BBC spends thousands of pounds of our money so Hansen and co don’t have to take the stairs!

Great story today in The Mail which reveals how the BBC has splashed out tens of thousands of pounds installing a lift into a Cape Town-based hospital from where they will broadcast for the 2010 World Cup.

According to the Mail the lift idea was to avoid top presenters, Alan Hansen, Gary Lineker and Alan Shearer having to mix with ‘common’ members of the South African public when making their way to the £1m roof top studio which the Beeb has built.

Apparently it was ok for Gordon Strachan, Jurgen Klinsmann, Harry Rednapp and Roy Hodgson to use the stairs.

The paper explains how hospital workers watched with astonishment as the last touches were put to the new exterior lift which has been reserved for the Beeb’s top team.

And it gets worse.  The Corporation which is financed through our licence fees is sending 295 staff to the extravaganza and putting 45 of them up at Cape Town’s Mandela Rhodes Place Hotel. Cost? £500 per skull per night.

In their defence the Beeb denied the lift installation was not about looking after their top brass, but aimed at ensuring there would be “no disruption to patients” who would be seeking treatment at the hospital.  Very thoughtful I’m sure.