National Audit Office criticises ‘generous’ BBC staff Salford payments
Individual BBC executives and presenters have each netted as much as £150k to oil their relocation to Salford according to newly released figures.
The huge sums were handed out as part of a £16m war chest doled out to around 900 staff after they volunteered to make the flit from the capital to the north of England.
At the extreme 11 individuals were each handed a six figure sum which helped purchase local homes valued at up to £1m.
The National Audit Office revealed that workers were entitled to lump sums worth up to 10 per cent of their salaries and able to take advantage of generous allowances for items such as stamp duty, estate agency fees, furnishings and moving costs.
Describing such largesse as ‘generous’ the NAO said that ‘inadequate’ controls had been put in place to manage payouts.
In total some 894 members of staff took advantage of the offer with 55 receiving upwards of £50k and 11 bagging between £100k and £150k.
A further 175 benefitted from a so-called ‘half way house’ deal in which they maintained their London residence but had some of their rent and travel expenses paid when in Manchester.
The maximum sum allowable under this scheme was supposed to be £1,900 per month but The Telegraph has disclosed that one member of staff received £3,390 per month before tax.
Commenting on this discrepancies the BBC Trust said: “Any exceptions should have been rare, clearly justified and supported by well-documented business cases. It is unacceptable, therefore, that the NAO found BBC management did not adequately document the reasons for all exceptions to the standard policy.”