The BBC is currently working towards a target of reducing its senior management pay costs by 25 per cent and headcount by 20 per cent by December this year. Speaking on BBC Radio 4's the Today programme, Patten said in some cases BBC executives are still being paid too much.
"They are taking over the period until the end of the year ... a hit of about 25 per cent in reducing the total cost of senior managers' pay and they're reducing the number of senior managers.
"... As far as management are concerned you have to balance the fact these are important creative jobs, working in the public sector, with the outside competition and I think it's inevitable that the BBC will lose senior talent from time to time, senior executives, because other people pay more. I think it's something you live with if you're paid for, not by people who have to flog up and down the streets selling advertising or subscriptions, but if you're paid for by the public, I think you have to accept that.
"Public service isn't just a brand. Public service is part of a culture and I think that it's true that you can talk about competitive pressures and so on, but public service broadcasting as we've fallen into it, designed it, built it, created it, in this country is unique and I think we recognise that and want it to stay.
"... There is a program at the moment for scaling back and that will be followed I hope by a longer-term set of proposals from the executive for actually dealing with pay in the long-term."
Last month the BBC published senior management pay figures, which showed that those within its News Group division had a salary bill which exceeded £16 million, as of April.
Moving on to the employment of 'talent' by the BBC, as opposed to senior management, Patten added that an important part of the BBC's role is to discover, train and employ "for a couple of seasons", and that if they leave to work for competitors then the BBC "shouldn't regard that as a terrible loss".
He also passed comment on the move of World Service funding from the Foreign Office to the BBC, saying that while he wished it was not facing substantial cuts he felt it was "safer in the hands of the BBC".
Image of Lord Patten by James Yuanxin Li on Wikimedia. Some rights reserved.
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