Local news organisations can apply next week for their share of a pool of 150 journalists, paid-for by the BBC, as the corporation says it expects the first recruits in newsrooms in the autumn.

The “local democracy reporters” are part of the BBC’s Local News Partnership, into which it claims to be investing up to £8m a year for the next 11 years.

The scheme, created with the News Media Association, will also open up access to an audio/video “news hub” of BBC content for use online and a shared data journalism unit.

Applications to the Local News Partnership open on 15 May to both regulated and unregulated news publishers.

The first of the new reporters are expected to be recruited in the West and North West of England.

The BBC said it hoped the partnership “will lead to improved reporting on decisions taken by public bodies and will see expertise shared around the industry”.

David Holdsworth, controller of BBC English Regions, said: “This is an exciting moment in the development of our partnership with the local news industry.

“We’re at a stage now where our ideas are close to becoming a reality.

“The BBC has made a big commitment to this project because we want to play our part in making sure decisions that affect the lives of our audiences are given appropriate journalistic attention.

“By working collaboratively and cooperatively with the local news industry we believe we can do that more effectively in communities across the country.”

Applications can be made online via the BBC Procurement website.

Picture: Reuters/Paul Hackett  

Press Gazette has rounded up the key broadcast dates for your general election diary.

The BBC, ITV and LBC have outlined their coverage ahead of polling day on 8 June.

Sky News is expected to announce its election coverage this week and key dates will be added below.

9 May

BBC One, 7pm – The One Show will interview Theresa May and her husband, Philip. Jeremy Corbyn also to be interviewed on the programme at a date TBC.

11 May

LBC radio, 7-7.30pm – Theresa May interview with Nick Ferrari. The first in a series of Leaders Live programmes on the station.

18 May

ITV, 8pm – The ITV Leaders’ Debate, moderated by Julie Etchingham, with leaders from all seven major political parties invited to attend. Corbyn and May have indicated they will not take part.

31 May

BBC One, 7.30-9pm – The BBC Election Debate live, moderated by Mishal Husain with “spokespeople” from all seven major political parties, but not necessarily leaders.

2 June

BBC One, time TBC– Question Time Leader Special live, moderated by David Dimbleby, with Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn

4 June

BBC One, time TBC – Question Time Leader Special live, moderated by David Dimbleby, with Tim Farron and Nicola Sturgeon

BBC One, 10.30-11pm  in England (11-11.30pm in Wales) – Election Questions to UKIP leader Paul Nuttall

BBC One, 11-11.30pm in England (10.30-11pm, in Wales – Election Questions to Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood

6 June

BBC One, 10.40pm (and live on BBC Radio 1 and the BBC News Channel at 9pm) – Newsbeat Youth debate, hosted by Tina Daheley, featuring “leading politicians” from all seven major political parties

8 June – Polling day

BBC General Election Results Night Special – Coverage of the election results led by David Dimbleby with Mishal Husain, Emily Maitlis and Jeremy Vine.

ITV News at Ten’s Tom Bradby will lead election night coverage

9 June

BBC One, 8.30-9.30pm – Final Question Time Election Special live from London

ITV, 6-9.25am – Good Morning Britain extended programme, hosted by Susanna Reid and Piers Morgan, with reporting from political editor Ranvir Singh.

ITV, 9.25am – ITV News Special on election results presented by Julie Etchingham

Picture: Reuters/Toby Melville

LBC radio has announced on Twitter that controversial presenter Katie Hopkins is to leave the station “effective immediately”.

In a short statement at 10am, the station said: “LBC and Katie Hopkins have agreed that Katie will leave LBC effective immediately.”

Hopkins, who has a regular column on Mail Online, has sparked outrage over her comments following Monday’s Manchester bombing atrocity in which 22 people were killed and dozens injured, including children.

In one tweet, the day after the attack, she said: “22 dead – number rising. Schofield. Don’t you even dare. Do not be part of the problem. Be part of the solution. We need a final solution. #Manchester.”

She later deleted the reference to the “final solution”, which echoed the Nazi term for the holocaust, changing it to “true solution” after public outcry.

“Schofield” is thought to be a reference to ITV’s This Morning presenter Philip Schofield who walked across Westminster Bridge in a move of defiance following the terror attack outside Parliament in March.

In response to one Twitter user calling on LBC to “sack” Hopkins over the tweet, she said: “Get over yourself. Tweet acknowledged as a mis-type. Amended. Corrected live on TV. Do not load me with your bile.”

A later tweet by Hopkins was reported to the Metropolitan Police who confirmed they had received a “complaint” and that it would be “reviewed and assessed by specialist officers”.

It read: “Western men. These are your wives. Your daughters. Your sons. Stand up. Rise up. Demand action. Do not carry on as normal. Cowed.”

Hopkins, who rose to fame as a contestant on BBC show The Apprentice, has 736,000 followers on Twitter, a platform on which she regularly posts comments.

She recently lost a libel case against food writer Jack Munroe, after confusing her for someone else on Twitter, and was ordered to pay £24,000 damages.

LBC is owned by Global, the UK’s largest commercial radio company, whose portfolio includes Capital FM, Heart, Classic FM and Radio X.

Other presenters on the station include former UKIP leader Nigel Farage and journalists Nick Ferrari, James O’Brien and Stig Abell.

More than 2,000 signed a petition on the website Left Foot Forward calling for advertisers to boycott the radio station until Hopkins was sacked.

Guardian columnist Owen Jones receive more than 5,000 retweets for a Twitter message which said: “Enough is LBC depends on guests to function. Until they sack Katie Hopkins we should all boycott all interview requests. Enough is enough.”

Some 45,000 people have signed a Change.org petition calling for Hopkins to be sacked over another controversial Twitter message which she sent earlier this year, and then deleted.

News of the Manchester bombing broke a little way into the start of BBC Radio Manchester’s late night phone-in segment, with callers bringing the news to the station live on the air.

Manning the phones was Allan Beswick, whose evening slot typically begins at 10am and runs until 1am before BBC Radio Five Live takes over the channel through until the morning breakfast show.

