MORNING SERIAL
- DAILY lobby briefing with the Prime Minister’s spokesman (12pm every day except Wednesday, when it is at 11am).
- Downing Street TV briefing (5pm daily): the daily briefing on coronavirus where a Government minister is flanked by two (increasingly uncomfortable looking) scientific/medical experts. Could be dynamite with loads of news lines or dull as dishwater, leaving the public with nothing to do except speculate on whether Dominic Raab and Matt Hancock are actually the same person/ political robot.
- Labour Party huddle (Wednesday straight after PMQs) – Similar to the lobby briefing, this is a chance for journalists to question Labour policy and seek clarification for comments made in PMQs.
- Daily Welsh Government press conference at 12.30pm every day.
On top of this is the day to day madness of announcements, u-turns and long road trips to test eyesight. The challenge of reporting these events is that the two governmental structures run simultaneously with no attention to overlap. This means it is hard to cover all of it live. This was not a problem in the days before news websites when all that was required was for the stories to be written before the print run, and there were also more reporters available than Boris Johnson has had dismissals from employment. With news websites there is a hunger from readers to consume news as it happens, meaning priorities have to be considered.
Wednesday is by far the busiest day with the lobby briefing at 11am, PMQs 12pm, Welsh Government press conference 12.30pm (and if you are asking a question you need to be logged on to Zoom at 12.15 to do a sound check), Labour huddle at 1pm then Plenary at 1.30pm. There is no set way of covering it all and quite often a decision is made by myself and my news editors on the day as to where the strongest news lines will be and what is most relevant to our readers.
Lockdown Wales by Will Hayward £9.99 www.serenbooks.com/ productdisplay/lockdown-wales ISBN 9781781726013
CONTINUES TOMORROW