As Quentin Letts returns to the Mail following a short-lived stay at News International, this assessment from The Times’ World Affairs Editor…

Good morning, it’s Monday 18th September.

The week ahead…

Tuesday: Court of Session: Scottish government makes its case against the Government’s decision to block Holyrood’s Gender Recognition Reform Bill.

The final report in the Brook House Immigration Removal Centre inquiry is published.

UN General Assembly.

Wednesday: Junior doctors and consultants hold an historic joint strike. 

King Charles and Queen Camilla begin a three-day State Visit to France.

Thursday: Watch for a possible Bank Of England interest rate rise.

British Social Attitudes Survey.

Friday:  England v Scotland in Women’s Nations League.

Sunday:  NASA mission returns asteroid sample collection to Earth.

Worth picking out a few quotes from John Ryley’s Steve Hewlett Memorial Lecture. The well-liked former boss of Sky News criticised the lack of media scrutiny over the royal family, and gave this insight into TV coverage of King Charles’s coronation: 

“The royal spin doctors had the opportunity to censor any pictures from the coronation before they could be replayed on the day … And the royal spin doctors dictated which clips of the footage could be shown in future broadcasts in what they called with an Orwellian phrase: ‘a perpetuity edit’.”

Apparently WhatsApp group would allow royal courtiers to tell senior editors at the BBC, ITN, and Sky News in real time if the royal family wanted specific pieces of footage removed from circulation. 

Broadcasters are now, he said, “too supine … too incurious … too compliant…Topics such as why King Charles didn’t pay any inheritance tax on the fortune he inherited from his mother or the fact the Duchy of Cornwall doesn’t pay capital gains tax should be examined properly. The reporting needs to be far more rigorous.”

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“He delights in scheduling disparate subjects on consecutive weeks. You can almost hear the glee in his voice when at the end of an episode on the siege of Paris, he announces: “Next week, we’ll be discussing solar wind.”

An extraordinary run. In Our Time reaches 1,000 episodes this week. 

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It’s reported Sir Paul Marshall, the hedge fund tycoon and investor in GB News has hired an investment bank to advise him on a bid for the Daily and Sunday Telegraph ahead of a looming auction of the titles that could fetch in the region of £600m.

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Long-time BBC correspondent Chris Morris becomes the new CEO of Full Fact

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On the Inside Edge website – Tony’s A-Z of media training: 

Q is for Quest:

Audiences can enjoy detective work as long as the investigation has distinctiveness and some nifty twists and turns. Uncovering a forgotten manuscript, gleaning a design from a formation of birds both offer fascinating colour. Avoid posing questions though. Both presenters and the people watching are looking for answers or at the very least interesting observations on the direction of travel.

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Footnotes:

Rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix died after collapsing at a party in London on this day in 1970.

Highs of 15 degrees in today in Edinburgh and 18 degrees in Northampton.

Finally the obligatory dog-pic photo….

Be part of the MMB. Thoughts on this week’s content, or interviews you’ve seen, heard, or (best of all) done. We’re @insideedgemedia or just reply to this email. 

Have a brilliant week.

All at Inside Edge

Good morning, it’s Monday 11th September.

The week ahead…

Monday: General Secretary Paul Nowak addresses TUC Congress.

Biden visits Alaska for 9/11 memorial. 

Tuesday: UK employment and earnings data published.

Wilko store closure programme begins. 

Putin scheduled to speak at the Eastern Economic Forum.

Wednesday: Commons motion to proscribe Wagner Group as terrorist organisation.

Ursula von der Leyen delivers State of the European Union address. 

Thursday:Theresa May’s The Abuse Of Power released. 

Vogue World (aka London’s Met Gala).

Friday: London Fashion Week begins. 

Saturday: Strictly starts. 

Sunday: 20mph speed limit introduced in Wales. 

It’s a Politician Special!!! Hang on, don’t unsubscribe… 

1) As you’ll no doubt have seen, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan provided timely and expletive-ridden evidence for one of the most basic of media training lessons – assume every microphone and camera is on.

