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Media
BBC appoints new DG
By CMU Editorial | Published on Friday 23 November 2012
So the British Broadcasting Corporation has a new boss, in the form of Tony Hall, currently CEO of the Royal Opera House, but a former BBC News chief. Hall also oversaw the Cultural Olympiad, that programme of cultural stuff that occurred in the run up to and during the Olympics, but you know, we shouldn’t hold that against him.
Hall, of course, replaces the bumbling buffoon that was Georgie Boy Entwistle, who scored himself half a million quid for totally screwing up the Beeb’s response to all the Jimmy Savile allegations and the subsequent reporting of untrue allegations against Tory Lord Alistair McAlpine. It’s not yet clear what total fuck up Hall is planning for his half million.
It was a speedy appointment that took less than two weeks, though Hall won’t actually take over as DG until March, with interim boss Tim Davie, formerly the Beeb’s top radio man, filling in until then.
Confirming the new recruit, the boss of the BBC Trust, Chris Patten, told reporters: “Tony Hall has been an insider and is a currently an outsider. As an ex-BBC man he understands how the Corporation’s culture and behaviour make it, at its best, the greatest broadcaster in the world. And from his vantage point outside the BBC, he understands the sometimes justified criticisms of the Corporation – that it can be inward looking and on occasions too institutional. But perhaps most importantly, given where we now find ourselves, his background in news will prove invaluable as the BBC looks to rebuild both its reputation in this area and the trust of audiences”.
Aside from all the fallout that has followed Savile-gate and Entwistle’s departure, Hall will also have to deal with other challenges at the Beeb, not least the cost cutting put in place by former DG Mark Thompson to meet government demands on budgets, and the resulting collapse in morale across the Corporation, which has only been exasperated by recent events.
