BBC journalists to vote on capping D-G's pay

NUJ journalists at the BBC World Service news and current affairs department are to hold their own referendum on director general Mark Thompson's salary.
They will be asked to back calls for him to reduce his salary to five times the median level of BBC news and production staff.
The BBC website puts Thompson's salary including bonuses at £664,000 and his total remuneration in 2008/9 at £834,000. According to the NUJ, this is more than 20 times the median salary.
The ballot paper will say ask journalists to deplore "the inflated salaries being paid to Mark Thompson and other top managers of the BBC and urge them to reduce them considerably - so that the annual salary and bonus paid to the Director General or any other BBC manager never exceeds five times the median salary of full-time staff ( Bands 2 to 11)."
It goes on: "Only then will they be able to regain the trust of their staff and argue convincingly with the government and the general public that the top-slicing of the licence fee poses a grave threat to the survival of the BBC and its editorial independence."
Salaries and expenses of senior BBC staff, including those in the Journalism Group, can be viewed here.