Where's Alan ?

First Twitter spotting - not yet triangulated

In Glastonbury hospitality with Dermot O'Leary and Alan Yentob. Caroline flack wandered by earlier.  Cracking weekend!
— Martin Austin (@TheRealMyth) June 30, 2013

Bob Shennan, 30th May 2013 "This isn’t a licence fee funded jolly - we’ve looked very closely at who will be there and each and every person attending from the BBC will be there solely because they have a job to do in either bringing our audience the best possible content or ensuring that everything we do at the festival is run as effectively as possible"

Creativity in action

How many people does it take to conceive, commission and produce a six-part tv show about pet dogs ?

Credited in the BBC release about "Ronnie's Pedigree Pals" (82-year-old comedian Ronnie Corbett shows just how potty the Great British public is about pets) are Alison Kirkham, BBC Commissioning Editor for Factual Features and Formats, Tom Edwards, BBC Commissioning Executive, Plum Pictures Executive Producers Will Daws and Stuart Cabb, and Series Producer Mark Jones. Presumably Danny Cohen or Charlotte Moore "greenlit", as the jargon goes.

It had better be good. Alison says "“It is fantastic to be able to welcome a true national treasure, Ronnie Corbett, back to BBC One. Ronnie combined with one of Britain's favourite passions, pets, feels like a real treat.” Tom says “It’s great to have Ronnie back on BBC One. And great to have him as our guide as we enter this entertaining, surprising and often jaw-dropping world of British owners and their pets."

Bald

I don't think we're going to glean much from the minutes of BBC Executive meetings from now on. Those from May - Tony Hall's "first full meeting" - have just been published, and whilst he said he was keen to enourage open debate about a few big topics, very little of it is written down.

Here's the sum total on one major issue - "The Board discussed closure of the Digital Media Initiative project, lessons learned and associated costs."

There is some fun though - the minuter offers a mischievous agenda title. "End to End Digital".

Reading between the lines, getting the BBC's position straight on commercial activities and international services is still proving difficult, and the strategists have much more thinking to do; and diversity targets, certainly for staff with disabilities, are a continuing problem.

Plus ca change

Cautious journalists know the risk of identifying achievements/breakthroughs/discoveries etc as "world firsts". You certainy got the impression from BBC reports over recent days that Newcastle University was way ahead in the science of "genetically altering" embryos to avoid risks of certain serious genetic disorders in babies.

Ironically it was the BBC who first revealed that 30 genetically-altered babies had been born, and born healthy, in the United States in 2001. Shortly after the story came out, the US Government banned the technique.  Which the UK may now allow.

Prismatic

30 BBC staff had their emails monitored by the corporation's Investigation Service in 2012.

They categorize the reasons thus...

•  Bribery 1
•  Computer Misuse 8
•  Miscellaneous Enquiry (eg. Disciplinary cases) 4
•  Enquiry by Police 1
•  Fraud 6
•  Harassment 1
•  Information Leak 4
•  Malicious Communication 3
•  Theft 2

“The BBC rarely monitors staff email accounts and only in exceptional circumstances where it is reasonable, necessary and represents a proportionate response. Monitoring of email accounts is invariably undertaken in relation to criminal or disciplinary investigations and staff are aware that monitoring can occur.”

Treasurer

There's some refreshingly frank, if rather dangerous, about Zarin Patel's farewell to the BBC in house organ Ariel. The Chief Finance Officer is leaving after 15 years with the Corporation - no job fixed, holidays first.

She has a turn of phrase that often seemed to desert her in front of the Public Accounts Committee. First - on leaving, she says it had been on her agenda since 2009 and the incoming DG, George Entwistle agreed it at the Olympic Opening Ceremony - "an extraordinary day of emotion".  Zarin was a guest of Lloyds, George a guest of the IOC. Will the details of that agreement figure in the NAO report on "Severance and wider benefits for senior BBC managers", expected next week ? Tony Hall's £150k cap doesn't come into play until September.

Then, on closing down an excellent final salary pension scheme: "Someone has to do the hard stuff, but in the end we lost the trust of our staff."

She also regrets not stopping the Digital Media Initiative a year earlier, and then, most unfortunately, refers to former COO Caroline Thomson as "partner in crime". This may be gallows humour unappreciated in the forthcoming Price Waterhouse Cooper report on what went wrong in controlling the project.

Happy returns ?

Who'll get there first ? BBC News and ITN are both seeking new editors for their main bulletins. At Auntie, the vacancy which straddles the Six and Ten O'Clock News is created by the move of James Stephenson to BBC World. (James' dad, Hugh, still features in many tv journalist training sessions via YouTube.)

At ITN, the job is a little wider. Deborah Turness had responsibility for all bulletins on ITV (1), and a co-ordinating role across regional bulletins, before she was headhunted by NBC.  And it seems ITV's own headhunters don't want to be outdone for the width of their search, prowling not just around Sky but the slightly less glamorous Services Sound and Vision Corporation. There resides Nick Pollard, inspector of the stables of BBC journalism - and, lest we forget, an executive producer at ITN for 13 years. Does he have the same affection for the place, as, say, Lord Hall had for the BBC ?

One shot or two ?

The six-monthly report detailing BBC Trust expenses is out, and whilst, at £32,115.10, they're marginally up from the previous six months, they're down on the same period in 2011/12.

In terms of internal and external entertainment, Trust Director Nicholas "Kaffeine" Kroll tops the list, at £1,223.12. 16 claims are for coffee, totalling £120.71. Sometimes, I suspect, it's a lot of coffee - or there maybe pastries involved - cf £12.71 at the Cinnamon Club, and £16.76 at Villandry. Hardly the Hodge Hair Shirt of Public Service Frugality. Of course, this was a busy time for Lord Patten's fixer - one broken DG to be replaced, so there was every reason for discreet meetings. It can't be just that Nick can't work the office Nespresso machine, can it ?

Serpentine

It's the perfect warm-up for Glasto - and they were all there at the Serpentine Gallery summer party. Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, Ewan McGregor, Sarah Jessica Parker, Princess Beatrice, Jimmy Fallon, Lakshmi Mittal, Damian Hirst, Bianca Jagger, L'Wren Scott and Mick. And Alan Yentob.

Does he get to Glastonbury as keeper of the one-hour stopwatch on the Rolling Stones' tv performance? If you're there and spot him, please let me know.

North by North West

Greg Dyke's approach to identifying BBC departments to go to Salford was less than strategic. Exasperated that he couldn't  knock heads together, he eventually decreed that every division would have to contribute. And they largely responded by sending those they loved least.

Thankfully, no-one's ever really tried to say too loudly there was a uniting idea in bringing 5Live (imagine the hoo-ha if it had been Radio 1, 2, 3 or 4 ?), Research & Development, Religion & Ethics, Breakfast, Childrens and Sport together.

Now, with a promise that a further 1,000 will head north still to be fulfilled, it's still proving next to impossible to be strategic. The first approach was to ask Directors for volunteers. Exactly.

So the task is becoming urgent. The NAO doesn't like empty buildings. And we know that The Mailbox in Birmingham is half empty.

