BBC Chief Quits: Director General to Step Down After Olympics

Stephen: The great British media behemoth loses its chief.  In this case, so a successor will “have time to really get their feet under the table” (whatever that means) before the next review of the BBC charter in 2016 – which seems rather along way off, even without Ascension…

By Anthony Bond, Daily Mail

March 19, 2012

http://tinyurl.com/77c3pl7

BBC director general Mark Thompson is to step down from the role this autumn.

Mr Thompson announced the move in an email to staff at the corporation today after a meeting with BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten.

He said: ‘This morning I told Lord Patten that I believe that an appropriate time for me to hand over to a successor and to step down as director general of the BBC would be the autumn of this year, once the Olympics and the rest of the amazing summer of 2012 are over.’

Mr Thompson said he had discussed his leaving date with Lord Patten last year and said he wanted his successor to ‘have time to really get their feet under the table’ before the next review of the BBC charter which will take place before the end of 2016.

He told staff the corporation had ‘weathered a series of lively storms’ during his almost eight years in the top job and was ‘so much stronger than the BBC I inherited back in 2004′.

Mr Thompson said: ‘Trust and approval are at record highs, our services are in brilliant creative form and we’ve demonstrated beyond contradiction that the BBC can be just as much of a leader and innovator in the digital age as we once were in the analogue one.’

He joined the BBC as a trainee in 1979 and worked on programmes including Watchdog, Newsnight and Panorama before leaving the corporation to become chief executive of Channel 4 from 2002 to 2004.

Mr Thompson’s departure could lead to the BBC getting its first female director general.

Its chief operating officer Caroline Thomson is second favourite to succeed Mark Thompson in the role, according to bookmakers.

George Entwistle – director of BBC Vision – was declared the early favourite to take on the top job when rumours first emerged that Mr Thompson could be on his way out.

Whoever takes the job will also have to take a pay cut compared to what Mr Thompson was paid after Lord Patten made clear the present salary of £671,000 would not be offered to his successor.

BBC Trust Chairman Lord Patten said: ‘Mark Thompson has been an outstanding director general of the BBC. He took over during a traumatic period in the corporation’s history and subsequently enhanced its reputation for creativity and quality, while setting the course for the BBC’s digital future.

‘I will miss him on both a personal and professional level and I wish him the very best of luck for the future. The Trust will shortly begin the process of recruiting a successor.’