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Guardian: ITN chief executive’s pay package nearly £700K

Sarah Marshall — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 10:03:42 +0000

ITN chief executive John Hardie earned £682,000 in 2010, the Guardian reports.

The boss of the commercial broadcaster received less than the director general of the BBC, Mark Thompson for the year, however.

According to this article in the Telegraph published in July last year, Thompson received £838,000, including a £163,000 pension top-up.

The ITN chief executive, John Hardie, saw his total remuneration package rise last year to £682,000 as the broadcaster recorded a pre-tax profit of £400,000.

Hardie received a base salary of £350,000 in 2010, as well as a further £300,000 in bonus and benefits payments, according to the ITV News and Channel 4 News broadcaster’s full-year accounts published last week.

The former Disney executive took home a total remuneration package of £238,000 in 2009, after joining the company in June that year.

The Guardian’s full article is at this link.

Comment: Is the director general of the BBC overpaid in relation to the ITN boss? Or is the ITN boss, who is operating in a harsh commercial climate, underpaid?

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Media release: ITN signs new video content deal with Independent

Rachel McAthy — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 12:49:13 +0000

ITN announced today it has signed a deal with the Independent to provide video content for its website news player.

The deal with the Independent involves the delivery of bespoke content taken daily from across ITN’s UK, world, entertainment, and financial news feeds. In signing up to the service the Independent joins news title stable mates that include the Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, Daily Express and Daily Star who all receive ITN’s award-winning content.

According to a release from ITN it already supplies content to daily freesheet Metro and several other regional titles from the Illife and MNA publishing groups.

In addition to the deal announced today, ITN Productions has also signed a new multi-year deal with the Daily Telegraph to supply video content for Telegraph.co.uk.

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Broadcast election editors go head-to-head at Media Society event

John Mair — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 14:36:12 +0000

It is the 100 metres of the TV Factual Olympics. General election night. The three main news broadcasters – BBC, ITN and Sky News – vie to get results to the nation first. A month on, the election editors of Sky News and the BBC appeared at last night’s Media Society event in London entitled ‘Who won the TV election?‘

The BBC won the greater share of the audience on 6 May. They always do. But John McAndrew, editor of the Sky News offering was there to claim journalistic credit for being not just first but clearest on screen. His was deliberately not a heavily studio anchored show: “We knew what the BBC would do and we aimed off for that,” McAndrew said. He had surprising support from one member of the audience – the BBC’s former political correspondent Nicholas Jones. Jones had switched over early. Sky News, McAndrew said, went with plenty of straight news and little comment.

The David Dimbleby programme on the BBC was at the other end of the spectrum. There were virtual reality graphics aplenty from Jeremy Vine and scores of outside broadcasts. Craig Oliver, their editor, was at last night’s event to defend their coverage, or at least try to. He had a near impossible job when it came to the now notorious ‘ship of fools‘, a BBC barge moored in the Thames full of celebrities giving their take on the election. Not many of those at the event felt that Joan Collins or Bruce Forsyth ‘added to the sum total of human knowledge’, as one audience member succinctly put it. Another pointed out that the £70,000 allegedly spent on the boat (the only cost figure mentioned on a night when all were coy about what they spent) was money wasted.

Oliver was on surer ground defending the BBC position of not calling any result until the Returning Officer had. ITN seems to jump the gun almost as a matter of principle. Oliver, who edited the ITN election programme in 2005 before defecting, was dismissive of presenter Alastair Stewart’s recent tirade in the Press Gazette claiming that the BBC ‘had missed the story’. His absence from the discussion said it all according to Oliver.

Channel 4’s ‘Alternative Election Night’ – featuring comedians like Jimmy Carr and David Mitchell – was a deliberately offpiste offering but it worked, beating ITN in the ratings. Deputy head of news and current affairs Kevin Sutcliffe was there to explain the thinking behind the format and reveal that it would be used again. Their satirical approach attracted a young demographic and twice the audience he expected, Sutcliffe said, adding that he was impressed with the (unintentionally) satirical quality of the BBC coverage.

Attracting the most audience comment last night was the stunningly accurate exit poll shared by the broadcasters and put out on the stroke of ten. It got the result right to within one seat. Some felt it destroyed the drama and made the remainder of the coverage predictable, suggesting a return to separate polls. Sue Inglish, the BBC’s head of political programmes and a moving force behind the poll, was on hand to explain and defend. The sheer size and cost of the 125,000 sample poll made it impossible to do more than once. But Oliver, in a mild mea culpa, said the BBC studio gurus had been wrong to downplay the surprising exit poll results for the first hour after they were broadcast.

The event had the air of an inquest, but not a particularly rancourous one – and the majority of criticism was reserved for the absent ITN. There was mostly praise for the British broadcasters for whom a 100-metre dash became a five day marathon. If the reaction in the BBC Council Chamber last night is anything to go, they had an audience satisfied with the results.

John Mair is events director of the Media Society.This event was jointly organised by the Media Society and the BBC College of Journalism

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#ge2010: Who was first-past-the-post in this year’s election coverage?

