‘Why is there a need for the public to know what BBC stars earn?’

• THE question has been raised – why is there a need for the public to know what BBC stars earn?

The answer is very simple, it is part of an unstated policy to get those stars to feel so fed up they will leave the BBC.

Note that this requirement by the government is only made of the BBC and not on any of its commercial rivals. This runs in tandem with the BBC being lumbered with the full cost of the over-75s’ licences.

The basic idea is that the licence being so dependent on the popularity of the BBC and the BBC being so dependent on it for so much of its finances, means the BBC would probably wither on the vine, so to speak, and be reduced to “the worthy channel” that no one watches (as with the PBs in the USA) or will be pushed into the commercial sector.

Those of us with long memories may recall a parallel to this when the Margaret Thatcher government went out buying votes by flogging off social housing. At least that time, the government were up front about the sales; albeit not for the reasons given at the time.

Not to be overlooked is that this was forced only on the public sector. A salient factor was the longevity of tenure.

However, longstanding tenants of private landlords never had the same right-to-buy option. Nor did tenant farmers where families may have been tending the same land for generations.

What of tenants (not managers) of pubs who again had notched up considerable longevity?

Obvious doctrinaire politics … but, then, it worked in Thatcherite times and to judge by rather more recent days, still does.

HARRY BOURNE, SW1