Mark Thompson left with a hint that BBC3 had been targeted for Salford - though, unhelpfully, Controller Zai Bennett has said "no way" will he go. One suspects that Danny Cohen has a plan up his sleeve - he's already paired BBC2 and BBC4 under Janice Hadlow; new BBC Controller Charlotte Moore could get custody of 3, and have someone more quiescent as a side-kick minding things in MediaCityUK.

In radio, Bob Shennan has been gathering his people around him, and will argue that economic synergies between 2 and 6Music can't be unpicked.  Future Media, onlie non-begetter of DMI, again looks spavined and vulnerable. But we're still way short of 1,000 - and Wimbledon is underway. This, unfortunately, cannot be left to the new term in September.

Position

Dear readers,

You know I like to be supportive, and I try. Particularly when it comes to the BBC World Service. But the "positioning paper" and "draft operating licence" published today by the BBC Trust, ahead of the move to licence-fee funding, are full of motherhood, apple pie and blah. They offer a tepid bath of reassurance that licence-fee funding fits with BBC public purposes, and that the World Service should "address the enduring global gap in the provision of trusted international news" - just what I was saying to my missus in the longeurs of The White Queen. Many more will be chanting it as they approach the Post Office with their easy payment forms.

Both papers focus on rationalising the status quo, rather than creating a compelling vision of the future - you might have thought Mark Thompson would have left some inspiring notes when he did the deal, but clearly not.  The core of the proposition is there must be a need - because what we are already doing gets an audience.

This "gap in the provision of trusted international news" needs defining. Whilst I admire the new viewing figures for BBC Arabic, viewers in the Middle East who speak Arabic can pick from around 500 free-to-air channels - are all the rest telling fibs ?  Who defines when the gap is plugged ?  In "French for Africa", can't we trust our Euro-partners who have it as a first language to deliver honest reporting ?  Etc, etc.

There are, thankfully, enough hints in the paper that the Trust would like to see all this as self-supporting in the long run, for me to lay off for the time being. See Clause 64c.

Yours

Bill

P.S. I don't underestimate the difficulties of this part of the transition, and commend this article which opens a window on some of the thinking.

Up

Peter Horrocks beams with justifiable pride out of the pages of The Telegraph today; they're privileged to reveal that BBC World Service audiences have increased this year, from 180m a week up to 192m a week.

The Director of Global News puts it down to great figures for the Arabic and Persian TV services, and increased ratings in post-Mubarak Egypt.

This wasn't what was forecast:  In January 2011, Peter had to tell the world that five language services were closing altogether; radio services to China, Russia, Ukraine and Turkey were to be cut; and shortwave broadcasting in Hindi would stop. Since then, there's also been some closure of medium wave transmitters (though pressure partially re-instated services heard in Israel). All in all, 650 jobs closed, and Peter forecast a drop of 30m listeners, from 180m.

So the remaining staff have plugged away - and grown the audience, in between the farewell parties. It's excellent news - now all we need is the clarity of a new operating licence, from the BBC Trust. Should the licence fee payer cough up for a service to North Korea, and if so, why ?

 

Patten's progress

Indomitable. Lord Patten delivers quality first by blessing the Cardiff Singer of the World, then, after "breakfast with overnight", proceeds to open Digital Futures Day, at Digital Cardiff Week.

The programme tantalises. "Join Lord Patten and Rhodri Talfan Davies for a lively morning of discussion and debate". Just don't mention spending £100m and getting nowt.

• Psst, Chris. Did Rhodri mention that the Taffia still think they're owed a nice new broadcast centre ?

Unrecognised

In September 2011, we were led to believe that Lord Patten had put his foot down and banned a move to re-introduce BBC bonuses for senior management. In today's Sun, we are told that, in the same year, a "recognition scheme" was introduced, and in two years, nearly £2.5 million has been handed out.

In the first year, 15 managers shared a £300k pay-out; in the second year, 8 managers shared £100k. In all, over 1,500 staff got something above their normal salary - which will irritate those who didn't, and thought bonuses were verboten.

In The Sun, it looks like the BBC spokeswoman did everything she could to avoid the word bonus - "modest cash awards", "small discretionary payments", "legacy contracts" - let's hope Lord Patten hasn't read it.

I Am not happy

Was series two of The Voice a better return on investment that series one ? Did the tweaks demanded by Danny Cohen and his Controller of Entertainment Mark Linsey (a candidate to fill the big chair at BBC1) work ?

Well, you have to say there was an element of surprise to the final. Who would have thought a veal calf could have stayed in Holly Willoughby's dress so quietly for so long ? And then "a visually-impaired civil servant" (the BBC's description, not mine) caught the hearts of an audience tuning in expecting Casualty. Affronted by Will.I.Am, Jessie J and that funny, squeaky girl, they picked up their easy-touch phones and voted, while the cool kids went to the pub, confident that odds-on favourite Leah had it in the bag. Universal Music now pick up the pieces.

7.2m watched the final - up from last year, but still not the event television of Britain's Got Talent and Strictly Come Dancing.

Mark Lindsay claimed £1,434.28 in expenses associated with discussions of new ideas and new talent in the most recent quarter. The money seems to have produced the idea of a comedian hosting a Saturday night show; Michael McIntyre is piloting next month.

Morning Gill

Radio 5 Live Breakfast has a new editor - Gill Farrington. (Previous incumbent Scott Solder has moved into making films for The One Show). As first owner, I like to keep an eye on these things.

Gill was one of the first to say "yes" to a move to Salford - but then, she's from the area, having studied at Hulme Grammar School in Oldham, before Leicester University. She has two children, and husband Tim, a motor industry analyst, struck a deal with his bosses to work one week London, one week Manchester.

Big Dave

The new editor of the Sun is David Dinsmore, a product of Strathallan School, in Forgadenny, just outside Perth. Contemporaries of David at this boarding school for the sons and daughters of well-heeled parents include Rick Fulton, showbiz editor of the Daily Record; Tim Reid, Westminster correspondent for BBC Scotland, and former newspaper columnist Dominik Diamond, now on classic rock Q107, Toronto.

Here's Mr Dinsmore defending printing pictures of Prince Harry in the buff.



Mr Dinsmore is, I think, 44 - and, at around 15 stone, heavy for a fanatical cyclist.

The Savile papers

The nice man who made the Freedom of Information request asking the BBC how much they paid Jimmy Savile over the years has been led a merry dance. Instead of just adding it up, the BBC sent files to an outside company to scan, then posted (without a stamp) 1,000 pieces of paper to the inquirer.

Without moaning, Martin Salter has now made the documents available to the world, on Google Drive. They merit some sort of postgraduate study.

My first peek reminds us how often BBC producers in the mid-60s sought Savile's opinions on "youth" - when Savile was already in his forties. There's 10 guineas for an interview with the African Service,  20 guineas for appearing on Line Up, with Yehudi Menuhin, 10 guineas for talking to Arthur Murphy on Look North about "your ideas for outside activities for children who are unmanageable at home", 5 guineas for taking part in "Something to Say" on the Light Programme and 5 guineas for a contribution to Junior Points Of View. When Radio 1 came along in 1967, there was £100 for each edition of Savile's Travels and £82.50 for Speakasy. The going rate for Top of the Pops was 150 guineas - and when it moved from Manchester to London, there was an additional £5 for the return rail fare; no hotel expenses.

