Harriet Cass and Charlotte Green to leave R4

[kernelbogey]

Apparently they are taking voluntary redundancy. Their loss will change the character of Radio Four.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/sep/05/familiar-bbc-radio-voices-to-depart

[Paul Sherratt]

It's changed already. Continuity person Alan Smith was broadcasting in shorts today.

[salymap]

I'm sorry about Charlotte Green, who has a lovely voice and obviously a great sense of humour.Perhaps she is glad to retire though, I don't know her age but she's been on R4 for some years. She will be missed.

[Lateralthinking1]

Sad news. The news readers and continuity announcers are far more significant to the overall sound of a station than many people realise. Their partial anonymity is what makes them so effective. Fortunately while Charlotte Green became better known, she still wasn't in Hello magazine every week. Weirdly, she was mainly at White Hart Lane.

Both of them had highly appropriate voices. Green's though was a musical instrument. Woodwind but which one? Supposedly ten of the twelve news readers on R4 are remaining. That most don't stand out, as in jarring, is a good thing. Still, I find it difficult to believe there are ten. It's Alice Arnold plus nine. Who are they and when can we hear them?

Harriet and Charlotte can't have been paid much. It is the cheap ones who are axed in "voluntary" arrangements. Those with the dulcet tones of a Moylesie stay on. They show that the BBC still attracts the sophisticated. Their pay is obviously linked to the deep concern that they will flounce off to Radio Honolulu (Best of the Eighties) Gold FM 94.9.

And the Beeb will take on new people within 18 months of the cuts. I guarantee it. I really hope that they don't go for the hard news merchants - Kate Burley and the like. For many months, I have been mulling over the potential suitability of Susan Bookbinder. Her voice is just about there - well almost - but even she is perhaps a little too newsroom.

[Resurrection Man]

Sad news. The news readers and continuity announcers are far more significant to the overall sound of a station than many people realise. Their partial anonymity is what makes them so effective.
...........
Both of them had highly appropriate voices. Green's though was a musical instrument. Woodwind but which one?

Agreed. But then.....

.....
Harriet and Charlotte can't have been paid much. It is the cheap ones who are axed in "voluntary" arrangements. ....

Why do you do it? What tosh...."voluntary" could actually mean voluntary. They could have been offered a very generous redundancy package. They might well have welcomed it with open arms as they wanted to pursue other activities. Who knows. Certainly you don't. Neither do I.

Can't we, please, have just one thread that was started on a positive note not being dragged down into your depressing mire?

[Richard Tarleton]

I wish them both well and shall miss them in the R4 landscape. I also remember - I'm sure it was Charlotte - corpsing over a newspaper cutting on The News Quiz. There was an item on PM about repairs to Big Ben, and they played some bongs (at 1755) as part of the story. Eddie Mair remarked how he imagined Charlotte running along the corridor, like a gazelle, thinking it was 1800 and she was late for the news.

[french frank]

Harriet and Charlotte can't have been paid much.

I bet they were! If they'd served a total of 74 years between them (one 40, the other 34) they might even have decided that there's more to life than work . And a good redundancy payment is the equivalent of getting paid for a few years more without having to clock in any more !

[Lateralthinking1]

Agreed. But then.....



Why do you do it? What tosh...."voluntary" could actually mean voluntary. They could have been offered a very generous redundancy package. They might well have welcomed it with open arms as they wanted to pursue other activities. Who knows. Certainly you don't. Neither do I.

Can't we, please, have just one thread that was started on a positive note not being dragged down into your depressing mire?

Depression can't be helped. Rudeness can. I don't like your rudeness.

The thread did not start on a positive note. Perhaps you might read things more carefully.

Person X gives person Y £5 if he leaves "voluntarily" now. X also says that he could make Y leave next month and give him 50p. That isn't voluntary. It is a threat. It is happening to a lot of people. It happened to me. And there's nothing positive about it.

This is particularly true when only a month earlier, X was legally obliged to pay Y £15 if he left. That happened to me - and it is happening to many others - too. (For 50p, £5 and £15 - read whatever figures you wish).