On Monday, he stayed on at the studio until 5am to take calls from the public and fellow local BBC journalists about the explosion that killed 22 people and injured dozens, including children.

“Suddenly it isn’t someone who wants to tell a joke or sing a song or something. Suddenly it’s this story and two things are happening,” Beswick told Press Gazette.

“Firstly it’s a phone-in show, so that has to continue, but then this news story starts so journalism starts to happen. My producer is a highly qualified producer of news so he has got his news head going on and journalists come wading in because they have heard about it.

“Within an hour I was talking to one of our journalists called Pav who was in the city centre saying: ‘I’m right by it, this is what’s happening.’

“Then these people come in, gear up and get out to the story and they are also reporting in. The audience wants the story.

“You have got the emotive stuff from people involved that is absolutely charged, but you also want a description – how many fire engines there are – because the public want to know what’s going on.”

Among the 74 callers that night was a woman who described what she had seen in the foyer of the Manchester Arena, where the explosion hit at about 10.30pm as young children and teenagers left a pop concert to meet waiting parents, friends and relatives.

Beswick said: “To be the person she decides to tell that to is an extraordinary privilege. Someone has that going on in their head and what do they do? They ring BBC local radio. I mean it’s extraordinary.”

He said he sees his role at the local radio station as that of a “conduit” through which people can tell their stories.

“You are just this machine in the middle – you aren’t a person at all,” he said. “You are just a broadcast machine taking information from people and spitting it out. The conduit for people with all this emotion who need to talk to somebody and you are just letting them really.”

He added: “It’s just a case of saying we are here. We are a radio station. It won’t be confidential and we aren’t the Samaritans, but we are here.

“I think there’s something special about local radio. When the stuff hits the fan you turn to the people you know. The people that you are part of and are part of you. You turn to your community and BBC local radio is a part of that community and it’s a bigger part in extremis.

“People to come on the radio with their raw emotions it enables them, in a kind of way, to dissipate some of the sharp edges of that for a while.”

Normally the station gets 25-30 callers within its three-hour slot, but this past week has seen the show extended twice – on the day of the attack and the following night.

On Tuesday, Beswick’s producer called him in two hours early, for an 8pm start, but with a special task.

“The boss said there’s been so much going on for the past 12 hours, what we want you to do is go on and not talk to anyone for an hour, just play a few easy tunes and just allow greater Manchester to breathe out.”

Covering the atrocity on the morning after the attack was BBC Radio Manchester’s Mike Sweeney (pictured top talking to Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham).

He began his broadcast live in the city centre with a personal story: His daughter’s best friend had been at the Ariana Grande concert where the bomber struck and only by chance had avoided disaster.

For Sweeney, it’s an example of the power of local radio, which he described as being “part of the community’s DNA”.

“There are people who don’t listen to us regularly, but when this [bombing] happened people said they turned to BBC Radio Manchester straight away because they knew we would keep them informed, we would empathise with them and would deal with everything in a way they would approve of,” he said.

And that is down to the radio station being “full of real people”, said Sweeney.

“It sounds like the radio station that broadcasts to the North of England, to an audience who, if they aren’t now, their mums and dads were working class.

“It broadcasts to a very down to earth, realistic and warm North West. And all the presenters, the news people and journalists all sound like that. They sound real. You can imagine them going to the Co-op or emptying the bins in the morning. It seems real.

“We broadcast with our audience, we don’t broadcast to them.”

Sweeney said that despite the tragedy, his colleagues had been “determined to do their usual professional jobs”, but said the incident was “raw and personal for every single member of staff”.

“When callers are in tears on the phone you have to be as strong as you can for them,” he added.

In keeping with the city’s united front in the wake of the tragedy, Sweeney told Press Gazette: “We don’t need extremism, we don’t need hate. We will deal with this. We will be strong. We will be tenacious. But we will still be Manchester at the end of it.”

Journalists have faced cricitism for approaching families of victims this week. ‘Death knocks’ as they are known in the trade are a staple of journalism, but one that is difficult for all concerned.

Asked what he thought of the behaviour of his peers, Beswick, who has worked in radio for more than three decades, said: “Whenever anyone asks me that I always name drop.

“I started in radio a long time ago. One of the first people I interviewed was [journalist] Alan Whicker. In a book he had out he talked about when he was filming in India, coming out of his hotel and stepping over the dead bodies of people who had starved that night.

“I said to him: ‘How do you justify it?’ He said: ‘They weren’t dead because of me. You know they were dead because of me. What did you do about it?’

“And that’s journalism. We tell people what’s going on. If we don’t tell people it will never change, but it isn’t the journalist’s job to change it.”

Four BBC journalists were injured and their driver killed after a vehicle bomb exploded in Afghan capital Kabul’s diplomatic quarter today.

The explosion killed at least 80 people and injured 350 when it went off close to the Germany Embassy in Zanbaq Square at 8.25am local time, during the morning rush hour, the BBC has reported.

Driver Mohammed Nazir was taking his BBC colleagues to work when the explosion happened.

In a statement, BBC World Service director Francesca Unsworth said: “It is with great sadness that the BBC can confirm the death of BBC Afghan driver Mohammed Nazir following the vehicle bomb in Kabul earlier today, as he was driving journalist colleagues to the office.

“Mohammed Nazir worked as a driver for the BBC Afghan service for more than four years and was a popular colleague. He was in his late thirties and he leaves a young family.

“This is a devastating loss to the BBC and to Mohammed Nazir’s friends and family. We are doing all we can to support them and the rest of the team in Kabul.”

The injured journalists were treated in hospital and their injuries are not thought to be life threatening.

Picture: Reuters/Mohammad Ismail 

Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott has pulled out of two planned media appearances today “due to illness”, including a BBC radio debate and the Evening Standard’s election hustings.

Abbott was replaced by Emily Thornberry in the BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour debate this morning, with the Shadow Foreign Secretary also set to replace her at the Evening Standard event this evening.

Evening Standard editor George Osborne tweeted: “Diane Abbott has pulled out of @EveningStandard hustings. It’s not like someone who wants to be Home Sec has much to talk about these days..”

Abbott’s broadcast appearances have come under close scrutiny since she muddled police funding figures in an interview with LBC’s Nick Ferrari last month, which made national headlines.

