BBC to make 131 freelancers staff

7 November 2012 Last updated at 11:13 GMT The BBC reviewed the way it paid on-air talent and freelance staff after answering questions about pay to a government committee earlier this year The BBC has announced it will review the freelance contracts of more than 800 on-air staff being paid through their own companies.

An estimated 131 freelancers could be offered staff contracts as a result, following a tax review by accountants Deloitte and BBC auditors.

However the BBC said there is "no evidence" it used personal service companies to help aid tax avoidance.

It commissioned the report after a government review of tax paid by staff.

The Public Accounts Committee report said too many staff, in the government and the BBC, made their own arrangements to pay tax and national insurance, which could allow them to contribute less.

The report found that in total some 2,400 civil servants were subject to such "off-payroll" arrangements.

The review of the BBC's freelance contracting arrangements, published on Wednesday, covered all staff contracted and paid in the financial year 2011/12.

Deloitte and the internal auditors identified 804 freelance talent paid more than £50,000 that year that should be the subject of the BBC's new employment test as a matter of priority.

It is estimated 131 of these could be offered staff contracts when their current contracts expire.

The BBC said this new employment test will also now be carried out on any new staff, to help move away from the practice of engaging on-air talent on long term contracts as personal service companies, when a staff contract would be appropriate.

It is hoped the changes will be in place by the start of the new tax year in April 2013.

'Inconsistent contracts'

The BBC admitted in the report that its current policy for contracting staff was "inconsistent".

The corporation added that this had resulted in on-air talent doing very similar work while being classified in a variety of ways; either as staff, self-employed or contracted through a personal service company.

"Our review shows the BBC is not using personal service companies to avoid tax or help others avoid tax," said Zarin Patel, the BBC's chief financial officer.

"Nevertheless, it shows inconsistencies in the way our policy has been applied. We are addressing this with a more objective employment test for all new contracts and by developing a new framework with HMRC for self-employed on-air presenters."

The BBC said it was making the changes to help address "the public perception that off-payroll contracts and in particular personal service companies are used to avoid tax".

It said retaining a freelance model was "critical" for the success of the BBC - and that staff would only be contracted via a personal service company when it was "absolutely satisfied" that was the most suitable method of employment.

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Ericsson to cut near 9 percent of Swedish staff amid downturn

The exterior of Ericsson's headquarters are seen in Stockholm April 30, 2009.

Credit: Reuters/Bob Strong

STOCKHOLM | Wed Nov 7, 2012 4:44am EST

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Ericsson (ERICb.ST) is to cut 1,550 staff in Sweden as the world's biggest maker of mobile phone networks aims to drive down costs in an industry facing a global slowdown.

Competition has pushed down telecom gear prices while global economic weakness has led to slower spending by operators, pressuring vendors in the industry.

In the third quarter, Ericsson's core profit fell 42 percent due to slower orders and a shift in business mix to less profitable contracts. The company said then it would focus on cost cuts.

Announcing the layoff of 1,550 staff in Sweden, out of the 17,768 currently employed, Ericsson said the redundancies were inevitable.

"We must ensure that we can continue to execute on our strategy to maintain our market leadership, invest in R&D and meet our customers' needs," Tomas Qvist, head of human resources at Ericsson said in a statement.

"To secure this we need to focus on reducing cost, driving commercial excellence and operational effectiveness. "

The company stuck to its forecast for total restructuring costs this year of 4 billion crowns ($597 million), a spokeswoman said. Its shares slipped 0.7 percent on the news.

Ericsson is not the only one suffering.

Earlier this month, rival Alcatel-Lucent (ALUA.PA) said it could sell assets to strengthen its balance sheet after posting a second straight quarterly loss.

Nokia Siemens NOKI.UL is cutting a quarter of its staff hoping for 1 billion euros in cost savings by the end of next year while China's ZTE Corp (0763.HK) and Huawei Technologies Co Ltd HWT.UL, the world's second-largest telecom gear maker, are also grappling with weakening sales.

