The BBC has today confirmed it is culling 520 jobs – a further seventy on top of the 450 job losses announced at the beginning of the month. As part of this latest round of cuts, the flagship interview programme The Andrew Neil Show, which provided some memorable interview moments during its short run, had received the chop. It was initially taken off air as a result of lockdown induced reduced programming. The morsel of good news for the Westminster village is that Politics Live – which was being threatened earlier this month – has been saved…
UPDATE: BBC says “The Andrew Neil Show will not be returning but we’re in discussions about a new interview series on BBC1.”
The BBC’s budgetary brinkmanship continues with public posturing designed to blackmail the government. Allegedly PoliticsLive is on the brink of being culled by the corporation in their latest spate of job cuts. After the show was taken off air during the pandemic, the Westminster village TV staple has returned in a once-weekly only format. It has been in this format just two years, following the axing of The Daily Politics…
In related news, it sounds like Andrew Neil’s time at the BBC may also be coming to a grinding halt as Tony Hall prioritises his £100 million diversity scheme. Speaking to the Radio Times Neil said “I would like to be doing more shows, of course I would… I don’t know what’s happening. There’s no clarity at the moment, so I’m just waiting for the BBC to make up its mind.” The BBC often threatens to cut popular shows and stars to focus the minds of the public and MPs; if Guido were Andrew Neil he’d be flattered…
Nature abhors a vacuum and if there is a mid-morning political programming opportunity it will be taken by rivals, be in no doubt. We’re going to be able to get an afternoon dose of politics from the horse’s mouth when the Downing Street briefings start livestreaming in the autumn. Go ahead Auntie, make our day and disintermediate yourself!
In a remarkably principled move, the Spectator is set to return the money it took from the Treasury in order to furlough staff across the peak of the shutdown. In a statement on the Spectator website, chairman Andrew Neil writes that thanks to strong subscription sales, “our magazines have weathered the Covid crisis better than we expected.” He goes on to say:
“we will return to the taxpayer the funds we took from government to finance our furlough scheme and withdraw from that scheme forthwith.”
Neil stresses that this move is “not to set an example for other companies to follow but because we can afford to do so… Many other companies will not be in the same fortunate position.” Guido hears The Telegraph are looking at making the same move…
UPDATE: For the record, none of Guido’s team were furloughed and advertising revenue falls were covered from reserves built up over a decade of profitability. Debt free and profitable, we expect to continue to grow in the future. Isn’t it noticeable that right-of-centre publications tend to make a commercial profit? Go woke, go broke…
Was this Starmer’s ‘Miliband tuss enough’ moment?…
Guido will let readers predict how Thornberry would go down in Leave-voting Labour heartlands if elected party leader…
7pm, BBC 2. You won’t want to miss this one…
