THE National Union of Journalists (NUJ) joined the Federation of Entertainment Unions yesterday to launch a Love It or Lose It campaign in defence of the BBC as Chancellor George Osborne renewed his attack on the publicly owned broadcasting corporation.

Mr Osborne said the BBC must meet a £650 million bill for free television licences for the over-75s — currently funded by central government.

He claimed that the BBC needed to “make savings and contribute to what we need to do as a country to get our house in order.”

The BBC already faces a £150m short fall in licence fee revenue.

Bosses have announced a cut of 1,000 jobs — on top of thousands more that have already hit national and local TV and radio news production.

NUJ general secretary Michelle Stanistreet said a review of BBC structures to see they are “efficient and fit for purpose” was overdue.

She said: “The NUJ has been pressing for a restructuring of the BBC that prioritises journalism and programming for some time, one that tackles the fleshy layers of management that have been preserved in the face of waves of cuts that have badly hit grassroots content.”

Ms Stanistreet added that the BBC’s “Delivering Quality First” cost-cutting programme, axing news budgets by 25 per cent, had hit journalists’ jobs and news programming.