A FORMER BBC Essex presenter is jumping ship to return to his roots on Radio Caroline… and hoping to take his loyal listeners with him.

Ray Clark will present a regular Sunday night show on the former pirate station after leaving the same slot at BBC Essex.

It follows a year of uncertainty and cuts to local radio at the Beeb.

Ray’s popular BBC show was broadcast across East Anglia and the South-East on Sunday evenings.

He launched a scathing attack on his former employer.

“Since the BBC has decided it no longer wants many highly experienced and long serving presenters, then it’s reasonable to assume that they’re not really worried about the people that listened to the shows they presented,” said Ray.

“But at Radio Caroline we’ve been making listeners welcome for nearly 60 years.

“My new Sunday early evening show on Caroline will be in the same style as my former BBC show and I’ll be playing the best songs, Caroline Classics, with perhaps an occasional witty comment – it’s what I do.”

Ray started his 40-year broadcasting career at the pirate station and has often presented on Radio Caroline over the years, including some monthly broadcasts from the station’s radio ship Ross Revenge, moored on the Blackwater Estuary.

Radio Caroline station manager Peter Moore welcomed Ray’s return and fired a broadside at BBC bosses over the reorganisation of local radio, which has seen programmes slashed to cut costs.

“There is the saying, ‘when you are in a hole, stop digging', but BBC management are continuing with a reorganisation of their local services while refusing to see that it is a disaster,” he said.

“Ray is just one of many loyal and competent BBC presenters who have been dismissed or placed in a position where they felt obliged to resign.

“But their loss is our gain and we are delighted to welcome Ray, or welcome him back in fact, and to place him on all our broadcast platforms.”

Radio Caroline is on 648AM, as well as on DAB, online and Freeview Channel 277.