Looking for 600

Economic forecasting at the BBC should be more straightforward than in a commercial organisation. So Tim Davie's farewell call for £600m in savings over three years must have some logic. Ahead is a 3.13% rise in the licence fee, but that's based on annual CPI - and the BBC always argues that 'broadcasting inflation' is way ahead of that.  Last year's pay deal saw the total wage bill rise 4.5%; a deal with Equity saw performers get rises between 10 and 13%.

The number of licence fees 'in force' is steadily falling, in the context of politicians and papers 'dissing' paying at all. If there hadn't been an increase in the licence fee for 2024/5, the BBC would have been down £50m, rather than up a billion in income. Say the number of licence fees in force drops 800,000 over the year, the remaining 23,000,000 paying the new £180 rate generates £126.5m of 'new money' in the twelve months.  And CPI won't come down to 2% until late 2027, according to the OBR. 

Young Roy

The Judge handling Trump v BBC, Roy K Altman became the youngest federal judge in the country in 2019, at the age of 36 - nominated by twice by The Donald, and turned down twice by a Senate committee. His first nomination was endorsed by Marco Rubio.

Roy was born in Caracas, Venezuela, and moved to Miami before he was two. He graduated with a BA in history and political science from Columbia University, where he played quarterback on the football team and pitched for the baseball team—earning All-Ivy honors.  He received his JD from Yale Law School, where he was projects editor of the Yale Law Journal. After law school, Altman worked a  clerk on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals for the Honorable Stanley Marcus.

Altman then was appointed a federal prosecutor at the US Attorney’s Office in Miami, where he twice received the Director of the Executive Office of US Attorneys’ Award for Superior Performance by a federal prosecutor. In 2013, Altman was awarded “Federal Prosecutor of the Year” by the Miami-Dade Chiefs of Police and the Law Enforcement Officers’ Charitable Foundation. In 2014, Altman became a partner at Coral Gables 'boutique' law firm, Podhurst Orseck, where he represented the victims of plane crashes and bank fraud.  

He's been an member of the America Israel Public Affairs Committee, The Republican Jewish Coalition, and, through Christians United for Israel, has been organising trips to Israel for fellow federal judges. At the end of March, Simon and Schuster publish his book "Israel on Trial: Examining the History, the Evidence, and the Law". 

On the edge

The brinkmanship over the Government's contribution to the funding of the World Service shines a light on tensions between Yvette Cooper, Lisa Nandy, Rachel Reeves and their key civil servants. 

Yvette Cooper has previous with Rachel Reeves in taking Home Office funding to the wire last year. But Ms Cooper's current Foreign Office position, a move triggered by insufficient progress on immigration, leaves Ms Cooper weaker within the Labour hierarchy than a year ago. Inside the Foreign Office, 80% of money for the World Service comes from the Overseas Development budget - and a reduction to 0.3% of GDP (from 0.5%) by 2027 has been written into spending plans.  The BBC has been helpfully/unhelpfully suggested that more could come from John Healey's Defence budget. 

Over at the Culture Department, the BBC's long-term ambition is to get the Government to fund the whole of World Service; last year the BBC allocated £221m of licence fee income to the World Service. But the BBC has been no global saint in this matter, reducing that figure from a 2020 peak of £261m.  The official DCMS official line is that the Department is 'open-minded' about a funding solution for the World Service from 2027/28. Tim Davie says the Government should be investing £600m/£700m a year. But back at the Treasury, the clear stand is that the BBC can only expect future funding to follow inflation, at the very best; they're unlikely to want to absorb £600m from direct taxation. 

The daft thing is that if there is a cut to come, the BBC will have to spend more on the process of getting people out of the door over the financial year than usually necessary. 

Tik Tok Today

The ad for a new Editor Today has been posted, and as you might expect I've gone through looking for nonsense. Thankfully, it's short and to the point. However, there is on oddity, perhaps emanating from the BBC Talent Acquisition Business Partner working out of Glasgow.

"Please note you will be asked to submit a showreel as part of this application process."

"Working class"

Analysis of the 2021 census by the Official of National Statistics assigned social grade C2DE to 43.9% of adults in households - 20.6 million people. 

A BBC press release may have given us an insight into what tv commissioners currently deem success. Senior publicist Chris McCluskey notes that The Traitors Series 4 Episode 1 has become the most watched episode of the civilian series to date, with 13.3m viewers across 28 days - and "A third of the audience were from C2DE socio economic backgrounds (4.3m)". 

The same release notes that The Night Manager drew 8.7m in 28 days for episode one of the second series, and "It achieved 2.6m viewers from C2DE socio economic backgrounds.". That's a nudge off 30% of the total audience.   

Advisers in the news

After the devastating Affaire Prescott, the BBC has advertised for two new Editorial Advisers to work for the Board's Editorial Guidelines and Standards Committee, for £15,000 p.a.

One will apparently champion 'complaints', and the other look at 'standards and guidelines'. The BBC seems determined that they are seen as 'independent', with these strictures. 

Candidates will need to be demonstrably independent of the BBC at the point of appointment. The criteria by which independence will be assessed will include whether a candidate:

* Has been an employee of the BBC, or BBC Group within the last five years;

* Has or has had within the last three years a material business relationship with the BBC either directly, or as a partner, shareholder, director or senior employee of a body that has such a relationship with the BBC;

* Has received or receives additional remuneration from the BBC apart from a Director’s fee or an appearance fee for media interviews; or has close family ties with any of the BBC’s advisers, directors or senior employees.

It doesn't say anything about not writing a grumpy farewell report that defenestrates a DG and a Director of News. 

Career development

 I've never been sure the Linkedin bots really understand what I do (or did).

Mates

Tim Davie is Director General of the BBC until April 4; John Shield was Director of Communcations at the BBC until July 2025, when he joined Teneo as one of their many Senior Managing Directors. 

Leading at the highest levels today means making consequential decisions under sustained pressure, public scrutiny and constant change. These realities were the focus of a breakfast discussion we were pleased to host with Tim Davie, outgoing Director General of the @BBC, on… pic.twitter.com/FJQ88wKuZK

— Teneo (@Teneo) February 6, 2026

£180

The latest licence fee increase is a gentle reminder to all those policy wonks in Government and the BBC looking for a sustainable and fully protected way of funding the BBC.  There isn't one - if it is to remain a universal service, then the Government, and particularly the Chancellor, will define broadly how much the BBC gets every year - because the OBR has defined that as a tax.  You can wave all the ten-year charters you want when the next Government comes to the revolving doors of BH and says that's your lot; you can set up Grand Commissions to define and determine investment in public service broadcasting, but if the economy moves forward tits up, their recommendations will be tossed overboard. 

The BBC has been immensely prissy about not being funded from general taxation, yet that's the most progressive, enforceable and cheapest way to do it.  The current Government is prissy about lumping it in with Council Tax; it could so easily be part of a major revaluation process that Labour have put in the 'too difficult' tray.  Lisa Nandy seems frit of the Big Streamers, but a levy on them, or a broadband levy is a sensible mirror of the days when we had limited transmission spectrums. 

Anyway, the BBC, I hope, will come forward with a response to the Green Paper with renewed ambition, new ways of measuring success, new ways of changing and adapting at speed, and some honest looks at how it will determine what to do less of, over the next ten years, in order to fund some groovy new stuff. With a generous risk pot in there, too. 

Still yanking

A new weekly tech podcast for BBC Studios/bbc.com, The Interface, launches this month. It will feature the decidedly American accents of Thomas Germain and Karen Hao, with Nicky Woolf, based in the USA since 2012.