BBC equal pay cases cost taxpayer £1m in legal fees
MPs have hit out at the BBC over revelations the broadcaster spent more than £1m of taxpayer money on legal fees fighting equal pay and race discrimination cases against its own staff.
In a letter to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport committee, published today, the BBC said it had forked out £1.1m between July 2017 and December 2020 to external barristers and solicitors working on tribunal claims.
The organisation could not put a figure on the cost of using in-house lawyers, but said more than 2,450 hours had been spent on the cases.
Committee chair Julian Knight branded the figures “unbelievable”, adding that the money could have been used for making programmes or easing licence fee costs for the over-75s.
“This at a time when the corporation is struggling to balance its books with hundreds of journalists’ jobs being cut,” he said. “This disclosure sits uncomfortably against the BBC’s claim that it offers value for money.”
The MP called for a full explanation of how the legal costs escalated and urged new chair Richard Sharp to investigate the issue.
A BBC spokesperson said the organisation was committed to being a “truly inclusive employer”.
“While we aim to manage costs efficiently and proportionately, the complexities of these cases mean they need to be managed by qualified professionals – not least to ensure fairness.”
The BBC has settled hundreds of cases with female employees in recent years, issuing back pay or salary increases to resolve claims of unfair pay.
Carrie Grace, the corporation’s China editor, became a figurehead for the movement when she resigned in 2018 in protest at unequal pay.
Last year Front Row and Newswatch presenter Samira Ahmed won a £700,000 employment tribunal case against the BBC after a judge ruled she had been paid less than Jeremy Vine for similar work.
The equality watchdog has cleared the BBC of unlawful gender discrimination, though it found a number of shortcomings in the way the broadcaster handled pay and complaints.
But critics including Grace branded the findings a “whitewash”.