More broadcasters alongside Samira Ahmed this morning, as she headed to her equal pay tribunal against the BBC in Holborn: Jane Garvey, Charlotte Smith, Jane Corbin, the Rev Richard Coles, Aasmah Mir, Matthew Sweet and Katie Puckrick.
Evidence from the BBC side reveals there have been 1308 pay queries from staff; 1235 have been closed, and only 36 of those were deemed to be issues of equal pay requiring a pay adjustment. That figure presumably includes Samira, who got back pay for work for R4's Front Row and R3's Nightwaves.
The BBC's case is that Newswatch, Ms Ahmed's News Channel show, is a niche, serious news programme, used as 'filler' when it is repeated on the Saturday morning edition of BBC1 Breakfast. It argues, in essence, that it catches viewers by surprise in the Breakfast running order, rather than driving an audience. Points of View, it says, is an entertainment show, fronted by high-profile presenters who deal with a topics in a “light-hearted way”.
The BBC says Jeremy Vine's salary for Points of View reflected his status across the organisation at the time. He got a major pay rise in 2008, when it's claimed a commercial broadcaster was offering £1m to leave the BBC.
Vine left Points of View last year, to be replaced by Tina Daheley, off-screen rather than in vision, who gets £400 a programme. Ahmed's legal team will argue that the move was related to her equal pay claim.
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