One eerie invoice - to Top of the Pops producer Johnnie Stewart, in November 1965, is for 25 guineas, for "for being filmed with children playing with toys" at Greenheys Primary School, Manchester.

Game on

A summer of sporting contests for screen time ahead on BBC News tv bulletins. "Combative" Dan Roan, square-jawed Chief Sports Correspondent, currently reporting standing sideways on the Lions tour, has a new member of his team - ITV sports reporter Natalie Pirks joins Auntie in July.

It's a return to public service broadcasting for Natalie - she was with Grandstand (remember ?) in 2003. Has she acquired the emphatic hand gestures, eye-brow raising and five-word groupings required of modern tv sports analysis ?  Dare Dan take a holiday ?

Table for one

The BBC's boss in Northern Ireland, Peter Johnston, a survivor of inquiries into Newsnight/McAlpine, had a busier quarter than normal in some middle-weight "fusion" restaurants around London. His declared expense claims detail his choice of eateries for "dinner with overnight" (most other claimants leave it at that). Oddly, there's no sign of BBC canteens in the list. Perhaps they were closed.

We have..
Soho Thai, St Anne's Court, W1
Wagamama, SE1
Golden Dragon, W1
Wahaca, W12
Conchiglia, W1
Gaylord, W1
Pizza Express, W12

Claims over the previous nine months feature...
Royal Tandoori, Holland Park
Busaba Eathai, W12
Wahaca, WC2
Sopranos, Kensington High Street
Kensington Tandoori
Smollenskys, Strand
Giraffe, Heathrow

X Factor

You may freeze my pay, but you can't touch my exes. The claims submitted by BBC senior managers rose by 19% in the last reported quarter. The spirit of Caroline Thomson lives on - taxis are on the up. My mini-league table (not comprehensive) has HR Director Lucy Adams at No 5, on £821.64;  Director of Television Danny Cohen at No 4 on £967.75; Creative Director Alan Yentob at No 3 on £977.87; Peter Salmon, Director North at No 2, on £1046.27.

Zooming in at No 1 is Commercial Director Bal Samra, at a whacking £2013.73.

Some other odds and ends: Ian Haythornthwaite, Finance Director, BBC North and Future Media, totted up £3728 on trains between Preston and London, and London hotels.

Regular reader Pat Younge gets a creative prize for claiming £405.50 twice for sessions with trainees, needed for "networking, reflection and regrouping".

What made Milwaukee famous

When BBC staff complain about smelly toilets, mice or wastepaper bins (lack of), their ire is directed at something that calls itself "Workplace". This is, in fact, an outsourced contract for facilities management, currently provided in London and Scotland by Johnson Controls, headquartered in Milwaukee. They, to the surprise of many UK firms, clinched the deal back in 2006, beating 47 other applicants in a nine-month tender process.

Now it seems, despite one contract extension, the partnership is about to end. The BBC has gone out to tender for a single contract to cover ALL buildings, and though Johnson made it to the last six, they failed to make the final three.

Is this important ? Well, if you're some of the key staff in this area who survived when the BBC first outsourced to Land Securities Trillium in 2001, then on to JC, and next year, probably to someone else, it's yet another TUPE with all that re-branding and new mindset guff - they probably would prefer to spend the time dealing with the mice.

It's a mark of their dedication that New BH scrubbed up so nicely for HM The Queen with this hanging over them. Now to settle that bill for Shake'n'Vak.

Deal of the day

Here's a clip from LBC on the FOI news (in fairness, I think, uncovered by The Telegraph) that 539 BBC staff have left the organisation over the past five years under compromise agreements (in tabloid-speak, "gagging orders") worth a total of £28 million.

A standard clause was that you don't tell anyone how much you got in your exit deal. This, to many personnel officers, was more important that anything else in the compromise agreement  - they were very nervous about establishing "going rates" (see what I did there ?) that could set new levels of demand from senior staff and their advisers. Some would say they failed.

listen to ‘LBC Reporter Doorsteps BBC Director General Over £22m Gagging Clauses’ on Audioboo

Prizes for identifying the mystery voice. 

Just for fun

Now it's time for the Only Connect wall. Imagine you are, say, Controller, Production, Radio of a major public service broadcaster, and you're seeking to combine some groups, to reduce the number of managers in your department. You have 30 seconds to reduce four to two....

Remember, the answer is not always obvious....

Benighted

The Daily Mail notes that Mark Thompson, former BBC DG, hasn't featured in an Honours list since his departure for New York - there's been something for most recent DGs except Alasdair Milne.

The independent members of the Arts and Media Honours Committee are Lord Fellowes of West Stafford, creator of Dowton Abbey for ITV (last seen on the BBC in a 2006 panel game Never Mind The Full Stops, which lasted just one series of five shows); Dame Liz Forgan, who left the BBC in 1996 after a fight with John Birt about moving radio news and current affairs to Television Centre (Mark was then running BBC2);  Julia Peyton Jones, Director of the Serpentine Gallery; Luke Rittner - Chief Executive, Royal Academy of Dance; and Sir Peter Stothard - Editor, The Times Literary Supplement, and Editor of Cherwell at Oxford University when Lord (Tony) Hall was editing Isis.

Ex-officio (until recently) members included Jonathan Stephens, formerly Permanent Secretary at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, who must have been part of Jeremy Hunt's team concluding the done-in-a-weekend licence fee settlement with Mark Thompson.

Paintballs

Fans of quality tv will be interested to know that the BBC has a pilot show under consideration called Kiss Bang Wallop - from a format developed by Fremantle Media, which they called Bang Bang. Here's the pitch trailer, that clearly caught some BBC eyes at Cannes last year - some rude words, so watch the sound levels. Let's hope the consideration period is short and decisive.

Prep time

The uncorrected minutes of the Public Accounts Committee session with the BBC in MediacityUK last week are rich stuff - but richer is to come in the BBC's Annual Report - containing the audited accounts which CFO Zarin Patel revealed were signed off by the Executive Board on that very day, June 10th.

KPMG are the auditors, and the PAC was interested that they also signed the accounts off last year, apparently happy with what they were told about the Digital Media Initiative - though we know now there were written concerns in the hands of The Trust. It took from October 2012 to May 2013 for Accenture to report on DMI problems - and their findings led to the cancellation of the project by Lord Hall. That was decisive action - but five months suggests that the issues were not cut and dried.

Zarin also revealed that the BBC spent £10.3m on consultants in 2012/3. I can't find a reported figure for 2011/2, but in 2010/11 it was £8.23m (including nearly £1m to Accenture; and £3m to Deloitte, who provided services to DMI, amongst other things - maybe that should have been the other way round). It's a line to watch for the current year - a number of new consultants have been spotted round the place, thinking strategically, as Lord Hall and James Purnell prep their "radical" ten-year plan promised for October. Lord Hall will be a sprightly 72 when that's fulfilled.

And we're being softened up for some big numbers in pay-offs - both in headcount and cash - with a rush for deals as the September cap (£150k) promised by Lord Hall comes into play. Watering eyes will be drawn to John Smith's settlement.

• The minutes of the PAC session also have some good stuff about Salford relocations. It seems one senior manager got a package to relocate his second home from the "East of England" to the Manchester area. According to Peter Salmon, "this was somebody who was business ­critical, a key leader here, and who had done a brilliant job for us". Presumably still doing that with their main residence in London, like Peter. 