Her no-shows today follow a difficult interview on Sky News yesterday evening in which she appeared to struggle to answer questions about her home affairs brief.

Abbott was questioned by Dermot Murnaghan about a report last year by former Metropolitan Police Authority chairman Lord Harris on security in London.

Although she said she had read the document, she appeared unable to recall any of the specific recommendations it contained.

Abbott, however, denied reports that Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell wanted to keep her off air during the remaining stages of the election, fearing she had become a liability.

“I am here. I have just come from doing another media interview. I’m going on to do another media interview. There is no truth in the idea I’m not in the media,” she told Sky.

A Labour spokeswoman said: “Diane Abbott has had to pull out of Woman’s Hour due to illness. Emily Thornberry will take part instead.”

Picture: Yui Mok/PA Wire

A memorial fund has been set up in memory of BBC broadcaster Steve Hewlett that will help cover costs for student journalists from lower income families.

BBC Media Show presenter Hewlett died of cancer earlier this year after being told he had weeks to live by doctors.

Money raised by the Steve Hewlett Memorial Fund will go towards the Hewlett Scholarship and other activities promoting the broadcaster’s legacy.

The scholarship will be presented annually to a student from a lower income family who is enrolled on an undergraduate broadcast journalism course in the UK.

Recipients will receive £2,000 per year for three years to fund their living expenses, membership of the Royal Television Society (RTS) and Hospital Club, and mentoring from industry professionals.

An annual lecture is also being set up in honour of Hewlett, with the Today programme’s Nick Robinson set to deliver the first on 28 September at the University of Westminster.

Hewlett shared his fight with cancer in a regular Guardian column and in interviews on the Radio 4 Today show with Eddie Mair.

His three sons, Freddie, Billy and Bertie, have helped launch the memorial fund appeal, backed by the Media Society and RTS.

In a statement they said: “We are so proud to launch this scholarship in dad’s name. He knew about it before he died and was involved in the early planning of how it would operate and the young people from lower income families it will help into journalism.”

Clive Jones, who appointed Hewlett to be director of programmes when he was chief executive of Carlton Television, adds: “These scholarships will be a worthy memorial to a brilliant, inspirational journalist that so many of us were proud to work with and call a friend.”

Theresa Wise, RTS chief executive, said: “Steve was a vehement campaigner for improving access to the media industry for those with geographically diverse and low income backgrounds so the fund offers a great way to celebrate his life and support his legacy.”

Organisations already committing funds to the scholarship include the BBC, Channel 4, ITN, Sky News, the London Press Club, Google UK and Scott Trust chairman Peter Taylor.

Donations to the memorial fund can be made online, or through payments to the bank account number: 32510047, with the sort code: 60-40-04.

Picture: PA/BBC

Former political party leaders Ed Miliband and Iain Duncan Smith will guest present BBC Radio Two’s Jeremy Vine show later this month.

Miliband and Duncan Smith will be presenting the flagship current affairs programme for five days each in the weeks beginning 19 and 26 June.

Head of Radio Two, Lewis Carnie, said: “Both [men] have held crucial roles in political life and will bring unique perspectives and insight to the programme, in the heart of the daytime schedule.”

Phil Jones, the editor of the Jeremy Vine show, said: “This follows a tradition of Radio Two’s popular current affairs show being occasionally guest-presented by prominent politicians, which began with figures such as Neil Kinnock and the late Charles Kennedy in the early 1990s.

“Political coverage is the bedrock of the programme and this is a sign of how important politics is to Radio 2, especially at such a key time in the nation’s history.

“Each day we will cover the big stories that affect our listeners and continue to inform, educate and entertain the Radio 2 audience.”

The regular host of the programme Jeremy Vine tweeted the announcement, saying it would be a “great listen”.

Miliband’s involvement follows rumours the former Labour leader may return to the Shadow Cabinet. Making light of the BBC’s announcement he tweeted: “In response to recent rumours, I can confirm I have been appointed to a new role…”

Picture: BBC/Twitter

Culture Secretary Karen Bradley has said she is minded refer Fox’s proposed takeover of Sky to a fuller investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority over media plurality concerns.

Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox has bid £12bn to buy the 61 per cent of Sky it doesn’t already own. Bradley issued a European Intervention Notice earlier this year to assess the proposal on the grounds of concerns over media plurality and commitment to broadcasting standards.

She told Parliament today that an Ofcom review of the merger had been “unambiguous” in concluding that it “raises public interest concerns as a result of the risk of increased influence by members of the Murdoch Family Trust over the UK news agenda and the political process with its unique presence on radio, television, in print and online”.

As a result of the merger, the report found that Sky would have the third largest total reach of any news provider, lower only than the BBC and ITN.

Bradley said the broadcast regulator’s report provided “clear grounds” to refer the merger to a “phase two” investigation by the competition watchdog.

She said Fox had “somewhat unusually” offered remedies to mitigate media plurality concerns.

These included establishing a separate editorial board to oversee the appointment of the head of Sky News and any changes to its editorial guidelines. It also offered a commitment to maintain Sky branded News for five years with spending at least at similar levels to now.

Ofcom said these would go some way to “mitigate” media plurality public interest concerns, but Bradley said she was minded “not to accept the undertakings that have been offered”.

On the issue of broadcasting standards, Ofcom said it had no concerns, adding: “We do not consider that the merged entity would lack a genuine commitment to the attainment of broadcasting standards.”

As such, the Culture Secretary said she was not minded to refer this aspect of the takeover bid on for further scrutiny.

Bradley said Ofcom’s fit and proper assessment of Sky and Fox, following recent scandals at the US broadcaster, found: “Behaviours alleged at Fox News in the US amount to significant corporate failures, however these did not, in [Ofcom’s] view, demonstrate that the merged company would lack a genuine commitment to broadcasting standards.”

Fox has until Friday, 14 July to make representations on the Secretary of State’s “minded to” decisions. She will then make her final decision on whether to refer the merger bid to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) at a later date.

