Category: BBC

Date: 17.03.2005
Printable version

The BBC's Board of Governors held meetings at the Media Centre, White City, London, yesterday and today.

The Governors have issued the following statement:

Transforming the BBC

The BBC's transformational plan has three main objectives:

A bold new programme and content strategy based, above all, around the idea of excellence

A transformation of the BBC into a state-of-the-art digital broadcaster

An irreversible shift in the culture of the BBC towards greater creativity, opportunity and simplicity

In November last year, the Board of Governors endorsed the strategic framework within which implementation planning would begin to deliver the recommendations in the four strategic reviews:

Out of London

Commercial Services

Content Supply

Value for Money

We agreed that more detailed scrutiny was necessary before the Board could confirm how these proposals can be funded and deliver more efficient and effective BBC services to our licence payers.

In December, we asked management to develop detailed implementation plans, which we would subject to independent and expert validation prior to giving our final approval.

Our concern was to ensure the best outcome for licence fee payers and be satisfied that service delivery will not be adversely affected, implementation risks have been properly identified and mitigated, and that costs outlined are accurate and that prior to increased investment, savings have been achieved and future funding secured.

The Board engaged PA Consulting to scrutinise management's value-for-money plans and to advise the Governors.

At today's meeting of the Board, we considered management's recommendations for efficiency savings in the content and output divisions, alongside plans for implementation of the overall value-for-money strategy including the professional services we endorsed in February.

The Board has approved management's value-for-money plans.

The Governors will review progress of implementation in June.

The Board endorsed the Director-General's plan to communicate conclusions and next steps to BBC staff.