BBC can recruit less well-off by slashing stars' bloated pay.

'A year on, the BBC is still largely made up of affluent middle class graduates'

- James Innes-Smith

CULTURE Secretary Nadine Dorries has accused the BBC of snobbishness, prompting the broadcaster to promise that a quarter of its staff will come from lower class backgrounds by 2027.

It's been over a year since the BBC launched its Diversity and Inclusion plan, which included a drive to set a “meaningful target” for hiring more working class staff.

Setting aside the woolly use of the word “meaningful”, the scheme felt like a long erdue correction, but as with so many diversity targets, including the corporation's own gender and ethnic minority drive, it falls well short of the mark.

Even the term “working class” feels hopelessly outdated and far too broad a concept to package into a neat little box. And why only a quarter of employees when a much greater proportion of the country is from poorer backgrounds?

A year on, the BBC is still largely made up of affluent middle class graduates. So can demographics really change there?

As part of a BBC workplace census, potential employees are being asked to declare whether they attended private school, if they were eligible for free school meals and what their parents did for a living.