Shadow Culture Secretary Tom Watson said Murdoch-owned newspapers – The Sun, Times and Sunday Times – had made an “implicit bargain” with the Conservative government over recent years to mutual gain.

He also called on the Culture Secretary to “get on with” starting part two of the Leveson Inquiry into the culture and ethics of the media, which will look at relations between the press and police, telling Parliament: “She doesn’t have a mandate to drop Leveson Two”.

In a statement, Fox said: “We are pleased that [the Culture Secretary] is minded not to refer to the CMA in respect of the commitment to broadcasting standards.

“While we welcome [her] decision on broadcasting standards, we are disappointed that she does not accept Ofcom’s recommendation stated in its report that ‘…the proposed undertakings offered by Fox to maintain the editorial independence of Sky News mitigate the media plurality concerns.’

“Separately, 21st Century Fox is pleased that Ofcom recognizes that Sky, under full 21st Century Fox ownership, would remain a fit and proper holder of broadcast licenses.

“21st Century Fox will now make representations to the Secretary of State regarding her provisional decision and Ofcom’s report, and will continue to work constructively with the UK authorities.

“In the event that the Secretary of State makes a final decision to refer to the CMA, we would expect that the review would take at least 24 weeks. In such an event, the transaction is expected to close by June 30, 2018.

Seamus Dooley, NUJ acting general secretary said referral to the CMA regarding the Fox takeover of Sky “must go ahead”.

“We call on the Secretary of State to open up this process and to give the public the opportunity to respond to the Ofcom report,” he said. “The union remains fundamentally opposed to this bid.

“Our opposition is based on a concern to protect the public interest. Karen Bradley must act independently in this matter and must not allow the further diminution of media diversity in the UK.”

Ofcom’s full report is expected to be published today.

Picture: PaliamentTV

The BBC is prioritising live video content on its mobile News app to challenge market leaders Facebook and Youtube as it looks to appeal to a younger audience, the corporation has revealed.

It is also working with Facebook on reducing the impact of “fake news” while expanding its Reality Check fact-checking service and investing in data and journalism teams.

The commitments have been made under the BBC’s Annual Plan, published today, which sets out the corporation’s creative and work plans for the current year which runs to the end of March 2018.

This is the first Annual Plan to be released under the BBC’s new 11-year charter, which began in January. The “period of transition” to the new charter is given as the reason why the plan has been released mid-year as opposed to before the year’s start, as is usual.

“The power of live and video is critical in driving engagement and usage,” the BBC said.

“We will prioritise live video programming within the News app.

“Live video functionality on third-party platforms like Facebook and YouTube continues to lead the market – we need to offer our own natively mobile live content on our platforms as well as using social platforms to reach out to targeted audiences, including women and the young and show them that we are relevant to their lives.”

In the report, the BBC said its goal for mobile and online is to “redress the BBC News audience balance – finding ways to remain relevant and serve more women, younger people and those on lower incomes”.

Proposals include developing more personalised notifications from the BBC News app, which has more than 14m adult users each week, and piloting a “digital first” approach across News in “key topic areas such as health and environment”.

It said: “Over the coming year our focus will be on developing an increasingly personalised, mobile-first proposition featuring short-form journalism and visual storytelling (using video, graphics and data), alongside offering a broader range of live event coverage and participatory experiences.

“These changes will help engage all audiences, but in particular will deepen the relationship with younger audiences.”

The BBC also revealed it is building an “Expert Network of independent think-tanks, academics and experts from around the world” with plans to “use their expertise to bring insights and analysis which complements our own”.

It added: “This will allow us to bring long-term, deeper understanding of global trends and themes to our audience. This ‘slow news’ output will benefit all audiences, but will initially be distributed via mobile and online.”

It said it wanted to use so-called “slow news” content is to “help people understand the ‘why’ as well as the ‘what’” and announced plans to build on BBC Stories, launched late last year, which showcases the best of the corporations news and factual storytelling.

Other commitments outlined in the Annual Plan for 2017/18 include:

• A refreshed focus on news from all the UK’s Nations and regions in the evenings
• Developing on-screen presentation through the development of augmented reality graphics and further enhancements to on-screen information
• Keeping investigative journalism at the heart of Current Affairs, with Panorama remaining the home of investigative journalism on BBC One
• Building data and journalism teams to strengthen the BBC’s capability for interrogation of data, facts and presentation
• Reality Check will be expanded and will fact-check the most popular outliers on social media and refute claims if they are found to be false
• Working with Facebook on how we can be most effective at building trust and reducing the impact of ‘fake news’
• BBC One continuing to broadcast more news in peak time than any other comparable channel.

BBC Chairman Sir David Clementi said: “This Annual Plan outlines how we will strengthen the core values of public service broadcasting for all audiences – first and foremost through the brilliant year of programmes and services that it describes.

“And it offers a framework against which the Board will be able to assess the performance of the BBC and monitor progress. We are united as a Board in implementing these plans with one voice.”

Read the full BBC Annual Plan 2017/18.

Picture: Reuters/Paul Hackett

A new survey has suggested that print is the least popular medium when Britons are asked to give one answer to the question “how to you stay up to date with news”.

The poll, commissioned by video agency Newsflare and carried out by Morar Research, asked 2,000 about their news consumption habits.

Asked “how do you stay up-to-date with news?” most respondents (31 per cent) said TV news, followed by 24 per cent who said online newspapers and 18 per cent who said social media channels.

Only 7 per cent said print newspapers.

But, when asked “which type of media do you think is most likely to provide trustworthy and factually-validated information?” 61 per cent said broadsheet newspapers were the “most important”.

More than half (52 per cent) said national broadcasters were the most important, while just 12 per cent of respondents said this of tabloid newspapers. Social media content shared directly by publishers was said to be most important by 4 per cent of those surveyed.

More than half (51 per cent) of those surveyed said they were “more likely” to engage with a news story if it included images or video footage captured by a member of the public. When asked why, the majority (42 per cent) responded that “it is footage taken in real time at the scene”.

Video and imagery taken by a member of the public make 36 per cent of participants more likely to trust the media platform, while 28 per cent said that statistics and data made them more likely to trust the platform.

