You've got to hand it to the BBC - they are rewriting the rule book when it comes to inventive ways of spending our license fees. £36m over budget on website redevelopment? Boring. Phone voting scandals? Old hat. They're much more creative these days.
It transpires that an artist was hired for his graffiti skills, to add some authenticity to the walls of Albert Square, home to their soap Eastenders. Fine, you say - admirable attention to detail. But so great was the beeb's desire for the real McCoy that they managed to hire the leader of a highly-organised graffiti gang ...
Appearing in court, rather than on BBC1, this week, 25-year-old Andrew Gillman was responsible for adorning 11 of the Eastenders set's walls with graffiti - including the Argee Bharjee Indian restaurant (scene of 'special' nights out for the soap's characters) and fish and chip shop Beale's Plaice. Less amusingly, Gillman and his gang, the DPM Crew, also decorated trains across Britain and as far afield as Amsterdam and Paris. Ever enterprising, the crew even took part in a 'graffiti workshop' in the Czech Republic, in order to teach 'young fans of street art how to use spray paints.'
Gillman used a false name - Eddie Jones - in his BBC job application. Let's hope that this latest embarrassment leads to more rigourous background checks. Endless re-runs and round-the-clock reality TV we can just about live with. Having our license fees find their way into criminals' pockets, we can do without.
