BBC’s ex-China editor on being forced to make a stand for gender pay equality
Carrie Gracie, who created a furore when she resigned as the British broadcaster’s China editor in protest over ‘unlawful pay discrimination’, reveals why, despite being terrified, she had no choice but to fight
Sipping a mug of coffee in her beautiful home near Richmond Park, London, Gracie is in a reflective mood. Everything surrounding her is perfectly ordered, apart from her small workspace beneath the stairs, where a slim desk is piled with paperwork and books. Since accusing her employer of maintaining a “secretive and illegal pay culture” in an open letter in January, she has become a figurehead of the equal pay movement, gathering support across the corporation and beyond.
“The system is set up to tell you you’re not equal and that’s why you’re not paid equally, because you’re not as good,” she says.
I’m really not in it for the money ... So you have to remind yourself why you’re doing it, and the answer is, ‘If I don’t do it, who?’
Hers was a case in point: as she wrote in her letter, “In the past four years, the BBC has had four international editors – two men and two women […] Last July I learned that in the previous financial year, the two men earned at least 50 per cent more than the two women.”
She later explained, “I could not go back to China and collude knowingly in what I consider to be unlawful pay discrimination.”
A string of other BBC women came out to back her. Presenters including Victoria Derbyshire, Clare Balding, Jane Garvey and Sarah Montague tweeted the hashtag #IStandWithCarrie and co-wrote a letter claiming hundreds of women were in pay disputes with the BBC.
Gracie jumps up from the sofa to show me the silver pendant necklace she’s wearing, given to her by some of her female colleagues. On it are inscribed the words “I stand with Carrie”. But did she ever imagine she’d turn into a game changer for the movement?