Mark Thompson may come under scrutiny after report shows some staff were paid over what was stipulated in contracts

This article is more than 7 years old

This article is more than 7 years old

Former BBC director general Mark Thompson will face further scrutiny over his eight-year tenure at the BBC after a damning report by the public spending watchdog into the corporation's six-figure payoffs to former members of its top management.

Tory MP Rob Wilson said Thompson had questions to answer after the National Audit Office investigation revealed that a string of senior executives were paid hundreds of thousands of pounds more in severance payments than they were contractually entitled to.

They included one senior manager who received a payoff of nearly £900,000, despite being given 14 months' notice and finding another job before leaving the BBC.

The NAO said Thompson approved the payoff – including £300,000 for salary in lieu of notice, £300,000 for redundancy and a further £266,288 in pension top-ups – even though it went against the BBC's own policy.

Members of the House of Commons public accounts committee have already called on Thompson, who left the BBC last year and is now chief executive of the New York Times Company, to return to parliament to give evidence on the BBC's £100m Digital Media Initiative fiasco.

Wilson said: "It does seem to me that many of the problems that have now been revealde at the BBC have their roots in Mark Thompson's tenure as director general.

"That is why I think it is very important that he is going to go before the public accounts committee, where they can hold him accountable for his time at the head of the BBC."

Wilson described the NAO investigation, published on Monday, as an "absolutely damning report".

He added: "The NAO has revealed that the BBC was over-generous in its 'severance in lieu of notice' arrangements, had no proper principles for applying them, and no proper governance arrangements for checking that licence fee payers' money was being spent properly.

"Most shockingly, in a quarter of sampled cases the NAO found that the BBC paid departing executives more than they were entitled to under their contracts, and of particular concern, found evidence of 'unusual' payments."

The NAO report found one individual who was given a £219,000 payoff – £141,000 more than they were entitled to – including £49,000 for training and IT equipment to help their skills and career prospects post-BBC.

In a total of five cases, the BBC made "unusual payments" that were subject to "little central assessment" by the BBC, the NAO said.

They included a commitment to buy £60,000 of consulting services from one former senior manager, at a daily rate of £1,000. The NAO said such payments "can create reputational risks and set inappropriate precedents".

In two other instances, former executives were awarded their maximum pay in lieu of notice despite securing future employment before they left.

The BBC also topped up the pension pots of 38 departing managers, at a total cost of £3.7m (a policy which has now largely been withdrawn).

Anthony Fry, BBC Trustee and chair of the trust's finance committee, admitted the size of the payouts "from a licence-fee payers' perspective appear to be shocking".

He told Radio 4's The World At One that what was "particularly worrying" was that the payments were being made outside of BBC policy and "without the proper authority".

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