It was only this morning Anna was telling us about the impending job losses at the Beeb and now it seems those who don’t lose their jobs might not have an office to go to anyway, as the BBC Trust has finally approved the sale of the prestigious Television Centre. You know things are bad when you have to sell the family silver to make ends meet, and with the Trust asking for a “property portfolio strategy” it looks likely there’s to be more cashing in on the Beeb’s architectural assets before we’re done.

A complex the size of Television Centre could be worth many hundreds of millions and is clearly a juicy pear ripe for the plucking in the eyes of the cash-strapped Trust, who are obviously completely unaffected by the 50 years of television history embedded in a structure that was home to Top of the Pops, Blue Peter and hundreds of other famous BBC names. The Trust’s statement, released today, also includes the chilling promise to scale back investment from areas which were “not delivering enough public value.” I don’t care what you say, the debate about the future of the minor digital channels ain’t over yet.

It’s just not been a good few months for the BBC, has it? Cookiegate and Crowngate have diverted attention for a while, but this has simply served to paper over the cavernous cracks of a much bigger problem – the fact that the licence fee has been settled at a rate below inflation. The Director General, Mark Thompson, has had some tough decisions to make, and, unsurprisingly, there are winners and losers. Well, more losers to be honest.

There are two sets of people that will be affected by the changes – the employees and the viewers. Let’s start with the former. The biggest job losses are likely to come in BBC News, as news across all platforms and channels – radio, terrestrial bulletins, News 24 and the internet – will soon come from just one department. It’s thought that around 500 people will lose their jobs as a result.

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Before we even start talking about the fiasco at the BBC involving The Queen, I’d like to tell you about a grievance I have. The Royal hubbub at Television Centre has seen the media dubbing the incident as ‘Crowngate’. The suffix of ‘gate’ stems from the Watergate scandal. In that case, if scandals are all tagged with ‘gate’, then Watergate should really have been ‘Watergategate’.

Anyway, enough of that. As most of you will probably know, Peter Fincham has tidied up his desk, taken down his foam dart board and loving stroked his vast desk for one last time, as now, he’s just another bloke sat at home in his pants eating pork scratchings. However, most blokes in that position aren’t the former controller of the British Broadcasting Corporation. He was fired because someone re-edited Her Majesty to look like she was storming out of a room… as opposed to storming into a room. What’s all the fuss about? Are more heads going to roll?

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As everyone knows, the world of media is a slime bucket. People are tossed aside in favour saving money and cutting corners. To hell with the content! Show me the ad’ money! Well, the BBC is no different as, according to the National Union of Journalists, the corporation are planning to ask news staff to write a 200-word memo setting out why they should keep their jobs.

The union has reacted angrily to the move, accusing executives of “losing the plot” and asking staff to “write their own suicide note”. It has written to the BBC asking for clarification after being informed the initiative was discussed at a meeting of the BBC journalism board. A source told The Guardian that everyone in BBC news would be asked to write 200 words on “why they want to keep their jobs” by mid-October. These would then be considered by a panel of managers.

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I’m watching BBC Three and BBC Four quite a bit these days. It’s got a cracking mix of comedy and documentaries that are seemingly aimed square at me. However, both channels have been under the threat of closure thanks to a funding gap of £2billion at the BBC, with people demanding that they should suffer in favour of news and current affairs.

Now, reports are suggesting that it is in fact BBC Two and BBC Four that are to be the hardest hit in the corporation’s forthcoming budget cuts. Having said that BBC Four is safe from the chop, insiders believe the corporation will look to share content between the two channels, enabling them to reduce the total programming budget. The only great news on this is that the constant repeats of 2 Pints of Lager… will be shunted off to the TV glue boilers in the sky.

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