TRIGGERnometry - ＂Journalism Is in Crisis＂ - Tom Latchem

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome to Trigonometry. I'm Francis Foster and I'm Constantine Kissin and this is

00:00:10.200 the show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people. Our brilliant guest today

00:00:15.540 is a journalist and broadcaster Tom Latchin. Welcome to Trigonometry. How you doing? I feel

00:00:20.780 slightly overwhelmed by that intro and also given who you've had in the past slightly cowed as well

00:00:25.820 You know, I mean, the brilliance of Peter Hitchens and Mike Graham.

00:00:31.480 Hello, Mike, if you're watching.

00:00:33.060 I don't know, Mike.

00:00:33.480 He doesn't watch the show.

00:00:34.540 Well, Mike gave me my break in radio.

00:00:36.880 So Mike was the man that got me onto TalkSport for the first time,

00:00:40.700 and I used to do a paper review with him every week on the overnight show,

00:00:43.840 and then I ended up getting my own show on TalkSport.

00:00:46.100 So if you are watching, Mike, thanks, but it didn't work. 0.99

00:00:48.640 All right, so if this is shit, you know who to blame. 0.83

00:00:50.940 but all joking aside it's great to have you on the show tom just tell us a little bit about for 0.97

00:00:57.140 anyone who doesn't know who you are what is your background like what's been your journey through

00:01:01.080 life that leads you to be sitting here in this chair um so i've always been into i've always

00:01:06.080 been good at english i suppose my dad was a journalist for the bbc for 20 years and my

00:01:10.360 younger brother is also a journalist for the bbc currently works for five live uh so there is very

00:01:14.760 much a journalistic background in our family um and so i decided i wanted to be a newspaper

00:01:21.960 journalist when i was about 14 i did work experience all that stuff ended up getting

00:01:26.760 on the daily mirror graduate training scheme straight out of university worked there for

00:01:31.100 three years pissed everybody off they moved me this is why he's on the podcast yeah they moved

00:01:36.500 me to the people uh which was like like the runt of the litter you know like a trinity mirror you've

00:01:40.960 got the daily mirror the sunday mirror and then the people and all the wrong ones works on the

00:01:45.100 people and basically the daily mirror they said yeah you you know you're a good journalist but

00:01:49.000 you're right in fact i remember my boss saying you're a rough diamond and uh and someone will

00:01:54.740 knock the edges off you but basically it wasn't going to be him and he moved me to the people

00:01:58.360 so i went to the people for a year which was miserable um because you know i mean the people

00:02:03.780 has a proud tradition but i don't think that proud tradition has been there for quite a number of

00:02:08.020 years uh and i got headhunted from there right at the end of my graduate training scheme i'd signed

00:02:13.760 a contract to be on the people to take their staff job and then the news the world headhunted me just

00:02:18.460 just after i'd handed in my contract and said do you want to come and join us on the features team

00:02:23.600 and so i had to go back and say that contract i've just signed uh can i not uh go through that which

00:02:30.020 again pissed people off i got put on garden leave and then i went and joined the news of the world

00:02:34.740 where I was a feature writer and then became TV editor quite quickly within about a year

00:02:40.680 and then of course the newspaper shut and threw thrust me out into the world and I decided at

00:02:48.440 that point I'd try and become a radio presenter because I'd done some radio and really enjoyed it

00:02:52.720 I loved the thrill of broadcasting and actually when I started my career I'd always thought

00:02:55.500 I'll do newspapers then radio then TV it's a nice sort of journey and I worked on that

00:03:03.580 freelance journalism worked on the attempt to become a a radio presenter mike graham gave me

00:03:09.880 that opportunity and then a couple years later basically this is what happens at talk sport they

00:03:14.560 had they had a big gap and they were like uh what are we going to do to fill it tom do you want to

00:03:19.020 do it and i was like absolutely yes so i did the overnight show for the weekends for like two or

00:03:24.200 three years and thoroughly enjoyed it and i think the ratings were among the highest they've ever