Don't tell Ma Hodge

The White Queen starts tonight...made in Belgium.

The series was commissioned by the Controller of BBC Drama Ben Stephenson. In Belgium the series is supported by BNP Paribas Fortis Film Fund who support Belgium’s Tax Shelter and by the Belgian Broadcaster VRT. An application for support has also been submitted to the Media Fund of the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF).

So Bruges's Gothic Hall is the Royal Court of Westminster Palace. The Heilige Geeststraat is a medieval London street. The Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk is Westminster Chapel. The Heilige Bloedkapel is the Tower of London.  Many of the smaller indoor sets were built in an old Philips factory nearby.

The Belgian deal provides 150% tax exemption for investors in audio-visual productions, provided they have a Belgian partner. David Claikens of BNP Paribas Fortis Filmfonds says “We are the only ones working with a ‘blind fund’, a system in which our clients invest without knowing what production is involved. This means the money is immediately available".  It's estimate that producing The White Queen required some 10 million euros - the highest tax shelter agreed so far.

Who goes where ?

Some interesting moves in BBC foreign postings are underway. Middle East Bureau editor (and Curtis Brown author) Paul Danahar is heading to Washington. Wyre Davies has already left, for Rio. Jon Donnison is leaving the West Bank and Gaza watch for Sydney. Yolande Knell is still based in Jerusalem. Jeremy Bowen is still Middle East Editor - appointed in June 2005 - but spends some of his time in London.

News and comedy

As well as Olympic-related gongs, there's a reasonable haul for other parts of the BBC in the latest honours list. Kay Alexander, who retired last October from presenting breakfast and lunchtime tv bulletins for Midlands Today, becomes an MBE, as does Harry Gration (roughly the same age, but still presenting Look North from Leeds).

There's an OBE for Gareth Gwenlan, now 76, who began his association with BBC Comedy in 1967. As head of department he commissioned Yes Prime Minister, Blackadder (which assisted Tony Robinson and Rowan Atkinson with their careers), 'Allo 'Allo, One Foot In The Grave and more. Before that he'd produced and/or directed The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin, Butterflies, To The Manor Born, and Only Fools And Horses.

Alongside that, there's another for comedy producer Jon Plowman, who worked directly for Auntie from 1980 to 2007 - starting with Russell Harty, and moving through sketch shows with Fry and Laurie, French and Saunders  and Smith and Jones, to Bottom, Absolutely Fabulous, The Vicar of Dibley, The League of Gentlemen, The Office, Little Britain and The Thick of It.

Actor David Haig, who probably won't want to be remembered for the Ben Elton sitcom-comeback, The Wright Way, becomes an MBE.

BBC special correspondent Sue Lloyd Roberts, who became an MBE for reporting on trafficking in human organs in 2001, steps up to OBE. Sue take her mind off human rights some of the time running a hotel in Mallorca with husband Nick Guthrie, ex-BBC foreign editor and producer, who still edits Dateline London for BBC World.

Overnights

From the blurb for The Crucible Theatre, Sheffield - home to the DocFest....

"No member of the audience is ever further than 22 metres from the stage, and the sightlines are excellent, offering equality of experience across the auditorium".

The 980-seat venue looked less than intimate for yesterday's 2pm experience - In Conversation With Alan Yentob. Individual tickets were £10 cash, £11.50 on a card, £11 online, and £8 concessions.

Olympian

The London Olympics feature, once again, throughout the latest honours list. There's an OBE for Clare Balding; an OBE for Dave Gordon, from BBC Sport, and an MBE for his chief engineer Richard Morgan. Arise, Sir Anish Kapoor, begetter of The Orbit-Twirly-Whirly Thing; Thomas Heatherwick, creator of the 204-flame Bunsen burner-cauldron, becomes a CBE; Kevin Finnan, who choreographed the opening ceremony is made an MBE. Dennis Hone, who was with the ODA from 2006, rose to CEO and now runs Olympic legacy, becomes a CBE.

There are gongs for a range of civil servants who clearly did quite a bit of co-ordination - Mandy Hope, at the MoD, Kathryn Foster at the Home Office/UK Border Force; Ann Wojtowicz at Local Government on legacy; Carolyn Dolan, at the Department of Transport. And bigger gongs for Jonathan Stephens, Permanent Secretary at the DCMS, who, spookily, announced only last month he was moving on. For conspiracy theorists, there's also an honour for Deputy Head of News and DCMS-lifer, Toby Sargent.

The police get three honours - Assistant Commissioner Christopher Allison, who was overall Security Co-ordinator, Met "Gold commander" Bob Broadhurst and Superintendent Brian Pearce. There's an MBE for Wendy Solesbury of the Red Cross; another for Shaun McCarthy, chair of Sustainable London 2012; and one for Penny Briscoe, paralympic performance director. Andrew Finding, CEO of the British Equestrian Federation is awarded an OBE.

I make that 20 Olympic-related honours - on top of the 39 we had at the New Year.

Nothing, yet, for Roger Mosey. I shall consider some BBC honours in another post.

Checks

Followers of natty John Smith, who left the BBC last year and is en route to Burberry will be delighted to learn that he's making do with a basic salary of £575k with his new employer. However, if he meets targets, there's a bonus of £3.8m. And he gets additional cash allowances for a car and threads.

He'll be called Chief Operating Officer, but really replaces Chief Financial Officer Stacey Cartwright, whose package this year was worth £3.2 million.

We'll have to wait to July to see what sort of farewell settlement John got from Auntie.

Gover-nando's

No tipis, motivational speakers or barbecues for Patten and the Krollster; the BBC Trust's big two-day meeting was held in 180 Great Portland Street on 24/25 April, with an agenda so dour that Lords Hall and Patten must have welcomed the chance to skip out for a light grilling by the good-natured MPs that form the DCMS select committee (presumably at risk as much as the Department brief they monitor).

And at the end of the two days with nary a mention of DMI, the Trustees had to hold up the Gilded Mirror of the UK Corporate Governance Code, and look themselves (and their nostrils flaring with the aroma of Peri-Peri Prego Steak Rolls wafting up from Nando's) firmly in the Weeping Eye of Board Self Evaluation.

There's something rather poignant about the minute: The Trust noted the outcomes of its board evaluation exercise and discussed how to report these in the BBC’s Annual Report for 2012-13. Surely just put the lot online ?

One more review

2012 was an extraordinary year for the BBC. But Lord Patten (and/or his successor) might like to consider commissioning one more piece of consultancy - an examination of how changing a CEO slowly created organisational (not output) paralysis.

Here are the bare bones. Ben Fenton outlined Patten's main task as early as December 2010 (before he got the chairmanship). I fleshed out the timetable in December 2011.  These were not necessarily searing insights - probably obvious to many more.

From the official "off" of the DG Stakes, you had an executive led by a man who did not want any late blots on his CV, and staffed by at least four people who thought they had a chance of the succession - and didn't want any late blots on their CVs. The boss didn't want to hear tales of failure, danger, risk - and the management team weren't keen to tell them.