Newsflare co-founder and chief executive Jon Cornwell said: “It’s both promising and worrying to see the scale of mistrust in the UK media.

“While it goes a long way to positively demonstrate the freethinking, self-influential world we now live in, recent reports of fake news have clearly changed the public’s opinion about whether media content is genuine and reliable. Instead, people are swaying towards user generated content.

“Eyewitness video is powerful not only because it’s a real time account but because it is able to prompt an emotional response, which is particularly effective in a socio-political context.

“Video has the power both to build audiences and to build trust. However, publishers and broadcasters must avoid taking shortcuts when it comes to verifying eyewitness video.

“A video and its filmer leave a complex digital footprint, which if properly understood and investigated, can guarantee a video’s authenticity before it is published or broadcast to support a news story.”

Ninety-six per cent of respondents said they checked the news regularly.

When asked, “who would you trust the most to deliver trustworthy and factually verified news reports to you?” 30 per cent said a journalist, while 45 per cent said a member of the public present at the scene.

On the issue of fake news, 42 per cent said of those surveyed said they had recently seen or read a piece of news that they did not believe to be true. Of these, 73 per cent said they doubted the overall legitimacy of the news source in question as a result.

Picture: Shutterstock

Jeremy Vine is the highest paid BBC journalist, followed by Radio 4 Today presenter John Humphrys, according to figures revealed today by the corporation.

The figures for stars paid more than £150,000 from the licence fee have been released following government pressure.

BBC News anchor Fiona Bruce is the highest paid woman journalist.

Salaries are shown in bands of £50,000.

Radio 2 presenter Vine earns between £700,000 and £749,999.

BBC News at Ten presenter Edwards is paid between £550,000 and £599,999.

BBC Radio 4 Today presenter Humphrys (pictured) is in the pay band £600,000 to £649,999.

Andrew Marr, who presents his own political talk programme on BBC One, is paid between £400,000 to £449,999.

BBC Northern Ireland presenter Stephen Nolan receives a salary of between £400,000 and £449,999 a year.

Radio Five Live’s Nicky Campbell is paid between £400,000 to £449,999.

TV newsreader, and presenter of the Antiques Roadshow, Bruce earns between £350,000 and £399,999.

Radio 4 PM presenter Eddie Mair is paid between £300,000 and £349,999.

Newsnight and Dragons’ Den presenter Evan Davis is paid £250,000 to £299,999, as does BBC News at Six anchor George Alagiah.

BBC Breakfast show and Football Focus presenter Dan Walker is paid between £200,000 and £249,999.

So to is Victoria Debyshire, who presents her own day-time current affairs programme, and Martha Kearney, who presents Radio 4’s World at One.

BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg, Daily Politics presenter Andrew Neil and Today programme presenter Mishal Husain all earn between £200,000 and £249,999 a year, figures show.

Husain’s colleague and former political editor of the BBC, Nick Robinson, is paid between £250,000 and £299,999.

BBC director-general Tony Hall said: “Of the 43,000 talent contracts with the BBC last year, less than a quarter of one per cent were paid more than £150,000.

“The BBC produces some of the nation’s most loved television and radio and the most trusted news, while operating in a competitive market with the likes of Sky, ITV, Netflix and Amazon. It is widely acknowledged that on the whole the BBC pays less than its competitors while delivering high-quality and award-winning content.

“We have significantly reduced the total bill spent on paying talent, down again this year by 2.5 per cent. The bill for top talent is down 10 per cent year-on-year and down by a quarter over the last five years.

“The amount we pay the very highest earners has dropped by 40 per cent across the same period. At the same time, there has been significant cost inflation across the industry, so that BBC has made savings in an environment where costs are significantly up.

“However, the great majority of the public say that they want the BBC to try to have the best talent on its programmes. The BBC does not exist in a market on its own where it can set the market rates. If we are to give the public what they want, then we have to pay for those great presenters and stars. The public agree.

“New research shows that four out of five members of the public think that the BBC should be able to try to get the highest quality presenters, actors and reporters for its programmes and services – even if it means paying similar amounts to other broadcasters.

“The BBC has led the way on transparency – which is unique in the media market – publishing salaries of senior managers earning over £150,000 since 2009, and numbers of talent in pay bands since 2010.

“It is our aim to pay senior managers less than the market rate, and those at the top of the organisation are paid less than half of what their commercial rivals receive.

“On gender and diversity, the BBC is more diverse than the broadcasting industry and the Civil Service. We have set the most stretching targets in the industry for on-air diversity and we’ve made progress, but we recognise there is more to do and we are pushing further and faster than any other broadcaster.

“At the moment, of the talent earning over £150,000, two thirds are men and one third are women. We’ve set a clear target for 2020: we want all our lead and presenting roles to be equally divided between men and women. And it’s already having an impact. If you look at those on the list who we have hired or promoted in the last three years, 60 per cent are women and nearly a fifth come from a BAME background.

“Meeting our goal on this is going to have a profound impact not just on the BBC, but the whole media industry. It’s going to change the market for talent in this country.

“Ultimately, people should judge the BBC on the quality of the programmes and services they get for their 40p a day.

“The public tells us they want the best stars on the BBC, and in a highly competitive market, that costs, even if we do on the whole pay less than our rivals.

“The reality is that the BBC today costs less in real terms than it did 20 years ago. But now we offer four times as many TV channels, twice as many national radio stations, plus our video-on-demand service – iPlayer – and everything we do online. All for less than three pounds a week.

“In fact, for every hour that anyone consumes the BBC, they’re paying an average of less than seven pence – brilliant value compared to any other form of entertainment.

“The BBC is hugely proud of our content and shows – and of those who make and appear on them. The UK has a world-class broadcaster in the BBC.

“We have made huge strides on efficiency in recent years with overheads down to industry-leading levels: just five per cent of our total costs – better than most in the regulated private sector – to make sure the vast majority of our spending goes directly into the programmes and services the public love.

“Part of delivering that great content is the talent who appear in those programmes, who present them, or who interview and hold the powerful to account on behalf of the public.

“The public backs having great people working for the BBC. That’s because they get extraordinary value.”