00:03:31.220 been when i left but it came it became obvious that i wasn't going anywhere on the top on talk

00:03:37.040 sport so i decided to jump before i was pushed and so i left a year ago and now i do i've everything

00:03:44.320 really a bit pr a bit of a bit of broadcasting just about to launch my own podcast on the 90s

00:03:50.120 rave scene if you want to check it out raw it's called raw the 90s rave podcast uh if you're into

00:03:55.880 that there'll be like one person maybe that's listening to this that might be uh and i'd yeah

00:03:59.840 just do all sorts

00:04:00.520 a bit of journalism

00:04:01.120 a bit of PR

00:04:01.920 and a bit of

00:04:02.620 a bit of broadcasting

00:04:04.060 a bit of everything really

00:04:04.960 so you were

00:04:05.920 a tabloid journalist

00:04:07.580 for very many years

00:04:08.620 I was

00:04:08.940 I was

00:04:09.340 and even when I was

00:04:09.960 a freelance journalist

00:04:10.620 I was generally

00:04:11.860 serving

00:04:12.540 tabloid newspapers

00:04:14.580 because the money

00:04:15.400 is not

00:04:16.540 really there

00:04:18.020 on broad

00:04:18.480 broadsheets don't tend

00:04:19.360 to pay for stories

00:04:20.240 in the way that

00:04:20.740 tabloids did

00:04:22.420 so I would

00:04:23.440 yeah

00:04:23.820 I mean I've been a tabloid

00:04:25.200 sort of

00:04:25.660 tabloid journalist

00:04:26.620 tabloid staffer

00:04:27.600 for five years

00:04:28.340 a freelance journalist working in tabloids for 15.

00:04:32.680 And when you see tabloid journalists

00:04:34.860 criticising tabloid journalism,

00:04:36.660 what is your initial impression?

00:04:37.940 Do you think they get a lot of unfair criticism?

00:04:39.900 Or do you think it's fair, the criticism that they receive?

00:04:44.660 I do feel,

00:04:46.240 and this will maybe annoy some of my former colleagues

00:04:48.920 and I apologise to them if it does.

00:04:52.040 Well, I feel that newspapers are very old-fashioned.

00:04:55.920 I think that when the news of the world shut, there was a sea change.

00:05:03.000 There was a desire for newspapers to be more modern.

00:05:06.980 You know, you look at just an example.

00:05:08.220 There was calls for such a long time after that for The Sun to drop page three.

00:05:11.980 And it took forever for them to do it.

00:05:14.100 And it was only when they were, you know, dragging and kicking and screaming to do so.

00:05:19.380 And I felt that there was an opportunity after the news of the world shut for tabloid newspapers to modernize,

00:05:23.100 modernize to to seek a younger audience maybe they just were never going to buy newspapers i

00:05:30.440 don't know but they focused on they sort of retreated and entrenched into their ever

00:05:36.360 diminishing aka dying readership you know and and i just felt that they became decreasingly

00:05:45.960 less relevant and so now obviously online the rise of online is where you're saying you are

00:05:51.340 seeing those big brands, Mail, The Sun, The Guardian, you're still seeing those big brands

00:05:56.520 dominating that market. But I think they probably started too late. There was no cohesion in how

00:06:08.800 they did it. Some did a paywall, some didn't. And the fact is, you can get most of your news for

00:06:13.080 free. You can't put the genie back in the bottom there and make people pay. And I think that's a

00:06:17.220 big problem for the newspapers and online.

00:06:19.040 Online journalism doesn't really pay

00:06:21.360 very well. They get kids in.

00:06:23.200 It's journalism. They're ripping off articles.

00:06:25.520 I should point out they are doing some

00:06:27.220 original journalism. The Guardian, of course.

00:06:29.340 The Sun does quite a lot of original

00:06:31.200 online journalism.

00:06:33.080 Telegraph as well, I would say.