So listening mode was off as the Executive drifted over and above problems with not just DMI, but Savile, bullying, pay reform, restructuring, who next to send to Salford, closing an orchestra and many more. Memos and letters in the DGs office went unread by Thommo, executive conversations were brief and elliptic, and unions were promised jam tomorrow.  Not long to Wimbledon, the Olympics - and the next big job.

Some of those too-hard decisions are still in the new DGs in-tray. Cancelling DMI was an important sign from Lord Hall about waste - but the consequences will play out for some time. It would be good to get out a few more before Glastonbury.

Oil

The contents of the BBC's kitchens at Television Centre are up for grabs - and it seems they had more than one way of dealing with potatoes.

Valentine s/s twin deep fat fryer, 2x Electrolux deep fat fryer, 2x Falcon deep fat fryer, Emodis deep fat fryer. More lots being added...

Gray day

Congratulations to Jim Gray, arriving back at the BBC to fulfil the Tony Hall commitment to putting "Current Affairs" back on the masthead for News. He'll be called Head of TV Current Affairs, and Deputy Head of the News Programmes Department.

Jim joins from ITN where, until last year, he was Editor of Channel 4 News for 14 years; not sure if there was a Jay Hunt factor in that parting. Before that, he spent 17 years at the BBC, first at Radio 4 (mainly The World Tonight) and later at Newsnight, where he progressed from Political Producer to Deputy Editor (to Peter Horrocks).

Will there be any travel from Auntie in the other direction, where there is a Deborah Turness-size hole as Editor ITV News ?

Brmm brmm

BBC FOI news: "During the financial year 1 April 2011 to 31 March 2012, a total of £2,646,618 was paid in car allowances to 531 individuals". That's a big drop from £3,279,866 in the previous year, but still a substantial number.

It's not entirely down to a reduction in the number of bosses. The BBC has been phasing out private medical insurance and car allowances for new executives and senior managers with effect from August 2011 and April 2012 respectively.  But when you're looking at the website for salary comparisons, you should note:  old execs and managers have the cash benefit included in their total package; new people, like James Purnell, James Harding and Anne Bulford don't.....

World weary

I'm having some senior moments with figures, and I know there are erudite readers who will put me right. The FCO has passed on the Chancellor's additional Budget cut of 1% in funding to "non-protected areas" of public spending to the BBC World Service. This, in the FCO's terms, is £2.22m. Yet the BBC puts grant-in-aid to World Service at £238.5m - so I'm really not sure what figure the percentage is taken from.

Then, variously, Lord Patten is increasing the World Service budget by £6.5m in 2014/15 or by £5m in 2014/15. I'm sure he knows the right answer.

More interestingly (I hope), we still don't have sight of a World Service operating licence from the good Lord. Why £5m - what for ? Taken overall, some 1.7m licence fees are required to support the planned £245m spend in 2014/15. Of course, this figure might be offset by advertising income - there are ads on BBC World Service sites in Arabic, Spanish and Russian; and an experiment with ads underway on a Berlin FM transmitter. I've no doubt this will grow - but, philosophically, that puts World Service in the same "boat" as the ad-funded BBC World - and yet tied to a double signature-deal with the Foreign Secretary and BBC Trust chairman if it wants to make any "significant change" to its output. The Operating Licence is supposed to define "significant change".

What really needs to be written down is an easily-understood rationale for BBC to be broadcasting in any foreign language, now it requires licence-fee support. The FCO motives are clear - soft power, influence, correcting a perceived democratic deficit etc. Frankly, I'm not sure any licence-fee payer has been properly prepared for helping to correct a democratic deficit from 1st April 2014. Mark Thompson said "the licence fee should provide more secure and more politically independent funding for the World Service"; bravo, but you can't start or cut a language service without FCO approval - and the current list is an odd mixture of the strategic and historic. 

I'd prefer a rationale that says the BBC should be concerned about global languages - bring back French, for example - and languages that link to the UK's major communities.  Let the Government fund directly output deemed "strategic", or allow the BBC to cut it from the list. And it now looks too late to retreat from the move to ad-funding; acknowledge that, and put a five-year plan in place, so I can stop worrying about defining "democratic deficits" and "significant change".

• Does advertising follow the agenda for BBC World ? It's pretty clear here.

Looking peaky

The BBC1 scheduling team must be itching to see Wimbledon on their screens - and running on into peak-time.

In the week ending June 2, 12 ITV shows (four Corries, 8 BGTs) rated higher than the highest BBC1 show in the overnights (Wednesday's East Enders, at 7.18m).

Since last Thursday, the 9pm slot has been something of a nightmare for BBC1. Thursday saw the Panorama Cash for Questions Undercover, returning 1.3m. Friday was a little better: The Voice, moved from Saturday to miss Hungary's Got Variety Acts, was the top scorer, but at a mere 4.21m. On Saturday, the BGT final duly produced 48.9% share of the audience, and Casualty was reduced to overnight figures of  2.9m. Sunday saw the first part of Dan Snow's D-Day documentary, at 2.3m, beaten by Poirot, at 4.5m. And last night, poor old Dan, moving up to 2.6m, was beaten by the last episode of The Fall on BBC2, at 3.7m.

The Voice has a clearer run this Saturday, with that nice Mr Fincham only offering a big screen animation Despicable Me to start. There may be more competition at the end of The Voice marathon (2 hours and 10 minutes - really) from Peter Kay's Goodbye Granadaland in ITV, and rugby on BBC2.

From Monday, the BBC1 9pm slot offers New Tricks (repeat), the last of Frankie (featuring lupus), The Apprentice, Life Savers and Miranda/Mrs Brown's Boys (repeats). Saturday sees another 2 hour 10 minutes of The Voice. Imagine The Queen sitting through that, Danny.

Multi-skilled

I'm getting mild amusement from one of the new features of the BBC Jobs wesbite: "People who applied for this job also applied for....".

For example, underneath the details of the vacancy for Orchestra Production Manager, BBC Concert Orchestra, someone thought their skillset also supported an application for Kick Off Sports Reporter Scotland.

An applicant to be Correspondent in Georgia also had a bish at Technical Project Manager, Salford Quays.

And those seeking to support Jim Purnell as HR Assistant, Strategy and Digital have been trying for Team Assistant, Legal: Marketing Co-ordinator; Licencing Co-ordinator - and Kick Off Sports Reporter London.

Positive thinking

"When I appeared in front of the PAC, I answered all of the questions from committee members honestly and in good faith. I did so on the basis of information provided to me at the time by the BBC executives responsible for delivering the project." Former BBC DG Mark Thompson, in a statement today explaining his praise of the now-cancelled Digital Media Initiative in evidence to the Commons Public Accounts Committee back in February 2011.

Here's part of his evidence: What is happening at the moment is that DMI is out in the business. There are many programmes that are already being made with DMI, and some have gone to air and are going to air with DMI already working. It is true that some modules are slightly later in delivery than we initially planned, but other modules have been brought forward, though. Crucially, is it on track now to fully deliver over the course of this year for BBC North and Salford? Yes, it is. Are there going to be any significant further delays in benefit from the way we are delivering it? No, there won’t be. We have got a more flexible way of delivering, but it is out in the business. The modules which are out there are working and are making programmes, and what is exciting about DMI is that the feedback from users of the system is very positive. I think you are going to see a broader deployment of the system across the BBC than we expected, because of the enthusiasm with which it is being used.