Picture: BBC

Piers Morgan has been called “unprofessional” and “disgraceful” by fellow journalists who accused him of breaking an embargo on BBC stars’ salaries by tweeting figures ahead of their official release this morning.

Morgan released details of the corporation’s top earners at 10.08am on Twitter ahead of the 11am release of the addition to the BBC Annual Report, which contained new figures for all BBC staff earning more than £150,000 a year.

The figures revealed Jeremy Vine, John Humphrys and Huw Edwards as the BBC’s three top earning journalists, with Fiona Bruce the highest paid woman journalist at the corporation.

The BBC organised a press conference this morning and made the report available to journalists selected to attend in the hours beforehand.

Morgan claimed a “scoop” online, but his actions enraged a number of journalists who said he had broken an agreement not to report the figures before a designated time.

The Good Morning Britain presenter was chastised by fellow ITV colleague and news anchor Alastair Stewart, who tweeted: “Breaking an embargo, with stuff we’ve all been sitting on for hours, is not a ‘scoop’, it is naff, delusional and unprofessional.”

Morgan, who has nearly 6m followers on Twitter, replied: “You snooze, you lose mate.”

Buzzfeed UK editor-in-chief Janine Gibson also tweeted at Morgan, saying: “Well I suppose you may or may not think the BBC News staff are overpaid but at least they understand the word ‘embargo’.”

Morgan, former editor of the Daily Mirror, replied: “I understand the word ‘scoop’ better.”

Guardian digital editor Ian Prior said: “Breaking embargoes is being that repulsive brat who sneakily unwraps his presents on December 23. Scoop my arse.”

Sky News senior political correspondent Beth Rigby said: “Piers Morgan is utterly disgraceful to break embargo when hacks gathered at BBC for press conference and respected lock-in. Shame on him.”

She added: “Morgan breaks an embargo that dozens of journos honour and calls it a scoop. Funny guy. And a bit of a joke.”

Morgan tweeted to Rigby: “Oh settle down, petal. I just scooped you. Be better next time.”

He later added: “I’d like to apologise to all fellow journalists I scooped on BBC salary story. I can’t help being this good at my job, unfortunately.”

Presenter John Humphrys has said he does not deserve his six-figure salary when compared to a firefighter on the scene at Grenfell Tower as he claims he would do his job for less money.

His comments came as he was named the second highest paid journalist on the BBC’s list of top earning staff members, behind only Jeremy Vine, with a yearly pay packet of between £600,000 and £650,000.

Speaking on Radio 4’s Media Show after the figures were released yesterday, the Today programme presenter said he felt he did provide a useful service within the media market.

Asked if he felt he was worth the hefty pay cheque, the 73-year-old said: “What do I do? On paper, absolutely nothing that justifies that huge amount of money.

“If you compare me with lots of other people – a doctor who saves a child’s life, a nurse who comforts a dying person, or a fireman who rushes into Grenfell Tower – then of course you could argue that compared with that sort of thing I’m not worth twopence halfpenny.

“However, we operate in a market place. I think I provide a fairly useful service. Somebody has to do the job of trying to hold power to account and speak the truth to power and all that stuff.”

Humphrys, who also hosts BBC 2 quiz show Mastermind, began working for the broadcaster 50 years ago on a yearly £2,000 salary.

He said he would “of course” do his job for less money and that his last job offer outside the BBC was “about eight years ago” for “about double what I was then earning” but he turned it down.

Asked why, Humphrys said: “Corny answer, forgive me: I love the BBC.”

Speaking of the publicly-funded organisation’s decision to unveil the figures – which were topped by Radio 2 DJ Chris Evans’ £2m+ sum – Humphrys agreed that it was the right thing to do.

“I’ve always thought that,” he said. “In fact I have offered many, many times over the years to reveal what I was earning and the BBC always took the view… that I shouldn’t do that. That they didn’t want me to do that.

He said the corporation had told him releasing his salary might end up “distorting the market place”.

Humphrys added: “As an individual, as opposed to a BBC corporate person, I am perfectly happy that people should know what I earn and to be honest I am terribly interested in seeing the reaction.

“It may be that I am absolutely stunned and pack it all in next Thursday week and say ‘that’s it, I’m full of shame,’ but let’s see what happens.”

One thing Humphrys did not agree with, however, was the revelation than some of his “brilliant” female Today show colleagues, such as Sarah Montague and Mishal Husain, did not make the top 10 list.

He said: “I’m not happy with that…I don’t think that is right.”

Covering the salaries story on his own Radio 2 show, Jeremy Vine was asked by a listener if he was “embarrassed” to pick up his pay cheque.

The journalist replied: “I just feel very lucky every day,” before the listener asked: “Do you think you’re overpaid?”

Vine said: “I don’t really want to answer that because I don’t think it’s the moment for me.”

The listener went on to say he thought all BBC staff were “grossly overpaid”.

Picture: BBC

BBC News staff have blamed a secretive culture of “chequebook” lunches for the high wages and pay disparity revealed in last week’s disclosure of top-earning on-air talent salaries.

A corporation insider told Press Gazette that salary deals for its most well-known journalists were negotiated during expense account “talent lunches” that lacked transparency.

“That’s how talent pay works at BBC News,” they said. “It is not subject to union bargaining, there aren’t set rates for the job. It isn’t a transparent way of agreeing a rate for a job.

“If you do pay in this way, this is the outcome: arbitrary salaries to a group of people that you can’t justify paying that amount to.”

The BBC typically negotiates contracts with “talent” through their agents, which it believes to be standard practice across the industry.

But, the corporation has been carrying out a talent review for the past year that has recommended introducing pay bands for on-air/on-screen talent in the news department, Press Gazette understands.

The ruling to disclose on-air talent’s salary information was set out in last year’s BBC White Paper, which outlined proposals for the renewal of its Royal Charter, with the threshold first set at above £450,000 before Prime Minister Theresa May intervened to reduce it to £150,000.

The salaries disclosed are those paid for directly by the BBC, and do not include wages from independent production companies whose work is broadcast on BBC channels.

The average salary for a broadcast journalist on a continuing or fixed-term contract in the BBC News division is £31,526 a year, rising to £42,489 for a senior broadcast journalist, recent figures obtained under a Freedom of Information request show.

