SO WHAT IS BBC STUDIOS MEANT TO DO (APART FROM HIDING SALARIES)?

THE BBC’s commercial arm BBC Studios has proven to be a convenient way to hide stars’ pay.

Yet its website boasts of ‘embodying the very best of bold British creativity’ and contributing to ‘significant financial returns that are reinvested into the BBC’.

However, it made just 40 hours of non-BBC programmes in its first year. Its programmes include Fatberg Autopsy, for Channel 4, which saw experts analysing the content of a giant lump of congealed fat, wet wipes and human waste. And viewers of W Channel can look forward to Sex, Knives & Liposuction, in which the presenter considers whether to have plastic surgery.

BBC Studios, which makes 55 per cent of all BBC programmes and was given free rein to pitch to rival broadcasters last April, insisted the company had made a ‘good start’.