BBC lead finance Trustee Anthony Fry told the PAC today "There was not enough technological expertise around either the Trust table, or the executive board table, to actually go ahead on something of this scale and complexity...It is extraordinarily worrying. At a personal level it is probably the most serious, embarrassing thing I have ever seen"

In February 2011, this was part of Mr Fry's evidence to that same PAC session.

Q96 Chair : I just wanted to ask Mr Fry: are you content with the degree of oversight and challenge that you have of the programme now?

Anthony Fry: I attended my first FCC in January 2009, and since then I do not think there has been a single meeting of the Finance Committee where the subject of DMI in its various guises has not been discussed. As I said to you earlier, we were more focused, rightly or wrongly, on the potential loss to the taxpayer, which is clearly very important in terms of the short term cost of terminating the contract. The longer-term loss to the taxpayer and the licence fee payer in the event that this contract goes wrong when it is managed in-house is much more serious. Am I content? No, of course I am not content. Until this is done and dusted and delivered, I am going to spend every FCC worrying the heck about this. This is a big contract. 

Q97 Chair : I asked a different question: are you content with your capability of overseeing and challenging?  

Anthony Fry: I think we have now a sufficient flow of information to actually understand what is happening and where the problems may or may not be occurring in the delivery of the contract. At the moment, I think we are content. But I am content this month; I may not be content next month. If I am not content, I can assure you I will be asking the Director-General to make me content. 

Alongside Messrs Fry and Thompson that February was Erik Huggers, Director of Future Media and Technology, about to leave the BBC at the end of that month for a job with Intel.

Q50 Ian Swales: You talked about the degree of innovation; can you give an example of something that was truly, truly innovative as part of this work?

Erik Huggers: Absolutely. I am going to be a bit technical, if you will allow me. 

Ian Swales: Go on, try me. 

Erik Huggers: Well, it is not that technical. Basically, everything stands and falls with metadata. Metadata is the data that describe the actual audio and video assets. Now, if you look at the sheer volume of output that the BBC produces, no one in the world had ever created a system to capture all that metadata in the way that we have done. We have talked to every broadcaster who is up there in scale and size, and they all say that this is unique. One unique thing that we have done is that we can track each frame of every video, literally down to the frame. No one has done that before. So, you can now search on a frame-by-frame basis-and there are 25 frames per second? 

Mark Thompson: Yes. 

Erik Huggers: For every bit of video ever shot. 

Q51 Chair : You mean all this little bit as we are being filmed now? 

Erik Huggers: Yes, absolutely. We would be able to track it if we were using DMI. We know for a fact that that is one real innovation. I think the other innovation is that it has never been done at this scale. 

And it may never be.....

Regulat-ion

I'm sure someone could do this for Huw Edwards...

Here's a short rap constructed by the Jimmy Fallon Show team, featuring NBC anchor Brian Williams. Sorry about the ad.

Copying without looking

Sometimes the BBC's wriggling over FOI requests is reminiscent of scenes from Alice in Wonderland. Here's the latest on attempts to get information about how much Jimmy Savile was paid over the years..

A request was submitted in January. At the end of March, the BBC, apparently generously, said that although "contributor files.. fall outside of the scope of the Act,  in this case the BBC is prepared to volunteer this information to you.  Due to the age of the files in question, it has proved difficult to scan pages in sufficiently high quality. I therefore propose sending the information to you in hard copy form."

Now we learn that the originals - many of them carbon copies - were sent outside the BBC to produce these  hard copies. So they WERE scanned, but not by the BBC, and instead of getting a digital copy  in the process, the BBC has only new paper copies. Which it hasn't got time or resources to SCAN. See ?  From the organisation that brought you the iPlayer.

Enjoy the detail of this letter, sent out at the end of last week...

As we have previously explained, the original documentation is over 1000 pages, much of which is carbon copy paper from the 1960s-70s. Our own photocopiers are unable to replicate a copy of a readable quality documents of this quality, so we have organised for a third party with appropriate technology to produce a photocopy on our behalf which we can post to you if required. 

We have not been able to scan this document to provide you with a copy via e-mail as the PDF document created by our scanning technology exceeds the size permitted to be saved and e-mailed by our systems. As I am sure you will appreciate, breaking the document down into more manageable chunks has significant staff time implications.

Aversion therapy

It must be very galling for someone quite new to tv reporting to see the guts of their scoop go to others, and then end up with a poor audience for their big debut.

Daniel Foggo, ex Mail, Telegraph and Sunday Times, presented the Panorama that teased MPs and Lords with pretend money from Fiji. The pre-emptive Tory party resignation of Patrick Mercer meant that the "money shot" (stop sniggering) of Daniel's Panorama special had to be pulled out and used by BBC political correspondents to explain the story on Friday 31 May. By the time we got to full transmission on Thursday 5 June, Panorama returned overnight ratings of just 1.3m viewers. It was even beaten by The Most Dangerous Man In Tudor England, on BBC2, with 1.6m.

Panorama also gave credit to the Telegraph's investigations editor, Claire Newell, as "2nd Undercover reporter". The film was made by Snapper TV, the indie formed by Philip "Pip" Clothier and his partner Rosie Millard, former BBC Arts correspondent. Pip apparently wears a snoring ring.

Passing through

It's not just BBC News staff who've been demonstrating minds of their own...there's solidarity from robotic cameras, apparently.

Lose loose talk

CNN's new boss Jeff Zucker must be scratching his head. He's trying to assemble a team of brighter, younger, sassier presenters (though failing on diversity), and says news is the name of the game. In a week's time he launches a new Breakfast pairing - Chris Cuomo and Kate Bolduan - in a set more reminiscent of a New York loft than a newsroom; and his new weekly chat show host, George Stroumboulopoulos (nicked from Canada) is on a promotional tour of tv studios (engagingly meeting George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America).

His new afternoon tyro, Jake Tapper, weekdays at 4pm, made an early impact in the ratings (such that people have started muttering about the poor figures for CNN's stalwart, Wolf Blitzer).

And yet. Last week's figures for the network - a week when the US news agenda had calmed down - are back down, some of them below last June's ratings, itself a record low month in 2012. In the "key demographic" of 25 to 54 year olds, Piers Morgan has returned figures of (Mon) 86k, (Tues) 84k (Wed) 96k and (Thu) 70k. It's clear sassy chat without the backing of a serious on-the-day news agenda will not hack it for Zucker.

Smiles all round

A grand day yesterday at Broadcasting House. It's tricky stuff, big buildings, and there were times in my life when I thought the BBC wasn't really the sort of organisation that could do it anymore - playing variously small and larger parts in Norman Foster's Radio Centre, planned for the Langham Hotel site, and RHWL's designs for a News, Radio Centre and Concert Hall as Phases 2 and 3 at White City; both cancelled by people who thought they knew better.

The redevelopment of Broadcasting House as a project has spanned five DGs (and two acting DGs). Lord (Tony) Hall beamed throughout the Queen's visit - probably remembering his part-time task whilst Director of News, creating a "2020 Property Vision", which set the strategy. Lord Patten was also chipper (morning, m'lord - I get the feeling he's a reader).