John Mair — Thu, 13 May 2010 14:23:04 +0000

It is an event producer’s nightmare. You book three big speakers, and they pull out with two hours to go. Reader, that was my nightmare on Tuesday.

Five day after polls had closed and Britain was still without a government. I had the general election editors of the BBC, Sky News and the editor in chief of ITN all set to go head-to-head on ‘Who won on TV?’ at Westminster University for a Media Society debate. The debate looked promising until Gordon Brown decided he had to go and would be replaced by David Cameron that very night. The broadcast editors decided they had better, well, broadcast.

Fortunately, the audience was nearly as distinguished as the panel, and veteran media commentator Raymond Snoddy and Professor Ivor Gaber were recruited to join Dorothxy Byrne, head of news and current affairs at Channel Four. They were joined by the doyen of political documentary makers, Michael Cockerell, and were under the watchful eye of ex-Sky News editor Nick Pollard, who chaired the debate.

The televised leaders’ debates came to dominate the election campaign and they very nearly dominated discussion on Tuesday night. Given the tight rules laid down by the politicians in advance, many claimed ‘debate’ was something of a misnomer. David Hill, Tony Blair’s ex-spin doctor, felt anything was better than the bear pit Question Time had become in the 2005 election. The audience at Westminster felt that broadcasters ITN, Sky and the BBC had too easily rolled over and accepted the preconditions laid down for them. The BBC was largely felt to have produced the best of the three debates thanks to the magisterial presence of David Dimbleby.

There was a different opinion of Dimbleby on the BBC Election night programme though. Some felt he looked tired and over-rehearsed, and a little lost in the behemoth of a set. While admiring his stamina, at least one person remarked on his miscall of a couple of swings. Jeremy Vine and his virtual reality graphics show divided the audience as did, inevitably, the Jeremy Paxman experience.

It seems that the BBC got it mostly right, but very wrong in one case in particular, namely the ‘Ship of Fools’, a barge on the Thames full of celebrities being quizzed about the results. The political opinions of Bruce Forsyth and Joan Collins were both predictable and irrelevant on a night of high drama. Nobody defended the ship. Clearly a wrong move.

As to network alternatives on the night, both ITN and Sky were seen as sharper and quicker than the BBC, partly because they got to the locked-out voters story earlier. In terms of set design and presentation though, there was no match for the BBC.

Where all the networks scored was in putting the newspapers in their place. The printed press was following the agenda in this election not leading it. Nowhere was this seen better than the live interruption of our debate to show the Gordon Brown resignation statement live from Downing Street. That moment really summed up this year’s election coverage – fast, exciting, and on television.

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Media Release: Tyne Tees and Borders picked for regional news consortia pilots

Laura Oliver — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 08:36:43 +0000

The Tyne Tees and Borders television region has been selected as the English pilot region for the Independently Funded News Consortia (IFNC) proposed by the government’s Digital Britain report.

Additional trials in Scotland and Wales will also take place and the tender process for all three pilots was opened yesterday.

Full release at this link…

Several local media groups have already outlined plans for IFNC bids. ITN has proposed a ‘grand alliance’ between local media groups.

Responding to the announcement of the English pilot region yesterday, John Hardie, ITN CEO, said in a statement:

“We’re excited to be joining forces with the talented staff who provide the current service in the Tyne Tees and Border region and in Wales to create the backbone of our bids for the pilots announced today. We are building a coalition with newspapers, radio and community groups to bring together the best in commercial journalism in each of the regions to offer a compelling multi-platform news service for viewers, listeners and readers.

“IFNCs provide an opportunity to re-invigorate local and regional newsgathering across broadcast, print and online and to ensure that there is an innovative and comprehensive alternative to the BBC. We look forward to playing a key role in this bright new future for local news.”

Trinity Mirror, Press Association and TV production company Ten Alps have announced a joint bid for the IFNC pilot.

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BroadcastNow: Ofcom warns ITV could lose £64m a year on regional news

Judith Townend — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 14:47:36 +0000

Ofcom has warned that the ITV network will be facing a loss of up to £64m a year by 2012, if it has to continue providing regional news bulletins, reports BroadcastNow.co.uk.

“The regulator indicated its support for establishing independent news consortia to deliver localised news across England, Wales and Northern Ireland.”

(…)

“The Digital Britain report released earlier this year also called for independent news consortias to take over the regional news slots on ITV, suggesting that the groups could comprise of existing media organisations and be funded by the surplus from the Digital Switchover fund.”

Full story at this link…

Related:

Last week John Hardie, ITN chief executive, called for separate contracts for replacement ITV regional news services to be issued for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – ie. a single contract for the whole of England (via MediaGuardian).

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Journalism Daily: Sub-editing for online, new role for Heat editor and more on MPs’ expenses

Laura Oliver — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 15:07:23 +0000

A daily round-up of all the content published on the Journalism.co.uk site. You can also sign up to our e-newsletter and subscribe to the feed for the Journalism Daily here.

