcom gets repeat outings on December 22nd, December 24th (two episodes), December 25th (Xmas special) and December 27th (repeat). That's nice, as I believe he/she says.

Back your hunches

BBC Trust chairman Rona Fairhead, Non-Executive Director of HSBC and Chairman of HSBC Holidings America Inc, bought 53,600 shares in the company on the 27th November 2014 at a price of 631.17p, bringing her holding up to 76,300 shares. Yes, just over £338k laid out.

Even more creative

As so often happens at the BBC, even in these cash-strapped times, one door closes and another opens.

Jane Ellison (Lycee Moliere, Paris, Farnborough Hill and Newnham, Cambridge) is leaving her role as a Commissioning Editor for Radio 4/Partnership Development Manager Audio & Music - to re-emerge as Lord Hall's new Head of Creative Partnership Delivery. So that's all good then.

Dance off

I like to keep you in touch with BBC alumni, and was looking for news of Caroline Thomson, the Chief Operating Officer-spurned-by-Patten-as-DG, who is, amongst other things, billed as Executive Director of the English National Ballet.

She's married to Baron Liddle of the House of Lords, aka Roger John Liddle, who is also Labour member for Wigton, on Cumbria County Council. This is in his current declaration of interests.

Wife – Caroline Thomson Chair, Digital UK; Director CN Group; Consultant Canada Broadcasting Corporation; Director (Retiring) English National Ballet. 

Of course, she's recently taken on new responsibilities at the Shareholder Executive; maybe, at 60, her terpsichorean work is over. And ENB deputy chairman Ed Williams (ex BBC and Mark Thompson's minder-in-the-UK) will have to help find another CEO.