Many more could and should take pride in the day. Over a decade there've been at least 4 Project Directors and many more mini-Project Directors across the organisation. (I ate at the pompous tree, too, calling myself Editorial Director for a period, in the misguided hope that I might stand out). Five different finance directors kept an eye on the books. Three lots of architects took part, MJP, Sheppard Robson and HOK - and it was sad not to see Sir Richard MacCormac there. [Bovis] Lend Lease were the builders throughout - they also got through a fistful of project directors.

But there's a handful, inside and outside the BBC, who've been there throughout or almost throughout (they know who they are), plugging away, committed, "delivering", trying to take intelligent decisions and make sensible, inevitable compromises to keep the thing going, when opponents of Auntie turned their fire (and some executives looked the other way).

If staff morale at the BBC is at rock-bottom, it wasn't apparent yesterday. At Broadcasting House, there's a new generation and a renewed buzz. It's unsteady, and a little fragile and confused. How come all these pinkoes flash-mobbed a constitutional monarch in a bizarre sort of Journalist Spring ? Told to behave, they just didn't.

The new Executive would do well to capitalise on the mood and the building, announce new structures, sort pay, and set a new, more convincing and transparent direction for the savings they still have to make, so that the buzz can get louder, and through to licence-payers and the world.

Formal

Very nicely choreographed. More tomorrow....

Wine

"The cost, excluding VAT, of all alcoholic products purchased from the BBC’s preferred supplier during the period 01/01/2012 to 31/12/2012 was £42,971.38. We can confirm that there was no spend on champagne. A detailed breakdown including the type and brand purchased is detailed at Appendix I."

"If you plan to use the information provided in this FOI for the purposes of a media report, we have provided you with the following on the record response from the BBC. “The BBC has very tight guidelines that govern the limited occasions when alcohol may be bought. For 2012 the total spend from our preferred supplier amounts to just over £2 per head.”

Appendix 1 can be found here:

Here are the top brands, by volume...

Still Wine
414 bottles of Mountain View Sauvignon Blanc (from "the largest family-owned winery in Chile") @ £4.00
384 bottles of Pinot Grigio Pavia Pasqua (Venetian)  @ £4.03
269 bottles of Neblina Sauvignon Blanc (Central Valley - Chile) @ £3.97

Sparkling Wine
261 bottles of Unduragga Brut (Maipo Valley Chile) @£4.77 (currently £8.99 at Majestic)

Beer
1920 bottles of Peroni Nastro Azzuro @£0.98 a bottle

Spirits
31 bottles of Smirnoff Red Label Vodka @£13.13 a bottle

But it's not all hair-shirt stuff. There were two bottles of Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc, at £16.66 each; two of the Cloudy Bay Pinot Noir, at £19.99, and a sprinkling of "Gift sets".

Creativity

Alan Yentob, editor and presenter, has just announced the next six-part series of Imagine.

Here's the line up.

1: "Vivian Maier: Who Took Nanny's Pictures ?"  This may well be related to a US documentary entitled Finding Vivian Maier, but may need added Yentob, maybe even filmed in Chicago.



2: "McCullin". This may well be related to the Artificial Eye documentary McCullin, released earlier this year.  Added Yentob not required; will we get it ?



3: "Rod Stewart: Can't Stop Me Now". Alan Yentob visits legendary rocker Rod Stewart at his LA home. Presumably our hero couldn't synchronise a visit to Rod's UK home in Waltham Abbey....

4: "Zaha Hadid: Who Dares Wins". Imagine visits her buildings across the globe, from Austria to Azerbaijan, as Alan Yentob explores what makes Zaha Hadid tick.

5 & 6: Robert B Weide's February 1912 feature, "Woody Allen: A Documentary", cut into two parts.

Do they mean me ?

I wonder how many BBC types will take this show in at the Edinburgh Fringe ?

"Making News" is the latest topical offering from Islington councillor and lawyer Robert Khan and his writing partner Tom Salinsky (who admits to having run some corporate training courses for Auntie); they wrote "Coalition" in 2012, and say they started work on this before George Entwistle was appointed.

It stars Phil Jupitus as Roger Seabright, BBC Director General - 'very much the old school patrician, a safe pair of hands'; Suki Webster plays Rachel Clarke, newly-installed acting head of BBC News; and the action follows the 24-hour news cycle as a major story is poised to break about the corporation. Other characters include an apparently 'assured 6 O'Clock News presenter, who's more panicky off screen', and a Panorama reporter 'crossing the line from current affairs to news'.

Still at large

I think we knew he was old, but...

Business assurance

Whilst a whistleblower (who'd left the organisation already) was writing to Lord Patten about the risks facing the Digital Media Initiative in May last year, was the rest of the BBC really silent ?

In an amusing re-cycling of consultants, the BBC Trust has peered over the Lyons Lorgnettes of Scrutiny and invited Price Waterhouse Cooper to find out what went wrong. In 2006 PWC helped the NAO with a review of the BBC's management of risk, for the BBC Governors - just ahead of the formal creation of The BBC Trust. The Governors noted they were "developing a draft risk protocol for possible approval by the BBC Trust in line with its duties under the new Charter. The protocol will specify how the BBC Trust will carry out its duties under the new Charter and Agreement regarding the oversight of risk."

One of the processes apparently already in place in June 2006 - a monthly written report for the Governors’ Finance and General Purposes Committee on the top five risks identified by the Director-General. I wonder how many monthly reports had red against DMI over the years ?  Or, alternatively, if it wasn't in the top five risks, why not ?

Then again, when the NAO scrutinised DMI in 2011 (did they really get the full story ?) there was a recommendation to the Trust to widen issues that should be flagged up, arguing that the current practice was based on narrow financial thresholds (i.e. budget changes) and not on "significant changes to the cost benefit of a project" (i.e. not getting what you were paying for). I hope the Clerkes of Great Portland Street can find a bit of vellum with that all nicely written up for PWC.

Relocation Relocation Relocation

The Commons Public Accounts Committee will grill the BBC next Monday afternoon on the NAO report on relocation to Salford. This particular curate's egg will be defended by Director of BBC North, Peter Salmon, outgoing CFO Zarin Patel (who must be hoping she can leave the Corporation before the Committee turns its mind to the Digital Media Initiative), and Trust finance specialist Anthony Fry (repeat previous bracketed content).

The committee might be asking about Peter's personal circs: at one stage he promised to buy "a family home"   near Salford by March this year.

• This session will distract from Zarin's briefing of Anne Bulford, newly arrived from C4, on the Corporation financial plans, and progress, or otherwise on Delivering Quality First. 

Stay calm

If things get a little fractious at MediaCityUK from next month, the spiritual soothing of a chaplain will no longer be available. Reverend Hayley Matthews, first holder of the post, is moving on, after nearly three years, to become the first female Rector of Holy Innocents' Church in the parish of Birch and Fallowfield, five miles south of the Ship Canal.

As well as being Chaplain to MediaCityUK, she's been co-ordinator of The Anchor project, based in The Pie Factory, an Associate Chaplain for Salford University, and a contributor to Pause For Thought on Radio 2.

No word yet on a replacement: Hayley was mainly C of E funded, and it may be somebody else's turn.

Thought for food

BBC staff may or may not be delighted to know that Auntie is putting her canteen and catering contracts out to tender, with a view to a three- to five-year deal worth up to £47.5m, starting in April next year. It might be a good time to remind your bosses what you think of the current service...