News and features:

Ed’s picks:

Tip of the day:

Local Twitter search

#FollowJourn:

@p_houston/editorial director

On the Editors’ Blog:

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MediaGuardian: Channel 4 axing News at Noon and More4 News

Judith Townend — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:59:40 +0000

Channel 4 is cutting its lunchtime news bulletin and More4 News ‘as part of a cost-cutting move that will place a number of journalism jobs under threat,’ the Guardian reports.

“Staff at ITN, which produces Channel 4′s news output, were told of the decision at lunchtime today. Channel 4 said the aim of the cuts was to protect the flagship 7pm bulletin, presented by Jon Snow.”

Full story at this link…

Benjamin Cohen, technology correspondent for Channel 4 News, tweeted:

“Grim staff meeting. News at Noon and More4 News cancelled. Wonder how it will be reflected on-screen tonight (…)”

Then:

“Tweet that Channel4 News at Noon and More4 News are axed spread like wildfire. Very tough story to cover I assume.”

Update: A spokesperson for ITN told Journalism.co.uk:

“We are immensely proud of the high quality programming produced for Channel 4. Whilst we are very disappointed that the financial challenges facing the channel have left them with no option but to reduce budgets, we’ve worked in partnership with Channel 4 to identify savings which will not jeopardise the quality and integrity of the flagship Channel 4 News bulletin. We look forward to continuing to provide the programme for many years to come.”

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Opposition to BBC’s newspaper video-sharing plans grow (the links)

Laura Oliver — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 10:19:54 +0000

Journalism.co.uk feels like its gone back in time today – specifically to autumn last year when regional newspaper groups, unions and industry bodies were voicing unanimous opposition to the BBC’s plans to increase its local video news content.

Well, another year, another video plan – and more opposition.

Yesterday the corporation announced an agreement to share news video from four subject areas with the Guardian, Telegraph, Daily Mail and Independent websites. The clips will appear in a BBC-branded player and run alongside the papers’ own news coverage.

In the announcement, the corporation suggested it would extend the plans to other newspaper websites – and asked third parties to register their interest.

The reaction

Welcomed by its launch partners (The Telegraph described the deal as ‘a step in the right direction’) – the plans were quickly denounced by commercial rivals ITN:

“The BBC’s plans to offer free video content to newspaper websites risk undermining the demand for content from independent news providers, potentially undercutting a very important revenue stream,” said ITN CEO John Hardie in a release.

“The pressure on commercial news suppliers has never been greater which is why ITN has led the way in opening up valuable new lines of business, and the BBC’s latest move risks pulling the rug from under us.”

According to a MediaGuardian report, News International says the arrangement is far from a ‘free deal’ for the papers, but rather free marketing for the BBC, which will lead to less diffentiated content on newspaper websites in the UK.

Meanwhile the Press Association said it had spoken with the BBC Trust about the plans before they were announced and was hoping for a market impact assessment – a process it says cannot now be completed because of yesterday’s launch. In a statement given to both Press Gazette and MediaGuardian, a spokeswoman for the PA said there were other ways for the BBC to work with commercial rivals, such as by sharing facilities.

The PA launched its own video newswire for newspapers earlier this year and has said the BBC’s plans undermine investment in video by commercial players.

The questions

Arguably, providing a pool of news video for diary events/supplementary content could free up the titles’ staff to cover original content and produce more multimedia of their own. A similar argument to the PA’s recent announcement of a ‘public service reporting’ trial.

One question that should be asked – hinted at in Alick Mighall’s blog post on the matter – how will the commercial details be hammered out? Will the BBC add pre-roll ads for BBC programming to the clips; and what if a pay wall is erected in front of the video players?

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Goodbye City University: @amonck reflects on four years as journalism head

Adrian Monck — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 10:06:18 +0000

As reported in May, Adrian Monck is to leave his position as head of journalism at City University, London after four years, to lead the communications team for the World Economic Forum, which holds the annual meeting for global leaders in Davos, Switzerland. Today, he bids farewell to City in this blog post, originally published here.

Although I’ll be haunting College Building for the next week or so, today is my leaving drinks (or ‘glad you’re gone’ party as we used to call them).

I’ll be keeping up a link with the place as a prof, and I’ll be trying to bash out a PhD. And I’ll also be giving a modest sum for the highest scoring MA project, which will be a prize in memory of Richard Wild. The first £250 will be handed out this autumn, so any City students reading: heads down for the finishing line!

Since I came to City in 2005, we’ve launched an MA in Journalism with new pathways in science and investigation, a Masters in Political Campaigning and Reporting, an MA in Creative Writing Non-Fiction, and a BA in Journalism. We’ve gained some fantastic new staff to go alongside the existing terrific team, including the Guardian’s David Leigh, Channel 4′s David Lloyd, ITN‘s Penny Marshall and visiting fellows like Heather Brooke and tech guru Robin Hamman. We have a distinguished scholar as head of research, Professor Howard Tumber, and we’ve just appointed Britain’s first professor of financial reporting, a chair in honour of Marjorie Deane (expect more on financial journalism soon).

We brought the Centre for Investigative Journalism to City, and its successful summer schools and hopefully there’ll be new initiatives to announce in that area soon.

