bbc male presenters.

As I heard her say, she didn't want to go to China, and only agreed to go if she got the same pay as the men. This was agreed, and it was only some time later she found out they had lied. They then offered her a pay rise, which was the last straw and why she went public

But Grampie, Carrie Gracie went to China leaving her children here! You can hardly say she lacked commitment to the job. I totally disagree that it's not about gender: there still seems an idea that men need more to live on than women.

Leaving the BBC aside for a moment, I asked a boss in the 90 s why a male staff nurse was getting paid more than his female colleagues, to be told men have homes and families to keep. I was so gobsmacked I had no reply at the time. It's not something new it has always been this way and until all women protest it won't change.

Well, yes, why not increase women's salaries to the same level as the men's?

But the, as many a WASPI Woman can tell you, the government decided to equalise male and female State Pensions by whacking women's qualifying age up to 65 - same as men - and then adding another year on top for both men and women.

IF the pension qualifying age had been brought down to 63 for men and raised to 63 for women that would have been much fairer.

But central government doesn't do fair, does it?

They are all paid vastly too much..................

I think it was right to bring down the male salaries rather than increase the females. It is far too much to earn for what is often a part-time job anyway.
I can't wait to see what happens when female footballers ask for the same pay as the men. Maybe at last they will get the ridiculous amount of money these posing players earn reduced to a level similar to that which Rugby players earn!

It isn't a pay scale. It's an amount negotiated with the performer's agent, just as for a star actor. The going rate for women seems to have been lower. Now they'll be asking for more. And we can start complaining about the pay differences between those in front of the camera and behind it. There are many inequalities other than the gender one.

Bringing down the male salary scales does not address the fact that for years they have been earning far more than the females for doing a comparable job - and for years these women have lost out.

Of course, there are differences in pay in respect to on and off camera staff. But it wouldn't be right for a camerawoman to earn less than a cameraman, unless her role was significantly different.

I wonder if the amazing work of the camera man on nature programmes earns him/her as high a salary as the presenter

They should raise the women's salaries and lower the men's so they meet in the middle! Won't cost any more.

Of course I agree that pay should be on merit and not gender. Hopefully we are moving in that direction.
It would be wonderful if the law stated that no one could earn more than the Prime Minister, the wealth could be shared more evenly although there’d be less tax in the coffers but perhaps we’d need less if the wealth were distributed more fairly. Close to Utopia.
Unfortunately we don’t live in that sort of world and the upshot would be that we’d lose the creme de la creme to the highest bidders abroad. While I’m happy to lose the overpaid footballers and celebrities, I don’t want our top scientists, medics, etc., leaving in droves.

They should sack the lot of them (especially that awful Peter Levy on Look North) and bring in some new cheaper faces. It surely can't be that difficult to sit and read out the news.

If you did two (or more) separate jobs with separate contracts for the same company, would you expect to have parity with someone doing one job?
I think not. John Humphreys reportedly has two separate contracts with two separate arms of the BBC. What we are reading is the lumping together of his two salaries by the media or effect.
The same applies to Claudia Winkleman. She has two separate jobs and two separate paymasters.

*For not or.

It has to do with lingevity in the position too.
A policeman with more years service than a 3 year 'rookie' is on a higher pay scale due to experience not rank.

Sorry. Longevity.

The vice chancellor of Bath University has now been sacked because she was so overpaid, yet I think some might have rated her job as being more important and more difficult than highly paid tv performers like John Humphries, Claudia Winkleman, Jeremy Vine, Alex Jones etc. They all work in a public service.

I am sure there are many well qualified and talented people who would be more than willing to present tv programmes for £150k pa or less.

A divorced working woman/mother will end up being the winner as they'll benefit from the divorce settlement, an ongoing income for the children, plus her own salary (on a par with a man) and any new single childless partner's income in the future. It does work for men but not in quite the same way. A close friend is divorced, has a high 6 figure salary but has to pay out an eye-watering amount for private schools for three children, buy a house for his ex and one for himself after selling the marital home and spent A LOT of money flying to see the children every weekend and renting a weekend place to spend time with them. His ex put a lot of pressure on him financially. House, car entertainment for the kids...the squeeze hurt. Don't forget. The salary announcements are not nett of tax. Their take home pay won't be anything like that.

I agree about men and women being paid equal amounts of money for doing the same job. But what about talent?

How is that defined? Is Claudia Winkleman, for example, more talented than Naga Munchetti? Should the more talented presenters (whether male or female) still receive higher pay?

It seems to open up lots of discussion!

There should be no 'him her' when it comes down to both doing the same job same qualifications.
Be it a cosy studio or battlefront.

I think we need our great women journalists and we don't need people like Chris Evans and Claudia Winkleman who are frankly annoying. Somehow the BBC are misunderstanding their audience.

Hear hear Margs!
Claudia Winkleman doesn’t annoy me (but she is overpaid!) but Carrie Gracie does. It’s impossible to compare them and say who deserves what as they’re doing totally different jobs. They can only be compared to others (men and women) doing the same job and paid the same.

libra10
The fact a person has the benefit in terms of years than another in which to achieve their chosen profession does not necessarily make them more ' talented' and could be seen as age related discrimination.

Radio 4s "Today" program has Mishal Hussein and Sarah Montague as presenters.
Now there are two very intelligent women who can hold the program together, interview important politicians and not let them off the hook when the interviewee is trying to get away with prevarication. These two women are just as good as the men in that program. They should be paid the same hourly rate.

I’m all for equality but it’s turning into positive discrimination against men ... what’s happened to being hired on merit?