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In pictures: The BBC's biggest earners as salaries of top stars revealed by broadcaster

A list of top earning BBC stars has been released by the corporation as it faces criticism for offering pay rises despite a wave of redundancies earlier this year.

The BBC is having to make savings of £125m this year because of the pandemic, and has announced a swathe of job cuts in its news division.

Despite the job losses, however, Match of the Day presenter Gary Lineker topped the list with a salary of £1.75m in the year to the end of March, although he will take a 23% pay cut.

Meanwhile presenters such as Zoe Ball saw her pay increase by £990,000 in the past year.

Last year's figures put the Radio 2 Breakfast Show host on about £370,000, but she had only just replaced Chris Evans on the airwaves.

Fiona Bruce also moved up the published pay figures by £195,000 to around £450,000, now she is hosting Question Time.

And Graham Norton is on at least £725,000 – a rise of around £115,000.

The BBC’s new boss Tim Davie said he expects presenters to work for less because of challenges posed by coronavirus and defended the pay rises for stars like Ball.

"Zoe is absolutely a broadcaster at the top of her game. She's delivering over eight million listeners," he said.

And he added of the station as a whole: "I think we're getting incredible value."