BBC Comedy to cut 24% of staff

The BBC is preparing to cut almost a quarter of jobs from its London comedy unit as part of the corporation's latest round of redundancies.

According to in-house BBC magazine Ariel, 15 out of 62 posts in the London comedy team are to be made redundant, including producer, production manager, script editor, assistant producer and personal assistant roles. Staff working at Comedy North and Radio Comedy will be unaffected by the job losses.

In an email sent to staff yesterday, head of comedy Mark Freeland said that the increasing pressure on budgets meant the London comedy team had to "adapt" in future.

"Over the last four years the comedy genre as a whole has had around 20% less commissioning money, which in turn has impacted on the level of in-house production," he said.

"Despite holding our income steady over the last three years, our business is unlikely to return to the levels of four years ago. Additionally, comedy has the pressure of tighter production budgets and lower levels of third-party income, which has removed much of the flexibility from the department.

"Furthermore, our responsibilities to grow comedy across the UK, especially in Salford, means that a smaller core team is needed in London."

The redundancies bring the total number of job losses at BBC Vision Productions to 187 since last October, or 18% of total staff in continuing roles. In addition, 90 multiplatform jobs spanning Vision production and commissioning have been cut, along with 47 in factual, 22 in drama and 13 in entertainment.

Despite the cutbacks, the BBC Comedy unit will still be the biggest comedy production department in the UK. Freeland is confident that the team will be able to continue developing more hit comedies, such as the award-winning sitcom Miranda.

"BBC in-house comedy has had an outstanding and award-winning few years, with exceptional programmes entertaining a wide range of audiences on TV, radio and now also online," Freeland said.

"On TV, Miranda, The Thick of It, Comic Relief, Roger & Val, Rock & Chips, Mitchell & Webb, Psychoville, Mongrels, Come Fly With Me, Mrs Brown's Boys, Twenty Twelve to name but a few.

"Radio Comedy is in great shape and in-house was, and continues to be, instrumental in the development of comedy online. Our content has been a credit to all the people who have worked so hard to create it, on screen and off."

A programme of voluntary redundancies will now begin among staff in the job categories affected, with the aim of making final decisions by June 10.