Yentob: 'I need to fly business class'

The BBC's creative director Alan Yentob has defended his expense claims for business class flights by saying that he could not work effectively without them.

In the corporation's latest expenses report, it emerged that Yentob had claimed for a return flight from London to New York in September last year at a cost of £3,381. He was filming part of his Imagine arts series for BBC One.

Reacting to an expenses question at a Voice Of The Listener And Viewer conference in London, Yentob said that the flight cost was fully justifiable in relation to his work schedule.

"I have been 40 years at the BBC and done quite a lot. I am quite a senior figure at the organisation," he said.

"When I went to New York, immediately [after] I arrived I went to give a talk to an organisation. I was then filming in the afternoon. I then returned within about 24 hours to London to work straight away.

"Now do you think I should have travelled economy to do that? Because I wouldn't have been capable of doing the job. I am not quite capable of doing all those things at once."

Yentob said that the BBC's "masochistic" decision to release quarterly expenses reports has made all senior executives think a lot harder about their claims.

"We are doing it more carefully and scrutinising more carefully what we do. The obligation to do that will change the way people do their expenses - they will think more about them," he said.

"A lot of people are very busy and perhaps don’t fill in their expenses as routinely as they should and perhaps they claim for things they shouldn't. Of course it makes us think harder about it."

Yentob also decried the National Audit Office (NAO) and the Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) for criticising the BBC's budgeting of major events, such as the £250,000 it spent on a studio for coverage of Euro 2008.

He said that there are now many regulatory bodies "trying to make decisions about the BBC", which can make it hard for the corporation to operate effectively.

"Interesting examples are the PAC, the NAO, who of course know everything about television programmes and how many footballers should be there and how many studios you need," he said sarcastically.

"Do you want it to look good or do you want it to look bad? There's also a point where people are trying to interfere in which programmes you do and how you do them. It can get a bit trying."