Thursday, April 05, 2007
Street market trader to be BBC chairman
A former street market trader with little experience of broadcasting has been made BBC chairman.
Officially BBC chairmen are appointed by the Queen, but the job is effectively gifted by culture minister and alleged Mafia associate Tessa Jowell, who has already squandered more than the national product of Iceland on one sporting event, namely a much publicised but limited lifestyle value Olympics.
Lyons, a self-made man who began as a street market trader, will set the strategic direction of the BBC via the Trust, which came into being in January, replacing the board of governors. His four-year contract is worth £140,000 ($266,000) a year.
Apparently he is a crony of Gordon Brown (believed to be next UK Prime Minister) and rarely watches television.
The last chairman but one, Gavyn Davies, was forced to resign in a row over the BBC's coverage of the lead up to the invasion of Iraq, while in November Michael Grade quit for a better paid and, arguably, more interesting job running ITV.
From the BBC 's point of view they presumably feel that this is a safe choice as he can always be changed if Brown doesn't rate. But on the face of it we certainly seem to be getting a bunch of dumbed-down and often inappropriate leaders.
IMO: I went to several street markets yesterday including the Nag's Head and Alfie's (not strictly a street market but roughly the same idea) but in fairness, for all their possible merits, I did not note any obvious heads for the BBC there.
[Commented 6/4/07 : To sum it up, murderers, drug addicts, drunks, and market traders are running the place.]
Officially BBC chairmen are appointed by the Queen, but the job is effectively gifted by culture minister and alleged Mafia associate Tessa Jowell, who has already squandered more than the national product of Iceland on one sporting event, namely a much publicised but limited lifestyle value Olympics.
Lyons, a self-made man who began as a street market trader, will set the strategic direction of the BBC via the Trust, which came into being in January, replacing the board of governors. His four-year contract is worth £140,000 ($266,000) a year.
Apparently he is a crony of Gordon Brown (believed to be next UK Prime Minister) and rarely watches television.
The last chairman but one, Gavyn Davies, was forced to resign in a row over the BBC's coverage of the lead up to the invasion of Iraq, while in November Michael Grade quit for a better paid and, arguably, more interesting job running ITV.
From the BBC 's point of view they presumably feel that this is a safe choice as he can always be changed if Brown doesn't rate. But on the face of it we certainly seem to be getting a bunch of dumbed-down and often inappropriate leaders.
IMO: I went to several street markets yesterday including the Nag's Head and Alfie's (not strictly a street market but roughly the same idea) but in fairness, for all their possible merits, I did not note any obvious heads for the BBC there.
[Commented 6/4/07 : To sum it up, murderers, drug addicts, drunks, and market traders are running the place.]
# posted by uv : 10:12 PM
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