And perhaps an executive opt-out of opera in 90s recordings, as a special perk for Lords Hall and Patten. After leaving politics, with perhaps more post-lunch leisure-time than in the past, he wrote a piece in March decrying the then plan to abolish 6 Music.
To the obvious problem of what to cut instead, the ex-minister had a simple solution — axe BBC2 daytime he was particularly cruel about Pointless. In terms of new programmes, you may have noticed, BBC2's daytime schedule disappeared last month, just in time for his arrival.
His very first commission, Broadcast reports, is the three-part Super Scroungers, following unemployed people who claim thousands of pounds in benefits a year. And no doubt its researchers will home in on many of those already blasted in the myriad stories about "scroungers" and "skivers" published annually in the Express and Star.
The Office got an average of 1. Luckily, though, there was no risky prediction of Derek which has been acquired by Netflix emulating the US success of the earlier sitcom, which is only just coming to an end there 12 years after its British birth.
This decision gave an extra buzz to a party at which at least some of the book's cast, similarly shielded by nicknames — but more identifiable with Boniface having ended her own anonymity — were present: who was Twatface, the vile fellow-journalist husband who left Foxy? Or Fatty, also a red-top showbiz hackette, who not only welcomed Twatface into her bed but allegedly used dirty tricks to filch stories from Foxy?
The only cast member Monkey was able to pin down was "Harry Porter", who explained that this was the name he once gave a pesky reader who had rung the Sunday Mirror news desk. When the reader rang back, asking for what sounded like "a reporter" didn't get him very far. You have maybe five minutes, tops, before Rebekah gets the message. The contact didn't tape it and won't go on the record. That voicemail is the only evidence you're ever likely to get that two nationally high-profile figures not only provoked a scandal but are conspiring to subvert a police investigation and have lied to Parliamentary committees.
This is the only way to nail the story. You don't have time to ring The Editor, or check it with The Lawyer. If you tell the police and wait for them to do it they have to go through all kinds of formal hoops and it could take days. This is your call. What do you do? You'd probably hack the phone. I'd hack the phone. And if you think it's all right to hack Rebekah Brooks' phone then there are other circumstances in which it's also right. To catch a dodgy politician, expose corruption at the heart of FIFA, locate someone the cops can't find.
I'd do it for a minor shagging story, if I thought that without it the celebrity involved would lie to a court and wangle a six-figure sum out of my newspaper in damages for something I knew was true. There's nothing I hate more than a liar. You might not like it, it's a moral minefield and it comes down to personal judgement, but journalists are expected by The Reader as much as their employers to do things no-one else would.
I know more about child sex abuse than most people, how a body smells after a fortnight in the open, the surprisingly undramatic pop of a gunshot when the barrel's right under the chin, how to spot and lose a police tail, what happens when you tell someone their loved one has died. Some of that knowledge, on some days, sits heavier than others. But by and large I'd rather there's a few people like me who know that stuff, rather than that everyone has to or, worse, that nobody does. I don't think my mum wants to hear the real, gruesome details of a child rape any more than I do, but if I listen to it and interpret it properly she can still read the story in the paper without having it ruin her perception of the entire human race.
That's why I think it's OK that sometimes I do things that are not nice. I'm not Mother Theresa, I do and have done stuff you might not agree with. Sometimes it might not make much of a difference, and other times it does. If I get it wrong there's plenty of people to tell me so but it's a hard truth that journalistic dark arts have their place, and are useful, and should at times be used.
I don't mind being unpopular - I'd far rather be in my gang than anyone else's - but if we had journalists who stopped going through the dustbins and started being everyone's pal we'd soon be on a very sticky wicket indeed. If you want to give me a kicking that's fine, but don't chop off your legs and mine when you're done. Watch Live. Fill 2 Copy 11 Created with Sketch.
0コメント