We’ve established a digital core to our curriculum – there should be a partnership with Nokia coming up in the autumn.

And this year we finally moved into multi-million pound facilities (on Flickr) worthy of the talents of the people who teach and study here. And we have a Graduate School of Journalism to go alongside the best anywhere has to offer.

Best of all, I’ve witnessed the annual progression of an extraordinary group of people who’ve joined us from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, and from Lancashire to Lagos – our students. Their qualities are what make so many people want to give up time to teach here. Their enthusiasms and passions are among the rewards.

It’s not all been plain sailing, as anyone who’s brushed up against me will doubtless agree. But I hope it’s been worth it. City is now, more than ever, a global school for journalism, bringing in people from around the world to share experiences and gain new insights. Its future is already being mapped out in areas like political and humanitarian campaigning, and in deepening specialist knowledge amongst those competing to enter what is still an extraordinarily privileged world.

And the privilege of journalism? It’s the privilege of speech. Maybe it’s narcissistic, maybe it’s worth dying for.

But despite our disagreements (and let’s be honest, academics have to be able to start arguments with themselves) it’s what unites me with colleagues in education, in the news business, and with new friends and acquaintances in the ever-widening world beyond.

So, with whatever voice you choose, keep speaking up.

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MediaGuardian: ITV suspending ITN news on website

Judith Townend — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 10:02:40 +0000

MediaGuardian reports:

“ITV is to suspend carrying news supplied by ITN on its website from next month after ending its contract, resulting in the loss of five journalists from the content supplier.

“ITN On, the division of the TV news producer that supplies video and text to websites and mobile internet services, will stop supplying content to the ITV website on 22 July.”

Full story at this link…

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#Digital Britain: Ten good links

Judith Townend — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:49:55 +0000

Yesterday it arrived: the final version of the Digital Britain report. Landline users among us will have to sacrifice around three lattes a year to meet the 50p a month levy for the Next Generation Fund.

Director of digital content for Guardian News & Media, Emily Bell, asked, via Twitter, for two words to sum it up other than ‘colossal disappointment’. An advanced Twitter search showed these responses from her followers: ‘as expected,’ ‘damp squib,’ ‘disappointingly colossal,’ ‘wasted chance’ and ‘too cautious’. However, Bell is now worried she might have been ‘too negative’ in her reaction – but that could just be her going soft, she says.

Ten good links*:

1. Universal access of 2 Mbps by 2012, but will it be achievable, asks the Guardian’s Jemima Kiss.

2. ThinkBroadband’s summary. It’s clear and rectifies misunderstandings that might arise from second-hand summaries of the report.

3. Ben Bradshaw’s announcement in the House of Commons, ITN video on YouTube.

4. No word on Channel 4 or BBC Worldwide partnership, as reported by Paul McNally on the Press Gazette blog.

5. PageFlakes page with related links for Digital Britain content: including video, Twitter and blog searches.

6. Bill Thompson’s thoughts, also here on the BBC’s pages.

7. The BBC opposes top-slicing of the licence fee for independent news consortia, stated by the Trust’s chair Michael Lyons in a BBC press release.

8. The paidContent:UK overall verdict is 7/10. Read it a bullet-point summary on the new-look site.

9. OFT report on local and regional media ownership rules released to coincide with Digital Britain report. Nothing will change. It’s a decision welcomed by the National Union of Journalists.

10. Oh, and the report itself, at this link.

*with an extra two, for luck.

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Amnesty International Media Awards winners in full

Judith Townend — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 16:38:41 +0000

Here are the winners from last night’s Amnesty International Media Awards; nominees and judges were reported here. The awards, designed to recognise ‘excellence in human rights reporting’, feature ten categories spread across print, broadcast and online journalism.

Gaby Rado Memorial Award
Aleem Maqbool, BBC News

International Television & Radio
World’s Untold Stories: The Forgotten People, CNN, Dan Rivers and Mary Rogers

Nations & Regions
The Fight for Justice, The Herald Magazine by Lucy Adams

National newspapers
MI5 and the Torture Chambers of Pakistan, The Guardian by Ian Cobain

New media
Kenya: The Cry of Blood – Extra Judicial Killings and Disappearances, Wikileaks, Julian Assange

Periodicals – consumer magazines
The ‘No Place for Children’ campaign, New Statesman, Sir Al Aynsley Green, and Gillian Slovo

Periodicals – newspaper supplements
Why do the Italians Hate Us? The Observer Magazine, Dan McDougall and Robin Hammond

Photojournalism
No One Much Cares, Newsweek, Eugene Richards

Radio
Forgotten: The Central African Republic, BBC Radio 4 – Today Programme, Edward Main, Ceri Thomas, Mike Thomson

Television documentary and docu-drama
Dispatches: Saving Africa’s Witch Children, Channel 4 / Red Rebel Films / Southern Star Factual, Mags Gavan, Joost Van der Valk, Alice Keens-Soper, Paul Woolwich

Television news
Kiwanja Massacre: Congo, Channel 4 News / ITN, Ben De Pear, Jonathan Miller, Stuart Webb and Robert Chamwami

Special award
This year’s Special Award for Journalism Under Threat was awarded to Eynulla Fәtullayev, from Azerbaijan.

