Mark Thompson, the Director-General of the BBC, faces the prospect of strike action amid widespread unhappiness at his finally confirmed plans to make 2,500 employees redundant, including heavy cuts in news, outside London and in factual programming.

He also endured criticism and questioning from prominent presenters such as Lord Winston and John Humphrys at a special briefing held for the corporation’s big names as he tried to justify swingeing cuts designed to save £2 billion from now until 2013.

Jeremy Dear, of the National Union of Journalists, said last night: “Do I think there will now be a strike? Yes.” Unions asked the BBC to confirm that it would stop sending out letters asking for voluntary redundancies by noon today, or it would hold a strike ballot. “We’ve had no satisfactory response from them so far.”

Mr Thompson also set himself on a collision course with the station’s big-name talents last night, indicating that the salaries of star names such as Jonathan Ross could be targeted.

“With constrained spending, we have to look hard at all our costs and that includes talent,” he told The Daily Telegraph. He declined to discuss individuals but said that “every single contract” would be looked at. Jonathan Ross’s record £18 million deal, negotiated by Mr Thompson, attracted strong criticism.

The BBC chief presented his plans to staff yesterday and said that he wanted to move quickly. “If there are to be redundancies, you’d like the whole process to be as fast as possible.” He gave little sign that he would meet the unions’ demands.

The growing unrest at the corporation gives unions the confidence that they would win any ballot easily, leading to one or two-day strikes in the run-up to Christmas, disrupting news and other live programming. News journalists in particular are unhappy about the loss of nearly 500 jobs, or one in six of the workforce, which is likely to erode the distinctiveness of different bulletins and programmes.

Pressure on Mr Thompson is widespread. Lord Winston was among those complaining about the cuts at a staff meeting attended by around 100 presenters, although last night he insisted that “what I said was at a private meeting, not for the press”.

Although the BBC described the meeting as constructive, John Humphrys had also raised objections, saying that when he or others made complaints about the cutbacks in public, they were criticised for doing so, even though Mr Thompson said that he wanted a debate on the planned cuts.

The final figures for the job cuts were broadly as expected, with the total number at 2,500, marginally less than had been feared. However, the BBC said that it hoped to reduce that number by creating 700 new jobs. Gerry Morrissey, of BECTU, the broadcast union, said that “there was no detail on the new jobs, because they have no idea where they will be created”.

Executives said that the cuts would have a limited impact on viewers. Cutbacks in news meant that the six and ten o’clock bulletins would merge, the one o’clock programme would be linked with Breakfast News, and a department created to house flagship current affairs shows, such as Panorama, Newsnight and Today.

Mark Byford, the deputy director- general, said that the plans were designed to stop widespread duplication. “We don’t need the six and ten o’clock news to send two reporters and camera crews to cover the same murder in Nottingham,” he said, adding that whatever the cutbacks, “news remains the cornerstone of the BBC”.

Jeremy Hunt, the Conservative Shadow Culture Secretary, said: “Public organisations should seek efficiency savings, indeed a compulsory licence fee gives the BBC a special responsibility to spend its money carefully. But Mark Thompson has a gargantuan task to persuade the public that quality in core areas such as news and documentaries will not be affected.”

Plans to launch local television channels across the country will also be shelved, but £300 million was still found to invest in a revamp of the BBC’s website, which will deliver personalised services such as My News Now or My Sport Now, offering multi-media updates tailored to individuals.

The BBC television centre in West London will also be put up for sale in 2013, once the £200 million move of Children, Sport and Radio5 Live to Salford is completed. The building has been valued at more than £100 million and with nearby sites included it is likely to fetch £300 million.

Cuts in staff and programme budgets are necessary, says the BBC, because it received less in the licence fee than it had hoped. Zarin Patel, the finance director, said this year’s 3 per cent increase in the licence fee will be cut to just 1.4 per cent after taking into account the costs of digital switchover.

Net job cuts

1820 Total net job cuts, of which:

650 are in television
530 are outside London
350 are in News
125 are in Internet
70 are in Radio and music
20 are in Sport
75 are in professional services

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