This is outtake-Thick-Of-It-level incompetence…

2) Rory Stewart had a moan about a Janice Turner profile of him in The Times on his Rest Is Politics podcast;

“I think the lesson I’ve taken from it sadly is that you can’t be naive and that you have to accept that these are artificial, structured things. You’re doing it for a reason and you’ve got to approach it quite cautiously, and not think that you can completely lay back and just chat in the way that you can to a friend. It’s a stupid thing to say, but the public should be aware of this…”

Rory, that isn’t a stupid thing to say. It’s an incredibly stupid and blindingly obvious thing to say. 

I’m going to return to this saga another time as the headline (see below) was a classic example of naively accepting the premise of a very leading question, but we’ll leave that for another week. 

READ THE PROFILE

Who will replace Huw Edwards as anchor of the BBC’s Election Night coverage? Laura Kuenssberg is the favourite according to latest reports, though it isn’t a done deal.

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GB News break the news of the re-arrest of Daniel Khalife with a calm, collected authority and poise…

WATCH CLIP (via Twitter/X)

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According to Apple’s podcast chart, 4 of the 10 most popular shows in the country come from Gary Lineker’s Goalhanger production company. (The Rest is Politics/History/Football/Money)

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And for those following Tucker Carlson’s rapid descent to the deepest sewers of journalism, Arwa Mahdawi’s article is well worth a read

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On the Inside Edge website – Tony’s A-Z of media training: 

P is for Prologue:

You haven’t got time for this classical device in an interview. “Where this all began” may sound a grand opening and is a favourite for some organisations who want to show the road taken. But broadcast audiences are a tough bunch. Rather than rely on past glories what are you achieving now? How relevant are you to making life better in the 2020s and beyond? Answer these questions and you will be more persuasive – and more concise.

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Footnotes:

Georgi Markov died of blood poisoning, four days after he was stabbed with an umbrella at a London bus stop on this day in 1978.

Highs of 20 degrees in today in Aarhus, Denmark (from where I’m writing this newsletter) and 22 degrees in Abergavenny.

Finally the obligatory dog-pic photo….

Be part of the MMB. Thoughts on this week’s content, or interviews you’ve seen, heard, or (best of all) done. We’re @insideedgemedia or just reply to this email. 

Have a brilliant week.

All at Inside Edge

Good morning, it’s Monday 4th September. We’re back.

The week ahead…

Monday: Interim leader General Brice Oligui Nguema due to be sworn in as president of Gabon following last week’s military coup

Tuesday: Ex Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio sentenced over Jan 6 attack

National Television Awards

Wednesday: the first PMQs of the new school term

Trump associates arraigned in Georgia

Thursday: Mercury Music Prize awarded

Friday: One year ago: Queen Elizabeth II died

Rugby World Cup

Saturday: Start of the G20 summit in New Delhi

No surprise that newspaper coverage in August included warnings about the impact humans are having on this planet of ours.

Perhaps more of a surprise is that we’re actually referring to…August 1912:

As for August 2023, what have we missed?

1) To be honest, Sir Mark Thompson had quite the CV anyway…

2004 – 2012 Director General of the BBC

2012 – 2020 CEO of the New York Times Company

It’s even better now. The latest line on the resume is top dog at CNN – struggling with falling ratings and internal discontent at the editorial direction of the news channel. The months ahead will be watched closely.

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2) GB News decided to commission a poll asking whether people were comfortable with politicians as presenters. 60% of respondents said no, which is awkward given their schedules are stuffed to the rafters with them.

“Politicians are politicians and journalists are journalists. We should stick to doing our own knitting.” Andrew Neil

The Guardian argues Ofcom needs to get its house in order…

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3) Laura Kuenssberg and Paddy O’Connell are now hosting Saturday and Sunday episodes of the BBC’s most listened to podcast – Newscast.