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ITN launches iPhone news app

Catherine Jones — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 17:32:45 +0000

ITN has launched a free news application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

It is the first, video-focused news application created for the Apple products and its special offline function allows users to access UK, world and sports news when they are out of wifi range, according to a press release from ITN.

“News is one of the biggest services on handsets and ITN has built a great reputation as a provider of high quality videojournalism on mobile,” said Nicholas Wheeler, managing director of multimedia division ITN On, in the release.

The application is available to download at the iTunes’ store – and at time of writing is the seventh most downloaded free news app from iTunes.

FT.com is also looking to tap into the iPhone market with plans to introduce a new site for the handset.

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Rebekah Wade’s first public speech in full

Judith Townend — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:47:56 +0000

If the Wordle and other coverage isn’t enough, here’s the Hugh Cudlipp speech by the editor of the Sun, Rebekah Wade, in full [note: may have differed very slightly in actual delivery]:

The challenging future of national and regional newspapers is now the staple diet of media commentators.

If you have been reading the press writing about the press you’d all be forgiven for questioning your choice of career.

I’m not denying we’re in a tough place – we are.

But I don’t want to use this speech to make grand statements on the future of our industry.

I want to talk to you about journalism.

As students, you will be very familiar with the academic analysis.

So tonight I thought I could share some of my own experiences in this often infuriating but always fascinating profession.

I started out as Eddie Shah’s tea girl and went on to attend this college before starting work at The News of The World.

This educational video, produced in the 1940s by a Professor Twogood, reminded me of my early years.

[shows video]

Fortunately the majority of my colleagues did NOT share Twogood’s view on women in the newsroom.

But there were a few!

When, at the age of 27, I was made deputy editor of the News of the World, some struggled with the concept.

At the corporate golf day, a senior male executive lost the buttons off his shirt.

The editor and I were busy meeting and greeting our high profile guests when suddenly a golf shirt and some buttons were thrust into my hand.

“When you’ve gotta minute darlin’ – sew ‘em back on for me, I’m teeing off in twenty minutes.”

Despite needlework not being my strong point, I did have the shirt ready in time.

And we were all sorry to hear what happened to him.

But trust me, no amount of studying you do here will prepare you for the sheer exhilaration of working in a newsroom.

It’s intoxicating. Because as a journalist, you can make a difference.

And today I hope you will leave this lecture hall more convinced than ever that journalism is the career for you.

I think it’s important that we start by dealing with the doom mongering.

Firstly – newspaper pessimism is age old.

Nearly as old as some of our media commentators I can see in the audience.

In ancient Rome, Julius Caesar produced the Acta Diurna. A daily gazette described by historians as:

‘Hand written journals posted in Rome and the provinces with the intention of feeding the populace information.’

As well as political decisions and military campaigns, I smiled when I read that these newsletters were said to record:

‘Gladiatorial contests, astrological omens, scandals, notable births, deaths and marriages, trials and executions.’

If you think about it not much has changed.

Our newspapers are still full of:

Gladiatorial contests.

We just call it Prime Minister’s Question Time.

Astrological Omens

Our own Mystic Meg

Scandals

Well they did until Justice Eady came along.

Notable Deaths

Obituary pages are still a must read.

Notable births

And trials and executions….well, we do have the Daily Mail.

Even in 59 BC these newsletters caused great debate and later rulers banned them, feeling they had no future.

The first modern newspaper was published to general scepticism in 1609.

But four hundred years later we are still here.

I believe for one reason only:

Journalism.

We shouldn’t fool ourselves.

I am not alone in thinking 2009 will see a seismic change to our national newspapers.

And to understand some of the issues, it’s worth a quick analysis of our industry in 2008.

The ABCs of our national daily newspapers show that last year 382,000 people stopped buying a daily paper.

And if you look at this chart – is it a coincidence that the biggest losses are where we’ve seen the biggest cuts in journalism?

Of course, the answers to our industry problems are more complex than that.

Last year, we gave away over 163 million copies in bulks to maintain these levels.

We listed 270 million foreign sales.

We gave away 120 million free CD’s and DVDs – of questionable quality and at enormous cost – just to rent readers.

We paid our retailers and wholesalers over 800 million pounds in margins that have outstripped RPI.

And while 1,400 corner shops closed, it’s been years since we developed alternative new routes to market.

We saw another increase in the number of free newspapers. In 2008 we distributed 639 million copies.

The huge growth in digital still doesn’t pay for high quality journalism.

We give away our expensive editorial content free online without an economic model that compensates for the loss in traditional revenues.

The rising cost of news and magazine print is in double figures and there is the small matter of the recession.

But despite all these challenges, there are huge positives. Especially if you compare our industry to television.

Despite the credit crunch, 3.5 billion daily newspapers were sold last year with an estimated 1.8 billion pounds in advertising revenue.