BBC News employs around 8,000 people.

“There is a lot of anger about the over pay,” said the insider. “Everyone is saying it reflects badly on journalists who aren’t being paid well and are being offered a real terms pay cut – it’s senior executives bringing the BBC into disrepute.”

“If £150,000 is the rate for that job, why aren’t others on that salary? That’s why people think it is the lunches that have resulted in the unbalanced wages.”

But anger at excessive talent pay is second to anger at senior management largesse.

“There is at least an acknowledgement that these people are doing the business of broadcasting, unlike the whole heap of senior managers that the BBC hasn’t got to grips with yet,” said the insider.

BBC director general Tony Hall was shown to earn up to £499,999 a year, deputy director general Anne Bulford was paid up to £449,999 and head of news James Harding up to £349,999 a year.

Bulford became the first woman deputy general at the BBC when appointed last year. The role had been discarded in 2011, but was reactivated by Hall. Bulford’s predecessor, Mark Byford, was offered nearly £1m in redundancy money.

BBC News staff are also concerned at the lack of ethnic diversity among the corporation’s top-paid talent, Press Gazette was told.

Six of the 42 journalists listed as earning £150k+ were non-white, although at 14 per cent this is in line with the ethnic make-up of the population of England and Wales according to the 2011 census.

George Alagiah is the highest paid non-white journalist, ranked tenth on Press Gazette’s list, and is paid up to £299,999.

Press Gazette was told: “The talk inside is about why the public focus is on gender, they accept it isn’t balanced but they see the real problem as being the lack of racial diversity [among high earners].

“There hasn’t been any commitment to address this, unlike for the gender pay divide.”

The insider also claimed there was a “mad panic” in the BBC’s news department to increase the diversity among its highest-paid talent ahead of the salary details being released.

A BBC spokesperson said: “These figures relate to the previous financial year for which the books have long been closed. The idea you could do some last minute manipulation is complete and utter nonsense. ”

Radio 2 presenter Jeremy Vine was revealed to be the top earning BBC journalist, earning up to £749,999 a year, followed by the Today programme’s John Humphrys and News at Ten anchor Huw Edwards.

Newsreader and presenter Fiona Bruce was the BBC’s highest paid female journalist, earning up to £399,999 a year, while Newsnight presenter Emily Maitlis didn’t feature on the list.

Maitlis, who is out of contract and in negotiations with the BBC, has joined a roster of other women journalists and presenters employed by the corporation who have urged director general Tony Hall to act now on the gender pay divide exposed by the disclosure of salaries.

The revelations around talent salaries comes as staff are facing a 1 per cent annual pay rise, which represents a 2.5 per cent real terms cut against inflation (currently at 3.5 per cent RPI).

The BBC has set a target to ensure all lead and presenting roles are equally divided between men and women by 2020.

A community radio station has had its licence revoked after broadcasting 25 hours of lectures by an alleged senior al-Qaida figure.

Iman FM, which is based in Sheffield and has been broadcasting since October 2014, put a series of readings by radical US cleric Anwar al-Awlaki (pictured) on the air during Ramadan.

Ofcom suspended the station’s licence on July 4 and revoked it yesterday.

Imam FM claimed that it was not aware of the background of al-Awlaki, who was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011.

But Ofcom said Iman FM was “unfit” to hold a licence after displaying “extremely reckless” conduct.

The station had broadcast “material likely to encourage or incite the commission of crime or to lead to disorder”, the regulator said.

It added that the lectures included “a direct call to action to members of the Muslim community to prepare for and carry out violent action against non-Muslim people”, and “statements clearly condoning and encouraging acts of crime, terrorism or violent behaviour”.

The service has been off-air since its licence was suspended and would not be reinstated, Ofcom said.

Picture: Reuters/Intelwire.com

Radio 4’s flaghip current affairs programme Today reached a record 7,655,000  listeners a week in the second quarter of this year according to RAJAR.

This compares to 7,340,000 this time last year, when figures would have been boosted by the referendum on leaving the European Union.

The data, which is based on a survey of radio listeners, suggests that heightened interest in current affairs around the general election and its aftermath may have benefited the programme.

It is only beaten by Chris Evans’ breakfast show on BBC Radio 2 which reached 907,000 listeners in the second half of the year, down from 9,472,000 at the same time a year earlier.

Radio 5 Live’s breakfast show, fronted by Nicky Campbell and Rachel Burden, lost listeners year on year with 2,274,000 in the second quarter versus 2,398,000 in the same period a year earlier.

The high numbers help explain why breakfast show presenters are among the best paid staff at the BBC.

Radio 4 Today’s star presenter John Humphrys is paid £600,000-£649,000, according to BBC salary disclosures.

His colleagues on the show also feature on the high-pay list:

• Nick Robinson: £250,000-£299,999
• Mishal Husain: £200,000-£249,999
• Justin Webb: £150,000-£199,999.Radio 5’s Nicky Campbell was paid £400,000-£449,000 last year by the BBC and Chris Evans was paid £2.2m.

  In many cases these salaries also include other TV and radio work for the BBC.

In the commercial sector, Alan Brazil’s breakfast programme on Talksport lost listeners year on year with 1,201,000 in the second quarter, compared with 1,570,000 in the same period a year ago (when it may have been boosted by the Euro 2016 football tournament).

Nick Ferrari on LBC 97.3 saw his audience grow year on year to 906,000 (versus 741,000 a year ago).

Ferrari has been boosted by some high-profile political interviews including a notable encounter in May with shadow home secretary Diane Abbott when she struggled to recall the cost of Labour’s pledge to increase police numbers.

BBC chiefs have dismissed calls for the corporation to report Brexit negotiations using the same editorial standards as it adopts during an election, which put increased scrutiny on impartiality.

The suggestion appears to have been made by Lord Malcolm Pearson and a cohort of Eurosceptic parliamentarians who met with BBC news director James Harding last month.

It follows an open letter signed by 70 MPs that accused the BBC of being “unable to break out of pre-referendum pessimism and accept new facts” regarding Brexit, which was published in March.

