Cuts at the BBC to save £500M, Radio 4 programmes to be axed

[nauticant]

The BBC has announced 550 job cuts in news, nations and TV and radio content as part of its first stage in its plan to save £500m across the corporation over the next two years.

In an email to staff, interim CEO of BBC News, Jonathan Munro, outlined the proposals including ending Radio 4's The World Tonight, and reducing the number of permanent presenters on Today from five to four from September, with a single anchor on Saturdays.
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Several other Radio 4 programmes will also end during the next year - the Midnight News, Money Box Live, AntiSocial, The Law Show and Crossing Continents.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvgmqrrlej5o

The real loss for me will be The World Tonight, I've long thought of it as the most classy of the news programmes of the day. Far more considered than the noise of the Today programme or the PM programme. Losing Crossing Continents will also be a shame.

To be fair, they pay presenters loads and expenses are wild.
If my dad could get to work every morning for 5am I’m not sure why presenters ( and guests) all need taxis every day, on top of 6 figure salaries.
It’s a great job, that like every other industry, has loads of people who have the talent to do it.
I love Radio 4 but honestly they ( like all the other media outlets) spunk money left right and centre.

I really like Crossing continents. It’s a shame that’s going.

They should pay the presenters less and stop paying through the nose for so called celebs on TV and give some unknown and cheaper talent a go.

I’m sad to lose the world tonight

it seems like a lot of the good news output is going. Crossing continents was excellent too

i wish they’d cut strictly instead🤣

I love Moneybox Live 😥gutted. Wonder which Today presenter will go?

Strange that they are cancelling AntiSocial - I can’t imagine it costs much to produce?

I think they’re not replacing amol

so it’s Justin, Anna, Nick and Katya?

I don't listen to radio 4, so won't miss anything. But I can't really understand why we announce a new Hungarian language service days before canning 550 employees. Surely the licence fee should go towards serving Britain as we are paying it.

Like all public sector organisations, the BBC will always cut services before it cuts its own internal bureaucracy.

@roycroppersshopper I really like Moneybox love too, it will be a great loss. The World tonight is also a bedtime staple for me.

Yep - R4 is living on borrowed time sadly. They will focus on entertainment.

but whatever they are doing to try and attract younger generations - it doesn’t seem to be working. Despite being brought up with R4 in the background my dc get their news from different sources - they weren’t brought up with the BBC/ITV being the only source!!

Is Emma leaving & being replaced by Katya? If so, that’s the only good news about the BBC I have heard recently.

They could stop sending so many people to stuff. We don’t need a presenter from each of Radios 1,2,3&4 AND people from TV every time there’s an important event.

I don’t understand the world tonight.

a lot of the content is shared with the world service and increasingly repeated from early bulletins

I would rather lose PM which is a bit too light entertainment sometimes

(I thought Emma had left!!)

Well losing a presenter of Today is no big loss although personally I would have preferred to see the back of Justin.

I think losing the World Tonight and Moneybox Live are very sad though. I'd rather lose some of the woeful so called comedy slots.

So sad to see Radio 4 being chipped away.

I love Justin!

moneybox is great. I also love in touch which I guess will be saved because they don’t want to look ablist

a lot of the comedy is dire. Current affairs seems to be dwindling at the altar of light entertainment

Today on Saturday is only two hours, but that seems quite exhausting for a single presenter, and is it really Today if there's only one presenter? Perhaps they could call it Saturhalfday. Perhaps they'll have more pre-recorded items. Real shame about Crossing Continents and the World Tonight.

Wonder if there's more to come - Really hope they're not going to cut drama again.

I agree, if it all becomes light entertainment and dumbed down, where do we get our serious news?

I too wish they'd stop trying to do comedy, its all terrible apart from Dead Ringers, and All around the kitchen and i hate the dramas (including The Archers).

I agree, axe all the radio 4 comedy and keep everything else!

Agree with this.

The journalists are in country anyway, so the cost of producing this programme must be limited?

Comprehensively ill thought out. Best thing to do would be to pause while having a rethink and getting rid of Matt Brittin. He might be replaced by a World Service shared newsfeed.

I've been really enjoying the Wednesday night stand up sessions! It's a Fair Cop is really good too, and the Mark Steele show is funny. Also like The Unbelievable Truth, the News Quiz, Just a Minute, ISIHAC... There's loads of good comedy!