00:06:34.780 There is some original journalism

00:06:37.400 but there's a lot of journalism

00:06:38.940 and there's

00:06:40.280 the

00:06:41.120 talent, the experience has been lost

00:06:45.260 out of newspapers and therefore the quality and the stories that they're delivering are lower

00:06:52.320 and they're less good. I mean, that's an issue. I think it's more about massive content than

00:06:56.740 quality of content. And do you think that's mainly a technological transformation where,

00:07:01.000 as you say, people don't want to buy a physical newspaper? They might not want to buy one for

00:07:05.320 ethical reasons. They might not want to waste the paper. A lot of people think that way as well.

00:07:08.900 It is that most, but a lot of people, you know, you can't get them delivered anymore.

00:07:12.600 Well, I mean, you can get the Times delivered, centrally,

00:07:15.040 but generally you can't get...

00:07:16.980 There's not many places that do newspaper delivery.

00:07:19.980 So unless you go to the supermarkets,

00:07:21.480 and actually this is another thing

00:07:24.560 that's just hastening the death of newspapers,

00:07:26.860 is coronavirus.

00:07:27.900 Most people would get it when they went to the supermarket

00:07:29.600 or they went to the shop of the morning.

00:07:31.940 Well, coronavirus, people weren't going to the supermarkets

00:07:34.480 or the shop every morning.

00:07:35.800 They would go once a week when they needed to

00:07:37.320 because it wasn't essential.

00:07:39.980 Well, therefore, newspapers, the newspaper sales just fell off a cliff over coronavirus.

00:07:44.620 That plus online, they were doing ad blocking.

00:07:46.840 I don't know if you know anything about this, but basically the advertising companies

00:07:52.560 basically have a list of block words where if there's a certain block word,

00:08:01.700 they cannot advertise on that page.

00:08:04.220 You can fine tune it individually, but one of the words was coronavirus.

00:08:09.280 Well, so all stories feature coronavirus.

00:08:12.720 Even if you're interviewing a celebrity now,

00:08:14.560 you ask them how their lockdown was.

00:08:16.500 How's coronavirus been for you?

00:08:18.140 So even if it's not, you know,

00:08:19.220 because I understand why they might not want to advertise on a page

00:08:21.960 about X number of deaths per day.

00:08:24.780 I totally understand that.

00:08:26.380 But to blanket ban coronavirus seems absurd,

00:08:30.100 particularly given that it is enveloping everything.

00:08:33.600 And so they lost millions and millions of pounds.

00:08:36.660 So again, that means there's less money to invest back into journalism.

00:08:40.460 And I think it's just hastened, probably hastened the death of newspapers.

00:08:46.180 I think newspapers, people like having something to hold.

00:08:48.960 A lot of the people I've been speaking to, friends, they think they've probably got like 10, 20 years,

00:08:53.060 but it will probably be the bigger brands that exist as newspapers, and then it will go all online.

00:08:58.800 But we're a million miles from, like the Made Online monetizes it, just about.

00:09:03.500 but no one else

00:09:05.580 I think the sun online

00:09:06.500 washes its own face

00:09:07.420 just about

00:09:08.020 but that doesn't mean

00:09:09.480 the next huge amounts

00:09:10.060 of money

00:09:10.400 and you know

00:09:11.980 the Guardian

00:09:12.580 as we've seen

00:09:13.300 it relies on money

00:09:14.120 from you know

00:09:15.440 the Scott Trust

00:09:17.440 they sold

00:09:18.180 they sold

00:09:20.260 they used to

00:09:20.760 AutoTrader

00:09:21.760 they sold that

00:09:22.440 for just a couple

00:09:24.400 of hundred billion pounds

00:09:25.040 something like that

00:09:25.500 and so all that money

00:09:26.480 is

00:09:26.660 but when you sell everything

00:09:28.300 and you haven't got

00:09:28.960 any more Scott Trust money

00:09:30.380 you aren't able

00:09:31.680 you have to monetise it

00:09:32.740 And I think they're doing it okay online, but certainly not making huge.

