Exposing star BBC salaries just pathetic, says Norton

GRAHAM NORTON has criticised the “pathetic” decision to publish the salaries of the BBC’S highest paid talent and claims some of the figures bear little relation to reality.

The 55-year-old said the disclosures were not in the public interest and had done little more than provoke “gossip” about what people earn.

It was the former culture secretary, John Whittingdale, who insisted that the BBC publish the salaries of everyone earning £150,000 a year or more.

But Norton said: “The public transparency was already there. They’d already published what proportion of the licence fee is paid to on-screen talent... now, that’s the bit that people should be interested in.

“This bit is just gossip. It’s so weird that when MPS discussed the charter, this was the demand they made...the poor old BBC are having to do it, and what the BBC said would happen is happening. They are losing people, because it’s not comfortable, it’s not nice.”

High profile departures include Chris Evans, 52, who recently announced a move to Virgin Radio, and Eddie Mair, also 52, who went to LBC.

BBC director-general, Lord Hall of Birkenhead, has described the salary list as a talent “poacher’s charter” and told MPS that it was a factor in Evans’s departure.

Norton is one of the BBC’S highestpaid presenters, with a published salary of £600,000 to £609,999. But that represents only a fraction of his earnings, as his television chat show is made by his own production company, So Television. His other work includes a BBC Radio 2 show and presenting the annual Eurovision Song Contest.