Thompson: 'BBC expenses are justified'

Mark Thompson has said that the recently-published expenses breakdown for top BBC executives show that claims were both reasonable and justified.

Speaking to BBC1's Breakfast and Radio 4's Today, the director-general defended the £350,000 worth of expenses recorded over the past five years.

The claims included his own £2,236.90 reimbursement to fly his family home from Italy when he was forced to return to the UK in the aftermath of the Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross radio scandal.

Thompson said: "Every one of these expenses in my view was reasonable and was justified.

"I don't believe that I've yet seen any evidence that a single one of these line-by-line expenses has been in any way unjustified."

He also defended BBC wages at the top executive level and rejected a comparison of his own £647,000 salary with the £195,000 earned by the Prime Minister.

He added: "I'm afraid that people who are making decisions about whether they should become head of television for the BBC or the head of radio aren't comparing themselves with a career choice about becoming Prime Minister.

"We all accept that we should get paid much less than our equivalents do in the private sector. It is quite reasonable that I should get paid a third of the equivalent in the private sector."