Dress sense

The dovecotes are a-flutter at Broadcasting House - and it's not the hired hawks that are doing it. It's the visit later this week by The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh.

A range of executives and middle-managers with little experience of presentee-ism on a Friday have had to change their out-of-office auto-replies - or get their PAs to do it. On Radio 4 Sian Williams and James Naughtie will be discussing the "cultural identity" of the new building - for a whole 45 minutes. (How many times will we hear "iconic"?)  Newsreader Corrie Corfield is worried about what dress and shoes to wear, and the curtsey-ing issue.

But a bigger headache is for the BBC News channel. If Her Maj tours the newsroom, will she be in the live shot behind the presenters - or will it happen when the show moves to a sub-basement studio, for George Alagiah's simulcast hour with BBC World ?

If she's allowed to make a Royal Progress through Dr Evil's Volcano News Lair, will her outfit comply with the "guidelines"? This Vogue record of her ensembles over 12 months shows a preference for bright pastels, and the odd yellow that strays into "Hi-Vis" territory.

Well I nivver

News zings into tradingaswdr HQ from "jez" at Shooting-Star PR; sadly it's not the inside track on the new Controller of BBC1, or the identity of the next Dr Who.

Still it's good news for Bishop Grosseteste University. In Lincoln. Named after the 13th Century theologian and Bishop of Lincoln. It started life in 1862 as a Diocesan Training Centre for Mistresses - that is, teachers. It was granted full university status in December last year. And Roger Mosey, Editorial Director of the BBC, is to be the next, unpaid, chair of the University Council.

Roger is already an Honorary Doctor of Letters at Lincoln University - though I can find no pictures of him in the kit. He joined the BBC as a reporter for BBC Radio Lincolnshire, after a start in broadcasting at Pennine Radio (now The Pulse of West Yorkshire) in Bradford. At Grosseteste, Roger succeeds Haydn Beeken, Area Manager, East of England, Department of Work and Pensions.

Regular John

We've had some fun here tracking the attempts of one Brit to make a dent in the hearts of American tv viewers. From next week, another has a go.

Birmingham-born, Cambridge-educated comedian John Oliver escaped the clutches of Mock the Week and Fighting Talk in 2006, to join Jon Stewart's Daily Show team in New York City - as "Senior British Correspondent". Jon is off for 12 weeks, to direct a film, so John is his chosen one to fill some of the gap - he gets eight weeks, and the remaining four will be filled with repeats.

Most recent overnight figures in the States show an audience of 600,000 18-49 year-olds, and total viewers around 1.5m. But there are many more repeats of the show, and edited versions shown in the UK and around the world.  Oliver tells The Hollywood Reporter: "The ratings are going to go down. Ice is cold, and the ratings of this show are going to go down in the summer. Add to that the fact that I’m here, so you’ll have your regular summer decline and that will become a more elemental nosedive... I’ve got to at least land this show in the water. So I know the ratings are going to go down, I just have to make sure that they don’t collapse".

• Piers Morgan secured the attention of just 86,000 US viewers aged 24-54, in figures for his CNN show on Monday, rising to 445,000 if you include all ages. 

Family Favourites

Past performance is not necessarily a good guide to future results. The People's Coronation last night on BBC One, presented by David Dimbleby, remembering his day with dad, turned in an average audience of just 2.8m in the overnight figures - beaten by drama The Fall on BBC2, with 3.3m.

The 1953 coronation itself turned in tv figures of 20.4 million, with 11.7m listening on radios. That's out of an adult population of around 36.5m.

D-Day wire

Channel 4's history stuff is steering a steadier course that the rest of the network - and "re-creating" D-Day as if live is an interesting idea. They've also got a "river of news" style online site, with stories coming through in the order it all happened. Probably more informative than Candy Crush if you find yourself with spare keyboard time...

Strike a light

I learn, from BBC Jobs, that the project to move BBC Worldwide 700 yards, from the Media Centre in White City to Stage 6 of Television Centre, is called "Vesta".

Vesta, according to Wikipedia, is the virgin goddess of the hearth, home, and family in Roman religion. But it's not what springs to mind to people of my generation...  (Is that John Arlott I hear ?)

Pull

In January 2011, BBC Breakfast Editor Alison Ford mused thus, ahead of the move of her programme to MediacityUK: "Will we get Will Smith on the sofa in Salford? It would be naive of me to say ‘oh yes, it’ll be fine’. It won’t be as easy as it is now."

This morning, Will Smith (and son Jaden) were on BBC Breakfast, filmed in a London hotel. And the piece was sprinkled liberally with promo clips from their latest film, After Earth. Liberally.


















As was a similar Breakfast interview in May last year....

Maybe next year....





.

Where were we ?

Half-term and the Hay Festival are over. So there'll be some bigger names back on BBC television news. Among the Hay performers, Gavin Hewitt, Europe Editor, may turn his attention to Turkey; Middle East Editor Jeremy Bowen may proffer some thoughts on Syria; and Political Editor Nick Robinson may care to look at lobbying. Stephanie Flanders might like to update her blog from 24th May.

Alan Yentob can regale the management board with his thoughts on Eric Schmidt's talk; he perhaps won't mention "wigging out" to Daft Punk at the GQ Soho House Landrover Party.

Team Danny

Danny Cohen has given his first interview as Director of Television at the BBC - to Jeremy Vine, on Points of View. It was recorded; he claims The Voice is regularly getting audiences of between 9 and 10m on BBC1 - last night it fell to a season low of 5.7m. Nonetheless Saturday's show ended with not one but two trails for Series 3 auditions - one embedded at the end of the programme, the second from a continuity that clearly hadn't previewed the show.

Wide-ranging questions elicit little information (and Danny's clearly been edited to push things along). Is the pronunciation of "something" a tad demotic ?

Adding up

The total bill to licence-payers for the Newsnight/Lord McAlpine libel claim settlement was £305,000, made up of £185k damages, £117k costs for McAlpine, and BBC external legal costs of £3k.

Bedfellows

The Panorama/Telegraph sting on Patrick Mercer is unusual in a number of ways. I can't remember the BBC "going undercover" to target an MP before; and I have no recollection of any previous journalistic partnership with The Telegraph, increasingly dismissive of BBC failings under editor Tony Gallagher.

The Telegraph trio of credited reporters (so far) all have previous experience on the Sunday Times. Claire Newell is Investigations Editor; Holly Watt is Whitehall Editor, and seems to have lighted on the Fiji idea - " chosen as the subject of the lobbying investigation because it is an undeserving cause for back-bench MPs; and Daniel Foggo now bills himself as a self-employed tv journalist, after 16 years in Fleet Street.

BBC procedures for this sort of exercise are labyrinthine, and harder to navigate when money is used. The Telegraph/BBC partnership seems to have started in January, as Helen Boaden's tenure at News was coming to an end, and way before the arrival of James Harding from The Times. I presume the team had a pop at a cross-party selection of MPs, and Mercer is the only one who bought the sting in a big way.

Most sincerely

Hughie Green was 50, when Bonnie Langford won Opportunity Knocks at the age of 6, and 54 when Lena Zavaroni won aged 10. Simon Cowell is 53.