The BBC isn’t the only place where male egos and pay are overblown

Thank goodness for Libby Purves and for her analysis of the BBC’s present difficulties in assessing the pay of their male and female presenters (BBC’s male presenters are vain and greedy, 16 January). Carrie Gracie’s careful and clear explanation of her position in regard to equality in the institution (or the lack of it) was compelling. How profoundly depressing that she should then be ridiculed in a leaked exchange between the septuagenarian John Humphrys and Jon Sopel as his sycophantic sidekick.

Carrie Gracie sends wonderful reports from China to BBC news services, working across two languages to explain to us a vast and important nation that we hardly know but desperately need to understand better. Her talent for explanation and expression was easily seen in her letter to the corporation, where she emphasised her position as someone who wants equality, not more money. As Purves says, many overweening news presenters need to realise that it is the BBC itself which is the star and propels them to the top of their pay grade. They should check their male, middle-class and egoistical privilege.
Jane Owen
Petersfield, Hampshire

• Carrie Gracie is to be applauded for her stand against unequal pay (BBC editor quits over ‘illegal’ gender pay gap, 8 January). We should also spare a thought for the generic (but legal) unfairness of pay in other professions. This is most obvious in nursing, traditionally a female career, whose practitioners must expect inordinately lower salaries than (traditionally male) doctors, yet the lines between their activities and skills are being increasingly blurred, both in general practice and in hospitals. Such disparity is also apparent between the activities of domestic cleaners (usually women) and gardeners (most often men), the former commanding hourly rates that can be half that of the latter. Is it not time to end this kind of discrimination, too?
Noël Riley
Sudbury, Suffolk

• The Newsnight presenter, Evan Davis, says the idea of equal pay for the same work in showbusiness makes little sense. Libby Purves says he is not in showbusiness but is “an economist who did a bit of Today”. I think, however, that he is an unusually skilled and engaging presenter and interviewer. But I also think that pricing human beings according to our rarity value treats us like commodities rather than as people.
Pam Laurance
London

• Zoe Williams is generous in attributing to courtesy John Humphrys’ failure to ask serious questions of Henry Bolton (Ukip trivia that speaks volumes, 16 January). In fact, for a considerable time now, the default position adopted by Today’s often discourteously aggressive interviewing has been that of the cynical, reactionary Ukipper-in-the-street. Devil’s advocate? Maybe… or maybe not. Bravo Suzanne Moore for drawing attention to the serious impartiality problem posed by this so-called flagship programme.
Jeff Wallace
Cardiff

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