Dithering over which bricks to use pushed up cost of EastEnders set

Revealed: How weeks of dithering over which bricks to use helped push up the cost of the BBC’s new EastEnders set to almost £87million

  • The Corporation set out plans in 2015 to rebuild and extend Albert Square, claiming that the work would be completed by October 2020
  • The project is set to run £27million over the original budget and is expected to be nearly five years late
  • Part of the overspend was due to the Corporation taking ‘weeks’ to agree on which bricks to use

The BBC’s new EastEnders set will cost an estimated £86.7million – in part because bosses wasted weeks deciding which bricks to use.

The Corporation set out plans in 2015 to rebuild and extend Albert Square, claiming that the work would be completed by October 2020 at a cost of £59.7million.

But the project is set to run £27million over the original budget and is expected to be nearly five years late.

BBC executive Richard Dawkins, who has been responsible for the EastEnders set project since 2017, yesterday revealed part of the overspend was due to the Corporation taking ‘weeks’ to agree on which bricks to use.

The Carter family outside the Queen Vic pub. Featuring (left to right) Nancy Carter (Maddy Hill), Johnny Carter (Sam Strike), Linda Carter (Kellie Bright), Mick Carter (Danny Dyer), Shirley Carter (Linda Henry), Tina Carter (Luisa Bradshaw White)

The broadcaster spent around 11 months negotiating its contract with construction firm Wates, six months more than planned.

Mr Dawkins, the £195,000-a-year chief operating officer of BBC Content, was quizzed about the project’s delays and cost increase when he appeared before the Commons Public Accounts Committee yesterday (WEDS).

He said it was ‘important to look at a range of different types of brick’ and claimed they could have been ‘fairly criticised’ had they not taken time to choose the material.

Labour MP Meg Hillier, chairman of the committee, said: ‘I didn’t think comparing bricks was part of the job description – how long did it take?’

Mr Dawkins admitted: ‘It was weeks. It was in the first part of last year.’

Work to rebuild and extend Albert Square was due to be completed in August at a cost of £59.7million


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The BBC is building a new ‘front lot’ – a brickwork replica of the current set – and a ‘back lot’ which will provide extra locations to ‘better reflect modern East End London’

The broadcaster spent £44,000 on brick samples before it signed the contract, it was revealed in a National Audit Office report last year.

Labour MP Chris Evans suggested it might have been easier for BBC bosses to go to a DIY shop to look at bricks instead of delaying the project.

But Mr Dawkins said it was ‘really important’ to ‘replicate the look and feel of Walford and Albert Square’.

He added: ‘If you look at the current set, there are different shades of brick, we’ve had a look at the different types of mortar, this is not just about going and finding off your local DIY store a limited choice. It was the right thing to do.’

The bricks must be tinted, moss must be applied, and the peeling paint outside the Queen Vic pub will be recreated to mimic the current set.

The soap’s existing set was built in 1984 using steel frames, plywood and plaster brick panels with the intention that it would be used for two years.

Aerial photo of the Albert Square set will have a new ‘front lot’ – a brickwork replica of the current set – and a ‘back lot’ which will provide extra locations to ‘better reflect modern East End London’. It has been reported that one of the new locations will be a mosque

The poor quality of the Elstree Studios set means high-definition filming is not possible and health and safety concerns can lead to filming delays.

Meanwhile, BBC director-general Lord Hall admitted yesterday that the broadcaster forced some of its stars to be paid via ‘personal service companies’ (PSC), leaving them without sick pay or maternity benefits and now facing large tax bills.

He said the Corporation accepts ‘full responsibility’ for ‘pushing’ people into the controversial arrangements as a pre-requisite of pursuing careers as presenters.

The arrangement saved the Corporation millions in National Insurance payments, and looked like it would help presenters reduce their own tax bills.

But it has dramatically backfired after HM Revenue and Customs later ordered some of the stars to pay back-dated tax.

One anonymous presenter was told not to come back from maternity leave unless it was under the new employment arrangement.

Last year, BBC Radio 4 presenter Kirsty Lang revealed to a Parliamentary committee that she even had to work throughout her cancer treatment because the Corporation would not give her sick pay.

Yesterday, Labour MP Caroline Flint said that BBC stars were effectively told, ‘if you want a career in presenting, you are going to have to move onto a PSC. There is no other choice.

‘If you want to be a shining star at the BBC, you are going to have to follow this course of action.’

Asked whether he accepted this, Lord Hall said: ‘Yes I acknowledge that. People were pushed into these things. We’re saying that we’ve accepted responsibility. That’s full responsibility.’

The BBC previously stood by a 2012 report published by Deloitte, which found ‘no evidence of any pressure to move staff to the PSC arrangements’.

But yesterday Lord Hall and his deputy director-general, Anne Bulford, accepted that there was pressure regardless.

Lord Hall said: ‘Going back and trying to find records of how these PSCs were set up and people’s correspondence with the BBC about them – we can’t find any record which point to one way or the other.

‘But the evidence from people I’ve talked to is… that they were asked to take up PSCs’.

 

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