Of course like any business in a recession, we have to cut costs and drive revenue to survive.

But cost cutting in this business only works if the savings are reinvested in journalism.

The death knell is already ringing for publishers who have forgotten our reason for being.

And leaving aside state funded and trust supported journalism, those of us struggling to survive in a free market have seen our competitors in the business change dramatically.

At The Sun, our scale means we now view prime time ITV as more of a competitor for advertising revenue than other newspapers.

Ten years ago, 30 TV programmes delivered a larger audience than The Sun. Now there are only three or four on commercial channels that can consistently deliver that scale:

Paid for media undersells itself. So even with our reach and demographics, national newspaper advertising revenues are predicted to be down 12 per cent this year.

As an industry we have perfected the art of beating ourselves up.

Sometimes I think we need a PR.

With these market forces, it’s even more important to remember why we exist:

Journalism.

Newspapers do not have the monopoly.

Matt Drudge and Perez Hilton regularly break stories that we would kill for at The Sun. Sky News, ITN, compete for buy ups and investigations.

And with the growth of citizen journalism the public are competing with news agencies.

In Germany, Bild are even selling their readers digital cameras complete with USB so they can upload their video content directly to the newsdesk. Which I think is very exciting.

Hugh Cudlipp is remembered for his belief in campaigning journalism.

Great press campaigns can change history and shape new laws. They can build a bridge between public opinion and public policy.

But they also require monetary investment and long term commitment.

The Times under Thomas Barnes campaigned brilliantly and relentlessly for the introduction of the Reform Act of 1832 which set this country on the road to universal suffrage.

The Sunday Times uncovered the scandal of Thalidomide victims in the 70s and five years later provided thousands of children with much needed compensation.

The Daily Mail’s Stephen Lawrence campaign for justice pioneered brave and uncharted waters for newspapers as did the Daily Mirrorr’s fight for the ‘Bridgewater Four’.

All these campaigns and hundreds more have made a huge difference to the lives of ordinary people in this country.

Whether it is The Guardian’s call to Free Our Data or The Telegraphs fight for savers, The Independent’s battle for Fair Pay or The Mail’s ban on plastic bags.

They are all valuable ways of connecting with your readership above and beyond any marketing or promotional strategy.

Every newspaper, has in its history, causes for pride.

However, to make this point, I will have to use my own experiences to demonstrate how this connection, this collective power between a newspaper and it’s readers can be a force for good.

Last November on a visit to Afghanistan I found myself wandering around camp Bastian in search of a missing page three girl, (as you do) when I was apprehended by an angry sergeant major.

With clear contempt for my blue press flak jacket and out of bounds location, he sneered as he demanded to know what media outlet I was from.

The Sun, I said. Hoping this was the right answer.

Well, it was as if I had told him he was coming back home to Brise Norton with us that night.

A broad smile. A big handshake. A thank you for all the Sun readers support. A shout to his colleagues, more thanks, everyone wearing our Help for Heroes band.

Their pride in our pride for them.

And Becky, 22, from Bromley was safely returned.

But the serious aspect of my trip was to see for myself the result and the importance of our Help For Heroes campaign.

Travelling from Kabul to the farthest forward operating bases in Helmand I discovered that their gratitude for any support is overwhelming.

The hostile public opinion to the war in Iraq had led to creeping anti troop sentiment throughout the UK.

This meant desolate parades for homecoming regiments, uniformed soldiers being jeered at in the streets, a lack of support, understanding and sympathy for all they were going through in theatre and a feeling of neglect on their return.

When Bryn and Emma parry set up this charity for the war wounded in 2007 they approached us for help.

Our campaign began with this page one splash and eighteen months later Sun readers have raised millions for state of the art rehabilitation facilities.

We’ve had a number one song from X-Factor.

Prince Charles hosted the first ever Royal Military Awards.

The Prime Minister committed to more funding and the opposition agreed to do the same.

But most importantly the campaign moved the dial on the public’s attitude to the military.

Right now in Helmand, British troops are engaged in some of the fiercest fighting they’ve encountered so far.

Many of our young soldiers have died in this latest push into Taliban strongholds. Others will return physically or psychologically damaged for life.

But if you look at some of the newspapers you’d be forgiven for being totally unaware of this latest battle.

There is now great public awareness and support for the daily heroism displayed by our Armed Forces.

It is up to all of us to report it.

Sarah’s law was one of the more controversial campaigns of my career.

I’ve never really talked about it but in some ways it represents one of my points about campaigning journalism.

Listening to your readers.

The entire nation grieved over the abduction and murder of eight-year-old Sarah Payne and like everyone else I was deeply moved by this terrible tragedy.

I had just joined the News of the World as editor and after the daily pace of The Sun, I was frustrated by the waiting room atmosphere of a Sunday paper newsroom on a Tuesday.

So I took a chance and drove down to see Mike and Sara Payne who were still staying with Sarah’s grandparents. The press pack who were outside waiting for the next police conference, were more than a little surprised when I turned up on the doorstep.

I introduced myself to the Family Liaison officer and I told him I was the editor of the News of the World and I would like to offer my help and support to the Payne family.

