BBC accused of ‘anti-British’ job cuts to workforce on protection of Queen’s funeral | TV & Radio | Showbiz & TV | EUROtoday

The BBC is accused of being “anti-British” over reported plans to slash its TV workforce behind broadcasts of royal events and veterans’ remembrance occasions. The broadcaster is purportedly slicing employees numbers at BBC Studios Events Productions to only one member. The workforce stands behind protection of state occasions, such because the Queen’s funeral, King Charles’ coronation and the annual Remembrance Sunday service on the Cenotaph.

Critics accused the company of prioritising different occasions, such because the Glastonbury Festival, over extra conventional events. A supply mentioned the small workforce, which lined the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee and funeral recognised by BAFTA, already operates with not more than six everlasting employees and prices “peanuts” in comparison with the thousands and thousands the broadcaster spends on filming the Glastonbury Festival.

The redundancies are mentioned to have been introduced final week, coming simply sooner or later after the workforce secured a Royal Television Society Award for its reside broadcast of Holocaust Memorial Day on 27 January 2025, commemorating 80 years because the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

A supply instructed The Daily Mail that anticipating a single particular person to supervise protection of serious historic occasions – reminiscent of VE Day and D-Day anniversaries – could be inconceivable, provided that such productions require months of planning and coordination, even when supported by freelance employees.

A spokesman for the BBC has mentioned viewers wouldn’t discover any change of their protection, including that the transfer was a part of the company’s goal at being extra environment friendly.

“As a prudent commercial business with a mandate to maximise returns to the BBC, we regularly look at how we’re set up and where we can work more efficiently,” they mentioned.

“We’re proposing some changes that will help us stay strong creatively and continue to deliver a range of high-quality programmes – whilst managing our costs in a challenging and fast‑moving market.”

Meanwhile, insiders at Buckingham Palace are believed to be uneasy in regards to the potential affect on royal programming if the workforce is closely decreased, amid issues this might result in a decline in manufacturing requirements and a lack of the prominence such broadcasts have historically acquired.