Ben Fordham yet to sign 2GB breakfast radio contract

Negotiations for 2GB drive presenter Ben Fordham to replace outgoing popular radio host Alan Jones are far from finalised with the new contract not yet signed off on, Annette Sharp reveals.

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News of Ben Fordham’s surprise signing to the 2GB breakfast slot made headlines a week ago but it seems the negotiations for the drive presenter to replace outgoing presenter Alan Jones are far from finalised.

Somehow in the rush to promote Fordham to breakfast — those talks taking place during a flurry of phone calls over one weekend earlier this month — it seems a new contract with Nine Radio has not yet materialised nor been signed off on.

2GB’s Ben Fordham has signed off on his afternoon shift.

Yesterday Nine Radio boss Tom Malone, a St Ignatius school mate of Fordham’s, refused to comment on internal talk that has it Fordham’s requested pay bump took Nine’s executive and board by surprise in cash-strapped times when Nine’s revenue continues to fall — down $30 million for April with a sharper decline expected for May.

It has left little in the kitty for a pay rise for Fordham at the current time.

As a result he moves to breakfast with only a verbal agreement of a future pay rise in place with Malone.

Fordham is halfway through a five-year contract with 2GB that expires in 2022.

He is believed to be earning about $500,000-a-year on that contract — a deal negotiated before 2GB was annexed into the Nine stable. He also has a separate five-year contract with Nine that was negotiated with the TV broadcasting arm after he stepped back from the Today show and wound back his TV commitments in favour of a radio career in 2014.

“Nine and Malone moved quickly to offer Ben Alan’s job, but finding an extra million dollars or so a year hasn’t happened so quickly,” one internal source said last week.

Outgoing breakfast host Alan Jones is on $4 million a year. Picture: AAP

With Nine revenue on the slide, Fordham, who is taking a team of four producers to breakfast, could be without a contract for some time yet.

Sources say he will start in the 2GB breakfast slot on June 1 on his current pay which is less than one-eighth of what outgoing $4-million-a-year man Jones was being paid.

First he will take a week off after farewelling his drive audience on Friday.

Originally published as Ben Fordham yet to sign 2GB breakfast radio contract