(Reporting by Simon Johnson. Editing by Patrick Lannin)

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TV networks to staff: watch what you tweet on Election Day

People vote at Holy Cross School during the U.S. presidential election in Indianapolis, Indiana, November 6, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Aaron Bernstein

By Lisa Richwine

LOS ANGELES | Tue Nov 6, 2012 9:00am EST

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - U.S. television networks face a new challenge in covering this year's excruciatingly close presidential election: prevent closely guarded exit poll results from leaking onto Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms.

The major TV news networks agreed to shield early exit poll data suggesting who is leading in a state until the state's polls close. That means no tweeting exit polls, posting on Facebook, or re-tweeting figures reported by others.

"We will not either project or characterize a race until all the polls are scheduled to have closed in that state," said Sheldon Gawiser, director of elections for NBC News.

Election officials worry that leaks could discourage people from voting if they think the race in their state is already decided, depressing the vote count and distorting the results. In 1985, Congress extracted a promise from the major TV networks to refrain from using exit polls to project a winner in a particular state, or to characterize who is leading, while voting continues in that area.

The closeness of this year's election between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney has focused attention on key battleground states - such as Ohio, Virginia and Florida - and what their exit polls might signal about who will win the White House.

It has resurrected memories of the disputed 2000 election between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore - some media outlets projected a Gore victory in Florida while polls in the western part of the state remained open. The networks later pulled back, leaving doubt about who won and leading to a month of recounts and court battles.

If early results become public, "it can be a real problem," said Jeff Berkowitz, a Republican strategist who runs Berkowitz Public Affairs. "For somebody who's got seven things on their list to do that day, and if they're already being told the election is over, are they really going to prioritize voting over the other six?"

Exit poll data is collected by New Jersey-based Edison Media Research on behalf of the National Election Pool, a consortium of Walt Disney Co's ABC, News Corp's Fox, Time Warner Inc's CNN, Comcast Corp's NBC, CBS Corp's CBS and the Associated Press. The media companies use the findings to help them call results in each state, and to inform post-election analysis.

Reuters is not a member of the consortium and collects exit data with market research firm Ipsos. The news organization will not share any exit data before polls close, a Thomson Reuters Corp spokeswoman said.

Smaller news outlets and Internet blogs are not bound by the commitment made by members of the National Election Pool, and could post any exit poll numbers they get their hands on.

In 2004, for example, The Drudge Report posted early results that favored John Kerry. U.S. stocks dipped, and Kerry eventually lost the race, highlighting that early and incomplete results can prove wrong. A representative for The Drudge Report could not immediately be reached by e-mail.

There is no evidence that exit poll results influence voters, but the rise of social media means any leaked data could spread like wildfire.

After leaks in past elections, the big TV networks have taken steps to keep a tighter lid on information. While some findings previously were available as early as 1 p.m. Eastern time, news staff are not to be given an initial look until 5 p.m. - still two hours before the earliest poll closings.

Following a template used in the last three elections, six analysts - one from each news organization in the National Election Pool - will be locked in a "quarantine room" from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern time on Tuesday with no phone or e-mail access, Gawiser said. They will conduct preliminary analysis of the data before it is released to staff at the news outlets.

"They cannot talk to us. We don't know anything about it. We can't see any of these data until five o'clock," Gawiser said.

These kinds of restrictions helped keep exit data under wraps in 2008, when Obama defeated John McCain. The race also was not as close as in the two previous elections, or indeed this year's vote, reducing demand for early information.

This year, the tight race and prevalence of social media increases the risk that data will spread quickly if it leaks, said Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism.

"If that were to happen today, with Internet penetration and the speed of social media, that (data) would be known pretty widely," he said.

(Reporting By Lisa Richwine; Editing by Ronald Grover and Steve Orlofsky)

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