Inexplicably Mike and Sara agreed to see me and repercussions of that meeting started the campaign you now know as Sarah’s Law.

It was immediately evident that Sara Payne was an incredible woman. Despite being racked with grief she was determined to get justice for daughter.

She told me that the police already had a suspect. He was a local convicted paedophile whose modus operandi fitted the crime.

He had previous of abusing and abducting and yet he was living near Sarah’s grandparents, unmonitored by any authorities, left ready to strike again.

Roy Whiting it turned out, was one of 110,000 convicted paedophiles living in the community.

The huge inconsistencies and loop holes in the 1997 Sex Offenders Act meant that there were tragedies like Sarah waiting to happen and that all the relevant agencies including the NSPCC had fought for three years to correct this legislation.

But nothing had been done.

From that first meeting, Sara and I spoke nearly every day. We were determined to change the law in Sarah’s memory.

Since then, Sara has lobbied at least five home secretaries and debated the rights and wrongs of the campaign up and down the country with great success.

Naming and shaming was my responsibility.

It was a blunt and contentious way of informing the public of these gaps in policy.

Hard lessons were learnt but I don’t regret the campaign for one minute:

Because in the end it was a simple truth.

As a parent, would you like to know if there was a convicted paedophile living next door?

The answer was always yes.

Parts of the media went on the attack with a blatant disregard for the facts of the campaign or more importantly their readers’ opinions on the matter.

After we published the first list, a group of mothers from an impoverished housing estate in Portsmouth, took to the streets to protest.

The BBC described them as ‘an angry lynch mob’.

What the BBC did not report was that the mothers had just discovered that Victor Burnett, a paedophile with 14 convictions for raping and abusing young boys between the ages of four and nine, had been re-housed amongst them unmonitored by the authorities.

Totally unaware of his background, the residents had complained for years about Burnett’s inappropriate behaviour towards their children but their voices, until then, had remained unheard.

This lack of control and supervision outraged the public. Weak sentencing, the incredible high rate of recidivism and the lack of clear and strong legislation meant there were predators all over the country.

Eight years later, just last month, Sara Payne was awarded a well deserved MBE for her tireless work and for the fourteen new pieces of legislation that form part of Sarah’s Law.

She rightly thanked the general public, in particular the News of the World readers, as without their collective power, nothing would have changed.

But campaigns can also be a lot of fun.

Years ago, an agency filed a story that villagers in a remote corner of Spain were going to celebrate a festival by pushing a donkey off a cliff to it’s death.

Blackie, was to be the sacrificial ass.

The affinity the population have with animals meant they were up in arms at this barbaric cruelty.

In turn, this reaction sparked a Fleet street dash to rescue Blackie and return him to a donkey sanctuary back in England. The victor would surely gain the publics gratitude and lets not forget – an uplift in sales.

The Sun, first on the scene, convinced the farmer to sell us Blackie and with the deal done, went off to celebrate their scoop.

Fatal error.

The Daily Star, arrived, kidnapped Blackie and drove him a hundred miles away to a ‘safe field’ and reaped all the glory.

Similarly, the Tamworth Two – five month old piglets who escaped from a lorry as they were being unloaded at a slaughterhouse – captured the publics imagination.

The search was on for the missing pair Butch and Sundance and once located, the pigs found themselves at the centre of a media auction to save their bacon.

£15,000 later, making them the most expensive pork in history, the Daily Mail had their scoop.

The fight between The Sun and The Mirror to return the 1966 football to Geoff Hurst is legendry newspaper tale.

The story broke that one of the German players, Helmut Haller had kept the winning ball after our world cup victory and thirty years later was now trying to sell it.

Our football loving nation demanded it back.

And Fleet Street was happy to oblige.

At least ten reporters and almost as many photographers descended on some sleepy German village all determined to get the ball which was not much more than a deflated bit of old leather.

£120,000 later, Helmut looked like he’d actually won the world cup and The Mirror were victorious.

These light hearted campaigns are often dismissed by ‘worthy’ sorts. They clearly forget that the readership have a whole gamut of emotions including a sense of humour.

Campaigns provide a unique connection to the public especially when the subject matter is of a serious nature.

For me, nothing can illustrate this connection better than our recent Baby P campaign.

The public outcry was deafening. And we began our fight for justice with a determination to expose the lack of accountability and responsibility for Baby P’s brutal death.

We delivered 1.5 million signatures to Downing Street and the collective power worked.

Children’s Secretary Ed Balls was forced to use emergency legislation to ensure that those responsible were held to account.

We received many many thousands of letters at The Sun about our Baby P coverage. I’d like to read you one:

‘I have never been a huge fan of The Sun, however I thank you for the coverage of Baby P. I am so grateful for the campaign. This is not a modern day witch-hunt but a petition for justice. Please, please do not relent.

In contrast, I’d like to quote from an article in…. ‘The Guardian.’

“Full of fury and repellent hysteria isn’t that part of the game? This is less about the creation of public emotion and more about its manipulation.

This knee-jerk tabloid kicking reaction is just dull.