If we don't dance around merrily naturally, perhaps you might like to vote for those who will order it.

No doubt you voted for this kind of thing anyway. If you did, thanks for the burglary.

[Keraulophone]

Harriet and Charlotte will be very much missed from the radio waves, having read the news to us for a combined 74 years.

On the old BBC R3 boards, I once remarked that if news of the apocalyptic meteorite on a certain collision course with earth issued from the radio at breakfast time, everything would seem alright if Charlotte Green were reading it.

[ardcarp]

Lateralthinking. I am inclined to agree with your viewa, namely that of suspicion and not a little cynicism about the Beeb's motives. Yes, I'll bet we get Radio 3-style gushing bimbos within the next three months....to make R4 more 'inclusive' and to 'appeal to a wider range of listeners'.

[Lateralthinking1]

Lateralthinking. I am inclined to agree with your viewa, namely that of suspicion and not a little cynicism about the Beeb's motives. Yes, I'll bet we get Radio 3-style gushing bimbos within the next three months....to make R4 more 'inclusive' and to 'appeal to a wider range of listeners'.

Thanks. You are right. I really don't like the personal attacks that are occasionally made here. Some can't seem to focus on the issues and the decision makers. Perhaps there is a type who enjoys the fact that it isn't face to face.

I believe I said that "supposedly ten of the twelve news readers on R4 are remaining. That most don't stand out, as in jarring, is a good thing". That was my position on the current remaining news readers on R4 yesterday. And it's my position today.

[french frank]

Harriet tweets : 'Please don't man the barricades: the choice to go was mine.'

Of course they'll be replaced by younger newsreaders. But if it weren't for a recent change in BBC policy HC would be retiring anyway, having reached the statutory BBC retirement age. I would understand it (from what I've read) that the newsreading staff was to be cut by two and the two longest-serving volunteered to go as they were nearing retirement anyway. Lat, would you have preferred younger people to have been forced out?

[Lateralthinking1]

Harriet tweets : 'Please don't man the barricades: the choice to go was mine.'

Of course they'll be replaced by younger newsreaders. But if it weren't for a recent change in BBC policy HC would be retiring anyway, having reached the statutory BBC retirement age. I would understand it (from what I've read) that the newsreading staff was to be cut by two and the two longest-serving volunteered to go as they were nearing retirement anyway. Lat, would you have preferred younger people to have been forced out?

No I wouldn't frenchfrank.

I am not for cutting staff numbers at all, nor am I for cutting the number of stations or the breadth of programme content.

I would take a very big axe to celebrity pay and quite a big axe to senior managers' salaries, both ahead of appointments and/or contract renewal, and I'd look very carefully at the travel and away day/party budgets.

I note that Harriet Cass is 60 and also that she has said it was her choice to go. That is one of the two. The ages of both though are entirely predictable. When we see the rest of the leavers, I guarantee that they will all be over 40 and possibly 45.

If they are going to make the retirement age 66, 67, 68, there is no argument for targeting people in their 40s and 50s - what one Minister again recently described as "the low hanging fruit". Another from the charm school no doubt. There's a lot of it about!

[cloughie]

I am sorry to hear that Harriet, Charlotte, Fran and Fenella are leaving R4 and R2, I shall miss their warm reassuring tones. The first three are all at the age when retirement is a bonus, being young enough to spend loads of time on things more interesting than reading the news, an Fenella who from her cv, I suspect is a little younger, has talents which will be welcomed elsewhere.

http://www.successcircuit.com/interviews/an-interview-with-bbc-radio2-newscaster-fenella-fudge/#more-1225

[amateur51]

I think we have to accept that when you've been doing a job for 34-40 years as Harriet and Charlotte have, the nudge to leave can be irresistible.

I don't blame them at all if they're taking a reasonable settlement. I'll miss them, of course I will, but BBC Radio has plenty of back-up. Let's hope the managers have done their sums right, tho'