Cellphones force BBC to slash 1 000 jobs

THE BRITISH Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) will cut more than 1 000 jobs to cover a £150 million (R3 billion) gap in licence fee income next financial year as millions of viewers turn off their televisions (TV) and watch programmes on tablets and cellphones.

The BBC, the largest broadcaster in the world, is grappling with swiftly changing viewing practices, the fallout from failing to investigate a prolific child abuser in its ranks, as well as scrutiny from Prime Minister David Cameron’s government ahead of a review of BBC funding next year.

BBC director-general Tony Hall told employees that he wanted to forge a leaner organisation with fewer layers of management to cope with the expected shortfall from the annual £145.50 licence fee that every UK household with a TV must pay.

“A simpler, leaner, BBC is the right thing to do and it can also help us meet the financial challenges we face,” Hall said.

Some Britons have discarded their TVs – the main source of home viewing for half a century – in favour of tablets which many younger people use to watch programmes over a wireless internet connection.

The BBC’s head of news, James Harding, last month predicted that by 2025, most people in the UK would probably get their TV programmes over the internet.

“The internet has ripped a hole in the business model of many great news organisations,” said Harding.

Just 69 percent of viewing by British adults was now through live TV and among 16to 24-year-olds only 50 percent of viewing was done through live TV, the country’s telecoms regulator said.

The BBC and other public service broadcasters had to keep up with the shift to online viewing to ensure that they retained a high visibility and could compete with rival services from Netflix and Amazon, the regulator said.