Daily Mail

THE BLOKES ARE BANNED CORPORATIO­N

Auntie’s being forced to make deep cuts. But what a coincidenc­e that almost every on-screen departure is a white, older man – while so many glamorous female presenters survive!

- by John Mair

VETERAN BBC PRODUCER BEHIND QUESTION TIME

TURN on the TV in an American hotel room to any news channel and you will see the future of British bulletins.

Every current affairs programme, be it political or local news, analysis or entertainm­ent, is presented by a someone from central casting. Often they are a black, Hispanic or Asian female, though occasional­ly you will find a young man. Either way, they are always impossibly good-looking.

Occasional­ly, one or other might be a halfway decent journalist too, but that is practicall­y incidental. What matters are the optics — the way they look — flattering us that we too must be gorgeous and smart or they wouldn’t bother talking to us.

What you won’t see are the craggy, older reporters, the ones with faces like badly packed suitcases. Their creases and lines speak of hard-won experience, earned through decades of interviews and fact-finding. They bring invaluable insight, knowledge and news instinct — but that counts for nothing compared to white teeth and taut skin.

AND as yesterday’s Mail revealed, now the BBC has followed suit, purging our screens of older, white, male reporters. The corporatio­n’s executives have decided that no one needs to see the likes of BBC Look East’s chief reporter Kim Riley — twice news reporter of the year and once presenter of the year at the Royal Television Society awards — who left after 38 years.

There’s no place for Harry Gration at BBC Look North, a man with 42 years in broadcasti­ng, who was awarded an MBE in 2013 for his services to television.

Also surplus to requiremen­ts are veteran sports reporter Mark Shardlow, leaving BBC Midlands Today after more than 30 years, and Justin Leigh, with 33 years on the job — axed as presenter of BBC Spotlight in Devon and Cornwall.

In fact, 29 regional news reporters and presenters have announced their departure or have already quit in recent weeks. And as our gallery of photograph­s here highlights, the majority (82 per cent, to be precise) have one thing in common: they are white, old and male. Of the 29, just five are women.

Already this year, seven of the 20 presenters on the 6.30pm regional TV bulletins have gone.

That leaves lone women presenting three of the seven regional programmes that previously featured two hosts.

Numerous local radio shows featuring double acts have also been told that they will be pared down to one presenter. Thanks to a weak and woke orthodoxy put in place by former Director-General Tony Hall, which appears automatica­lly to favour women, this amounts to a male exodus — an emasculati­on of the BBC.

When Graham Norton announced he was quitting his Saturday morning slot on Radio 2, for instance, did anybody really think he would be replaced by any middle-aged man with lashings of experience — Steve Wright, say, or Simon Mayo? Sure enough, in comes Ms Claudia Winkleman, who is chiefly known as a TV presenter.

Together, the latest round of

exiled men between them have more than 500 years of service at the BBC. That astonishin­g loyalty to the national broadcaste­r was rewarded yesterday by BBC ‘insiders’ accusing them of taking large pay-outs and running.

One claimed that the leavers handed in their notice to avoid this year’s deadline that will cap voluntary redundancy payments at £95,000. By going early, so the story goes, some of them will walk away with bigger cheques.

Such a cynical rumour directly undermines the comments by Harry Gration, for instance, who says he is bitterly sad to be going. ‘I’ve been very emotional about it,’ he says.

I’m of the same generation as Harry, and I know what dedicated, serious profession­als many of us were. I also know how the BBC has long regarded regional news almost as a provincial embarrassm­ent, and I am not surprised by their shameful treatment.

About 30 years ago, before I helped create BBC Question Time, I was a producer on London Plus, the South-East’s news magazine.

The show had a nickname — ‘Sod Off Kent’ — because the garden of England so rarely got a look-in on the reports.

Our star presenter was Jeremy Paxman, serving out a punishment in the Beeb’s equivalent of the Siberian salt mines, for some perceived misdemeano­ur on the national Six O’Clock News. I daresay his habitual candour had upset somebody. Paxo was bored but brilliant. The success that followed on Newsnight shocked nobody on Sod Off Kent.

BUT he was aided by some superb individual­s. Every regional BBC newsroom had them and, though they had often reached the peak of their careers (not everyone can go on to become a national treasure), they were the backbone of the operation up and down the country.

That backbone has now been ripped out. I see the results every time I switch on my local news in Oxford. Officially, it is called South Today but in my house we refer to it as History Today, because we’ve already seen every story online or in the regional newspaper. That’s where the reporters find their material — they don’t seem eager to travel any further than their desks.

Now that Auntie is intent on making savings of £800 million by 2022, those newsrooms are the easiest target.

What the bosses have never understood is how well-loved the figures on this page are. They might be unknown outside their region but, on their own turf, they are familiar faces. You wouldn’t find a more popular choice to open a supermarke­t or switch on the Christmas lights.

And their deep experience paid dividends for the new generation­s coming through. They guided the young reporters and film-makers learning their craft.

If we fail to maintain that schooling, it is because we don’t appreciate how vital good, impartial, fearless news reporting really is.

We’ll miss it when it’s gone — more than we can imagine.

 ?? ?? Farewell: BBC East Midlands Today presenter Quentin Rayner, 59, (with Fiona Bruce) left on October 23 after 36 years
Farewell: BBC East Midlands Today presenter Quentin Rayner, 59, (with Fiona Bruce) left on October 23 after 36 years
 ?? Picture: PA ?? Emotional: Look North’s Harry Gration (with presenter Keeley Donovan) left, aged 69, after 38 years in the role
Picture: PA Emotional: Look North’s Harry Gration (with presenter Keeley Donovan) left, aged 69, after 38 years in the role

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