BBC staff strike as new director general warns of ‘tough choices’ on his first day

Matt Brittin begins task of finding budget cuts as World Service and Radio 4 journalists protest against plan to increase workloads

Matt Brittin, the BBC’s new director general, has warned staff that “tough choices are unavoidable” under his tenure, as his first day coincided with a strike by a group of the corporation’s journalists.

Brittin, formerly Google’s most senior executive in Europe, arrived at the corporation’s New Broadcasting House while a group of journalists from the World Service’s Newshour and Radio 4’s The World Tonight were picketing in response to a plan to increase their workloads.