BBC meeting its savings targets

1 Nov 11
The BBC is on track to meet its £487m efficiency savings target, auditors said today.

By Nick Mann | 1 November 2011

The BBC is on track to meet its £487m efficiency savings target, auditors said today.

The National Audit Office concluded that the broadcaster’s efficiency programme was providing value for money and was in line to save 3% per annum between 2008 and 2013, the goal set by its governing body, the BBC Trust. At the same time, it was ‘broadly maintaining’ its overall performance levels.

The NAO’s report, published today by the BBC Trust, found that, as of March 2011, the BBC had saved £396m of the £487m it needs to cut by 2012/13 under its 2007 licence fee settlement.

The BBC is forecasting a further £164m savings over the final two years of the programme, which would exceed the overall goal.

However, the NAO said the BBC was unable to demonstrate with certainty that all the savings made represented true efficiencies, due to difficulties in gauging whether they had affected its performance.

Commenting on the report, NAO head Amyas Morse said the efficiency programme was proving a ‘clear success in the terms set for it’.

But he added: ‘It is hard to say whether the target set was stretching enough and the BBC cannot say whether all the savings made amount to real gains in efficiency.

‘To manage within its 2010 licence fee settlement, the BBC must strengthen its approach to targeting savings and create a culture of continually challenging how services are delivered.’

In response to the report’s findings, the BBC Trust said that it would be looking for more effective ways of measuring the efficiency savings and their impact, taking into account their effect on the BBC’s core objectives.

It also committed to apply the lessons of the current ‘Continuous Improvement’ efficiency programme to the next one, ‘Delivering Quality First’, which runs from 2013 to 2017.

And it said the BBC would continue to look at how other industry organisations were changing their ways of working and finding savings.

Anthony Fry, the BBC Trustee with lead responsibility for value for money, said: ‘It is clear from this report that under the trust’s stewardship the BBC has made great strides in continuing to improve its efficiency and this should be commended. When targets are achieved, of course people can question whether they are too low; just as, when savings fall short, it is rarely suggested that targets were too high.

‘What is most important is that the lessons learned to date, along with the NAO’s suggestions for further improvement, will be invaluable as we implement the challenging programme of efficiencies proposed as part of the Delivering Quality First process.’

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