But total disregard and respect for public opinion never ceases to amaze me.

They demanded accountability.

And as a result of the campaign, some, just some, of those responsible were removed from office without compensation.

Or as this Sun reader wrote:

‘The tabloid press, which the arty-farty press like to look down on so much, has shown that it prides morality over political correctness.’

There is nothing more rewarding than setting the news agenda with your own story.

Every newspaper editor, every journalist, lives for a great scoop.

The newsroom needs journalists who have great contacts, the reporters who can break the news not just report it, the photographers that can bring in the exclusives.

Great investigations, like yesterdays Sunday Times expose of The Labour Lords are lifeblood to newsapers.

I read an article a few weeks ago about The Penny Trumpet that began in 1841. The slogan for this single sheet, one penny publication was ‘quality not quantity’.

A phrase now over used but still a lesson to us all.

The quality of our journalism will make or break our industry not the recession.

Our ancient craft is to tell many people what few people know.

The sheer thrill of disclosure motivates the best journalists.

And as an industry, we should use our collective power to campaign for the freedom to do so.

This country is full of regulators, lawyers and politicians eager to frame and implement legislation that would constrain freedoms hard won over centuries.

We are already losing those freedoms. Privacy legislation is being created by the drip, drip of case law in the High Court without any reference to parliament.

Sometimes I suspect most of the media commentariat are suffering from Munchausen syndrome.

They are certainly making us suffer unnecessarily!

Only journalism allows us to exist. Yet they often decry it’s existence.

And it’s the epitome of self-flagellation when The Guardian publishes Max Mosley’s views on press freedom.

The relentless negativity, this almost morbid fascination with our own demise, must stop.

News International, Associated Newspapers and The Telegraph Group are battling to change the restrictive and prohibitively expensive Conditional Fee Arrangements.

But we need the rest of the industry to win this fight.

The silence is sometimes deafening.

The new distinguished chair of the Press Complaints Commission, Peta Buscombe certainly has her work cut out.

You would understand if the public were interested in our naval gazing. But they are not.

No one really lives in the bubble world of media-metroville.

And every successful business needs to know it’s customer.

Every year, my editorial team go on vacation with Sun readers either at a caravan park or holiday camp.

This year we are off to Sunny Blackpool for four nights as part of our £9.50 holiday promotion .

In 2008 nearly 2.5 million people took up the offer. It makes The Sun the biggest short haul travel firm in the UK.

The holiday is invaluable time with our readership and there are often some surreal moments.

On one such weekend at Butlins in Bognor – we were in the Sun and Moon pub having a few drinks, when one reader decided to make a speech.

‘I love The Sun’, he said, ‘it’s the best. But the editor should be fired.’

Much laughter from my merry team,

He went on to explain the reason for my demise:

‘I couldn’t believe it the other day, I picked up the paper to find that Yasser Arafat’s death got less coverage than Wayne Rooney’s car crash. I mean what’s the world come to?

My political editor George Pascoe Watson was thrilled. Clearly in vino veritas, George stands up and announces: ‘old chap, I’d just like to say on behalf of the political team at The Sun, I totally agree with your sentiments.

‘To be honest mate’ replied the reader. ‘I’m not sure why they employ you either. No one’s interested in that Westminster claptrap you write.’

But the upside of really knowing who your readers are is worth it.

And knowing who your future readers are – is the holy grail.

Tesco’s boss Sir Terry Leahy regularly operates the check out in one of his stores and he even gets his executives to live with Tesco customers for a week to really understand their wants.

As an industry our data collection is traditionally poor. New media has made that more effective but we still trail behind companies like Tesco.

Obama’s election campaign can teach us a lot. The data he already has on his supporters is immense.

We need new ways of engagement – to find out everything about our supporters.

So we can understand their buying habits and provided them with the relevant content, promotions, offers and services they require.

I said, at the beginning, I wasn’t here to give an obituary on our industry, far from it.

Despite our ‘internal’ disagreements, the depth of quality and diversity in our national newspapers will be our salvation.

But it’s important to be prepared for the challenges ahead.

Investment in journalism is the key to long term prosperity yet cost cutting is inevitable.

Journalism needs a free press to thrive yet under the threat of censorship the industry remains divided.

We’ve been masters of the written word for centuries yet we fear a future beyond print.

An independent media is imperative to a democracy yet the recession will hurt all but state funded journalism.

Our traditional business model is still profitable yet we need new ways to connect with our readers to stop the decline.

These contradictions are subject to deep thought in most newspaper companies.

I am optimistic.

And as an industry, we owe it to you, students of our trade, to rise to these challenges.

We need to ask ourselves:

Can we unite to fight against a privacy law that has no place in a democracy ?

Can we agree that self-regulation is the best way to deal with the occasional excesses of a free press?

Can we have a press that has the courage and commitment to listen to and fight for its readers?

Can we survive this economic climate if we keep investment in journalism at the heart of what we do?

I suggest to you tonight: in the words of Bob The Builder, plagiarised by Barak Obama.

Yes. We. Can.

Thank you.

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