Anger as staff question bosses’ pay
Channel 4 staff questioned whether bosses had “lined their pockets” after the broadcaster said it would axe 240 roles and sell off its £100m London HQ as it battles an advertising slump.
The Bake Off network said it would make fewer programmes and adopt a “ruthless focus” on creating commercial hits to accelerate its move to become a “streaming-first” digital broadcaster.
Headcount will be slashed by 18 per cent with around 200 redundancies and the closure of approximately 40 unfilled roles.
The broadcaster said it would move out of its 40 year-old Horseferry Road headquarters in Westminster and find a new “fit-for-purpose office space” for its reduced numbers in central London.
However, Channel 4 said the nightly Channel 4 News would be protected from the cuts and pledged to hit its target of creating 600 roles across the Nations and Regions, including several hundred at its regional base in Leeds, by 2025.
The announcement prompted anger at the publicly-owned, commercially-funded broadcaster. “Everyone is waiting to see if they will get an email from HR. We don’t know if we will have a job or not,” said one staffer.
Others questioned the performance of CEO Alex Mahon, awarded £1.5m in pay including a £155,000 “retention bonus” last year, for staying in post during the “uncertainty” of Channel 4’s campaign to avoid privatisation, and programmes chief Ian Katz.
Another staffer said: “Bosses boasted we had hit billion-pound revenues so how has the business been managed?,” asked another. “Were they lining their pockets before walking out of the door? Did everyone need retention bonuses?”
Channel 4 said Mahon had indefinitely deferred her retention bonus and decided not to take an annual pay rise, as had Katz and other senior executives.
The broadcaster said it was using the “market shock” event of a prolonged advertising slump, with ad revenues set to fall 14 per cent this year, to speed up its digital streaming shift and become “nimbler and leaner” to secure its future over the next decade.
Jobs in programme commissioning will be cut by 20 per cent, i understands, with a “ruthless focus on cut-through with fewer, stronger new titles that generate more scale and impact.”
Younger viewers will be targeted on YouTube while Channel 4 seeks streaming hits in drama, high-end documentaries, comedy and reality TV.
Channel 4 will cut original commissions to its E4 youth channel and look to close some of its secondary TV channels.
Staff were told at an internal briefing that the commitment to moving programming and roles out of London remained absolute.
Most of the job cuts will affect London staff with the increased numbers working from home another factor supporting the HQ sale plan.
The cuts undermined Channel 4’s case against selling off the broadcaster, MPs said.
Former culture secretary John Whittingdale told i: “Their protestations of financial health and sustainability were always optimistic and clearly motivated by their campaign against privatisation.”
Selling off the Government’s stake would allow Channel 4 to attract outside investment, allowing it to compete with rivals like Netflix, he suggested.
Channel 4 sources said its commitment for specific hours of news and current affairs hours were enshrined in its licence – managed via Ofcom – and were not affected by the announcement.
Shows axed by Channel 4 following a commissioning freeze include Steph’s Packed Lunch, its daily daytime show produced from Yorkshire presented by Steph McGovern. Rise and Fall, an expensive reality show from the company behind The Traitors but which failed to match the BBC series’ impact, has also been scrapped.
“While getting ourselves into the right shape for the future is without doubt the right action to take, it does involve making difficult decisions. I am very sad that some of our excellent colleagues will lose their jobs because of the changes ahead,” Alex Mahon said.
“But the reality of the rapid downshift in the UK economy and advertising market demand that we must change structurally. In preparing for a new digital-first future, I hope we can make Channel 4 simpler – for staff and our suppliers – and create a more efficient, inclusive and high-performing organisation.”
Channel 4’s remit requires it to take creative risks. Despite the shift to commissioning fewer programmes, the network will remain “a disruptive, distinctive brand” with a strategy that “builds on our founding public service principles”, an insider said.
Sources indicated that Mahon, who has been linked to outside roles, remains committed to Channel 4.
Despite its current struggles, Channel 4 retains several advantages over commercial rivals. It has built a youthful digital audience with 85 per cent of the UK’s 16-34-year-olds having a Channel 4 streaming account. It is becoming less dependent on linear television ads with rising digital revenues now accounting for 27 per cent of its total.
But there are concerns about Channel 4’s ability to create the next generation of hits with its two most popular shows, Gogglebox and The Great British Bake Off, both more than a decade old.
