BBC Top Brass “Looking At Options” For Next Phase Of $400 Million Worth Of Savings, Says Deputy DG

The BBC‘s top brass is in the process of “looking at options for the next stage of savings,” according to the Deputy Director General, which will total another £300M ($400M).

Rhodri Talfan Davies said it is very unlikely another big savings announcement will come before Christmas but stressed that the “lion’s share” of the cash has to be found before the end of the current BBC charter in 2027/28.

He said these conversations are currently taking place at the very upper echelons of the broadcaster.

“The executive senior team is now looking at options for the next stage of savings,” Talfan Davies told journalists at a Broadcasting Press Guild lunch. “We haven’t yet shared those with the [wider] team because we’re still working through them. There are lots of ideas on the table, but until the Executive Committee reaches a decision, there’s nothing to announce.”

Talfan Davies was interim Director General in April when the BBC announced it was laying off 2,000 people. Since then, his new boss Matt Brittin, the permanent DG, has been busily enacting the £500M savings plan, a tricky task in the funding climate.

Last month, the BBC made the long-awaited announcement that it would be shutting youth-skewing linear network BBC Three along with the BBC Scotland channel and Radio 4 Extra.

Our analysis spotlighted how the worst is to come and floated that speculation internally has turned to the future of radio and podcast streamer BBC Sounds.

Today, Talfan Davies gave press a window into the corporation’s thinking around Sounds and VoD platform BBC iPlayer, which is in the process of being transformed. “The real question – and I don’t know the answer – is whether iPlayer will be more and more the home for some of our biggest audio brands,” he speculated. “But you’ll still need a strongly creative collection of all your services. Brands come and go, but there will be a home for BBC audio content and its listeners.”

The BBC remains unsure over its future funding model as charter negotiations with the government continue and Talfan Davies said the corporation is in the meantime having to “ride two horses in terms of financial outcomes, which is not ideal.”

The main funding solution to have emerged so far appears to be the so-called “Netflix tax,” which would force streaming service subs to pay the £180 annual license fee as it desperately tries to get more audiences to pay the fee.

With Netflix in a tight stop having just laid off 1,000 staff itself, Talfan Davies acknowledged that the streamers “might not be supportive” of the proposal but said “in some ways it’s not a million miles” from yesteryear when everyone in the UK had to pay the fee even if they only watched other linear TV channels.

“There are echoes of that reform in what has been suggested,” said Talfan Davies.

Case against Donald Trump “very strong”

On the day of the U.S. midterms, and with Republicans expected to be inflicted with heavy defeats, Talfan Davies also addressed the $10B defamation lawsuit the BBC faces from Donald Trump.

While saying he is “not in the business of second-guessing judges,” Talfan Davies said the BBC’s case to have the defamation suit thrown out of a Florida court over jurisdiction is “very strong.” “We’ve put our best foot forward in setting out the arguments about why we don’t think it should be heard in the U.S. at all,” he said. “I would like the judge to agree.”

The situation emerged when a BBC Panorama show made a botched edit of Trump’s Jan. 6 speech that appeared to show him inciting insurrection.

Talfan Davies, who as Deputy DG now oversees the editorial standards and legal teams, said “a lot has changed” internally since the error was made and the “sluggishness” of the BBC’s response was “probably more profound” than the error with the package itself.

He stressed the BBC has introduced “before final gate processes for our most contentious programmes” that sees the key people involved “go through the programme line by line.”

He caveatted by saying “anyone in my job who says there won’t be future issues in an organization is being naive.” “The BBC does big investigations,” he added. “I’m not naive about that. But I do think the processes and controls we’ve put in place have made us much stronger.”