In separate letters to Lord Pearson, acquired by The Sun this week, both Harding and BBC chairman David Clementi said they did not think adopting special guidelines for reporting Brexit was the “right thing to do”.

Harding said: “You suggested that we should consider particular Brexit negotiation guidelines for our editorial teams given the importance of the negotiations. I have considered the idea and do not think that is the right thing to do.

“The Brexit negotiations are not an election or a referendum. Our coverage of the process is held to the same standard as our reporting on all other areas of politics and Government business.

“The BBC’s editorial guidelines, as they stand, set those standards, articulating our clear commitments to accuracy, impartiality, diversity of opinion and fair treatment of people in the news. These are the values we will bring to our reporting in the months ahead.”

Clementi added: “The specific point you raise with me is whether the BBC should apply the editorial guidelines which operate during an election or a referendum. Having consulted with colleagues, I do not think this is the right thing to do.

“An election or referendum is characterised by a finite period of debate, at the end of which the electorate must make a choice. This is not the position in respect of the current Brexit discussions, and I do not believe you and your colleagues are arguing for a second referendum.”

Clementi, who became head of the BBC Board in January, said it was “vital” that BBC news coverage of Brexit was seen to be “free of political interference wherever it comes from”.

He declined to meet with Lord Pearson and his “colleagues” on the issue of Brexit impartiality, but added: “I am sure you will continue to make your concerns known to senior managers in BBC News.

“In turn, I can assure you that impartiality, accuracy and independence will remain fundamental principles which will drive my work and that of the board.”

In his letter to Lord Pearson, Harding said: “We are always keen to be alive to and reflect upon criticism [at the BBC]. We accept the need to make the distinction between the EU and Europe.

“We will be reporting on many of the areas mentioned in your memo, including the strengths of the UK’s position, the costs and benefits of immigration, the range of business opinion and a rounded view of the performance of the economy. And, of course, we are committed to reporting views on Brexit from across the EU.”

He added: “I mentioned in our meeting the importance of the editorial independence of the BBC. Our aim is to provide full and accurate news led by the professional judgment of experienced correspondents and editors.

“I am always happy to meet and discuss our coverage with politicians, but I want to underline that our job is not to be pushed or pulled by one political interest or another. It is to serve our audiences.

“We can certainly agree that there has not been a more interesting or important time to do that.”

Under current BBC election guidelines, bids for interviews or proposals to profile UK party leaders must be referred to the Chief Adviser Politics.

Picture: Reuters/Neil Hall

The Government is seeking further advice from Ofcom on Rupert Murdoch’s £11.7bn Sky takeover bid after receiving “new evidence and comments”.

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has written to the communications regulator asking for extra input before Culture Secretary Karen Bradley decides whether the proposed deal should face an in-depth investigation.

Bradley said last month that she was “still minded” to refer the takeover tilt to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) following a report by Ofcom flagging “public interest concerns” surrounding media plurality.

In a statement, the DCMS said Ofcom had been given a two-week window in which to respond and expected a reply by no later than August 25.

It said: “The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has written toOfcom under section 106B(2) of the Enterprise Act 2002, seeking further clarification in relation to representations made on the Secretary of State’s referral decision.

“After assessing the large number of representations made in relation to the Secretary of State’s referral decision, a number of these raise new evidence and/or comment on theOfcom assessment.

“Any referral decision by the Secretary of State must be taken on the basis of a valid assessment of all the relevant evidence.

“For this reason the DCMS has asked Ofcom to advise on a number of points arising from these representations.”

Ofcom warned Bradley in June that an attempt by Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox to acquire the 61 per cent of Sky it does not already own risks handing the tycoon’s family “increased influence” over the UK’s news agenda and the political process.

Since then, the Murdoch family have piled the pressure on the Secretary of State, saying her treatment of their bid for Sky will prove a test case for how far Britain is “open for business”.

Murdoch’s approach comes after his last attempt at taking over the business through News Corporation in 2011.

The tilt faced opposition from media industry rivals and politicians before it was scuppered by acute pressure on the company, brought about by phone-hacking claims involving News International.

Responding to the DCMS, an Ofcom spokesman said: “We have received the department’s request for further clarifications and will respond within the requested time.”

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable added: “I am very pleased that the representations made by myself, Ed Miliband and Ken Clarke are being taken seriously and are being properly investigated as they should be.

“There are serious issues yet to be resolved, particularly around the ‘fit and proper’ test.”

Picture: Chris Radburn/PA Wire

BBC journalists Andrew Neil and John Humphrys have both been accused of being “chums” with Brexit Secretary David Davis and so giving the Tory cabinet minister an easy ride in interviews.

The claims were leveled by former Daily Mail political editor James Chapman, also ex chief of staff to Davis, in a series of tweets published yesterday.

Targeting Today programme presenter Humphrys, Chapman said: “It is totally inappropriate for Humphrys to conduct Brexit interviews. Mail has to be prised out of his hands and he holidays with [David Davis].”

He added shortly after: “[David Davis] would never prep for @bbcradio4 as he knew Humphrys would do Brexit chums act then hector and interrupt @labour spokespeople #byebyejohn.”

Today editor Sarah Sands defended Humphrys in response to the tweet, saying the claim was “not true” and that “John has never been on holiday with David Davis”.

Chapman, who plans to create a new centrist political party opposed to Brexit having left the Department for Exiting the EU before June’s general election, also targeted BBC Two Daily Politics presenter Neil.

He tweeted: “[David Davis] was also relaxed about [Andrew Neil] as they drink (lots) together regularly and his producer Robbie Gibb is a deranged Brexiteer now at No10.”

Neil said the claims were “simply untrue”, adding: “Have dined with [David Davis] once in 10 years (you were there), lunched once in 10 years. NEVER had drinks with him in 20 years or more.”

A BBC source told Press Gazette: “After years of interrogating ministers, I’m not sure you’d find anyone who felt they had easy interview with either John Humphrys or Andrew Neil.”

Former head of BBC Westminster and editor of the Daily and Sunday Politics shows, Robbie Gibb, was named as the Prime Minister’s new director of communications last month.

Picture: BBC/Youtube