BBC's top earners: More transparency to come

Last year, Gary Lineker was the BBC's top earner

In a move to be more transparent, top BBC salaries will be published in a new way this summer.

Last year, staff who earned over £150,000 were grouped in bands of £10,000 but this year will be in bands of £5,000 instead,

This move will not be extended to the commercial arm of the organisation, so will not include BBC Studios.

It means that payments to presenters like Claudia Winkleman and Alex Jones will not be disclosed.

The report said that disclosure for higher earners in £5,000 bands would "promote better public trust, avoid the suspicion that there is something to hide and be consistent with other public sector organisations".

The news come as part of an independent review into the BBC, which also found that the broadcaster was among the UK leaders in pay transparency and went beyond many other British public or private sector organisation.

'Even further'

As well as making these changes, the BBC said it will "help staff and managers better understand the way decisions on pay are made".

And it will "roll out existing unconscious bias training to all staff in the next year, to tackle the potential for the small amounts of this that may exist in any organisation".

BBC director-general Tony Hall said: "The BBC already publishes a vast amount of information about our spending, but we are determined that the BBC should lead the way when it comes to transparency.

"We are already more transparent than most organisations, but the additional steps we are taking today mean that we will go even further."

BBC chairman David Clementi said: "These reviews show that the BBC is already among the leaders when it comes to transparency, in both the public service and in our commercial operations.

'Highly uneven'

"But, while we have a strong record to build on, there are also areas where we can go even further which is why we are accepting many of the recommendations.

"I believe these improvements will help us build trust, whilst also running our operations effectively and competitively."

The report also said there was still work to do, noting that "BAME (black and minority ethnicity) representation... is highly uneven across the organisation. It is highest in the World Service Group (54.4%) but very low in divisions such as the nations and regions (3.1%), despite some BBC locations being in ethnically diverse towns and cities."

But it acknowledged the BBC was making progress to address these issues.

In last summer's list, Gary Lineker came out on top as the highest earner, with men still dominating the wage bill.