LISTEN HERE

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4) Every single national newspaper saw a year-on-year print circulation decline in July, according to the latest figures.

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“Is it just me or has the Great Twitter Crisis etc mostly ended up not in everyone migrating to a Twitter substitute, but more people doing social media less and surprising themselves by not massively missing it?”

Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff ponders the brave new world of X. Is this your experience? (It’s certainly mine.)

Meanwhile as Storm Hilary battered California and Nevada, US researcher Will Stancil observed…

On the Inside Edge website – Tony’s A-Z of media training: 

N is for Niche:

Even if the reporter you’re briefing has some knowledge of your field or sector, in no way will they have the specialist knowledge you possess. They might want to appear on your wavelength, but don’t assume they understand the fine detail. Give context if that will help them make sense of your work. Remind them of past significant developments if that establishes the importance of what you’re doing now. It’ll help ensure that what’s printed more accurately reflects what you do.

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Footnotes:

The Wolfenden Report suggested consenting sex between homosexual adults “in private” should no longer be a criminal offence on this day in 1957.

Highs of degrees in 33 today in Athens and 22 in Brighton.

We’re going to continue with the dog-pic-footnote until someone tells us they’ve had enough.

Over the summer the boys were joined by their best mate John…

Be part of the MMB. Thoughts on this week’s content, or interviews you’ve seen, heard, or (best of all) done. We’re @insideedgemedia or just reply to this email. 

Have a brilliant week.

All at Inside Edge

“There’d be no point in me being here if I couldn’t say what is happening. I have to try and do my job as honestly as I can. But they can pull the plug anytime.”

Fascinating interview with the BBC’s Russia Editor Steve Rosenberg in the Sunday Times.

“It’s going back to the old days of Kremlinology, where you were constantly trying to guess what it all means, who’s standing next to who at the top of the Mausoleum during the parades and what battles are taking place within Kremlin walls.”

On Ukraine: “Putin was someone who prided himself for years on being able to outsmart the West…But it’s all gone wrong. It’s been a disaster.”

READ HERE (paywall)

It’s Monday 17th July.

Good morning. The week ahead…

Monday: Interim report from the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry

Tuesday: BBC DG Tim Davie appears before the Lords Communications Committee

Wednesday: UK inflation figures 

Fourth men’s Ashes Test 

Thursday: FIFA Women’s World Cup begins in Australia and New Zealand

Friday: Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer open in cinemas across the UK

Sunday: Voters in both Spain and Cambodia go to the polls

“You’re less likely to be mugged…”

Thanks to Ben for passing this absolute gem our way. Extraordinary candour from the Chief Executive of the Northern Ireland tourist board in the mid-70s.

I think our well-spoken friend may be beyond media training, though I’d politely point out to him that the elegant riff on cholera in Italy, murders in New York and landmines in Israel was perhaps ill-advised…

On the Inside Edge website – Tony’s A-Z of media training: 

L is for Lighting:

The glare of studio spots can be unforgiving, especially in HD when blemishes and wrinkles look so much clearer. They can also generate heat fostering that unnecessary blush. So always take the advice of the professionals and accept make up if offered. When you are undertaking the interview in what we call “quality” then you’ll not really have any say on the lighting. Skype is a different matter. It’s your responsibility to look good. So avoid film noir shadows by getting plenty of natural light in to the room.

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Regarding The Sun’s breathless, judgmental and inaccurate coverage of the Huw Edwards story, it’s worth noting Samantha Fox was just 16 at the time the paper decided to manufacture this situation… 

Be part of the MMB. Thoughts on this week’s content, or interviews you’ve seen, heard, or (best of all) done. We’re @insideedgemedia or just reply to this email. 

Footnotes:

An explosion in the Tower of London left one person dead and 41 injured on this day in 1974.

Highs of 37 degrees in Athens today and 20 in Birmingham.

And this week’s dog-pic-footnote…Stan in pond (again)…

Back on Monday with the final Briefing before we take a break over the summer. Have a good week.



Team Inside Edge