00:09:35.960 Well, The Guardian, I mean, their section at the bottom begging people for money is now bigger than half their articles.

00:09:40.640 But, you know, I was asking you about the technological point, because I guess one of the things we've explored quite a bit on the show is what you might describe more broadly as the kind of decline of the mainstream media more generally.

00:09:52.540 And the feeling among many people that the mainstream media don't seem to be offering the substantive stuff that they're used to, which is where stuff like this comes in, where people actually have the conversations.

00:10:04.920 And that's obviously not a newspaper thing.

00:10:06.500 It's more of an online, the radio, all of that stuff, TV.

00:10:10.420 A lot of people now feel like the mainstream media is no longer doing the job that we think of the mainstream media as being there to do.

00:10:18.380 Do you know what I mean?

00:10:19.040 I do.

00:10:19.560 A good example is sport.

00:10:21.820 So the sports coverage was, certainly in the tabloids,

00:10:25.880 it would be all about transfer rumours.

00:10:28.300 Well, I mean, nowadays, if you're on a transfer rumour,

00:10:30.080 you can get them anywhere.

00:10:31.240 You can get that stuff anywhere.

00:10:33.360 All sorts of places are doing it.

00:10:35.220 I don't believe half anyway.

00:10:36.340 It's all sort of agents who want to get something out there.

00:10:43.060 Hardly any of it, hardly anything you read,

00:10:45.320 exclusive transfer-wise, is really a genuine exclusive.

00:10:48.960 So what I was thinking was, why don't they?

00:10:51.020 why don't they switch to analysis you know because that's the sort of stuff you can't get

00:10:55.860 anywhere because you know you need to be really in tune with the people who who know what they're

00:11:02.080 talking about you know you need to be having those conversations on a daily basis those websites

00:11:05.840 that run by kids don't have those let them do the transfer crap fine whatever but it's that sort of

00:11:10.820 in-depth analysis and which is why you've seen the athletic you know be so successful because

00:11:16.360 actually it focuses on i mean it could do a good sub-editor because the articles are way too long

00:11:21.180 but they do focus on in-depth issues and explore things tactical side of things all that stuff

00:11:27.500 and i just felt why don't they do that so you know there was an opportunity for instance in

00:11:32.780 that area to provide something that is different and makes them stand out that they've got the

00:11:37.300 um the budgets and the capabilities and the staff to do and they don't they haven't really done it

00:11:42.700 So that's an example of how they're failing, I think.

00:11:45.920 And it's also, do you know, I think as well, Tom,

00:11:47.520 is the fact that people no longer have faith

00:11:49.400 in what they're being told by the mainstream media.

00:11:51.480 A lot of people no longer believe it.

00:11:53.820 Yeah, I mean, there's definitely a trust issue.

00:11:56.520 I don't think that goes across the board.

00:11:57.960 Where that comes from, it's probably partly to do with their own fault

00:12:00.920 through a series of...

00:12:04.600 Honestly, it's a series of things, isn't it?

00:12:06.900 You know, phone hacking, which erodes that sort of trust.

00:12:12.080 It's the close links between the police and the government and the newspapers, which again erodes that trust.

00:12:19.940 It's the sourced quotes where you don't know where they come from and they're not named and that erodes the trust.

00:12:27.200 Yeah, there's just a series of things.

00:12:29.220 But you've also got lots of people like Donald Trump and other people, Boris Johnson, not necessarily Boris Johnson, but Dominic Cummings, whatever,

00:12:38.080 just telling people

00:12:39.280 that this is

00:12:39.700 you can't believe this

00:12:40.480 it's fake news

00:12:41.300 when it isn't

00:12:42.560 and I think

00:12:43.400 there's just been a

00:12:44.180 there's just a sort of

00:12:45.500 series of factors

00:12:46.280 like a maelstrom of factors

00:12:47.500 that have led

00:12:48.440 led to this position

00:12:49.960 and it's partly

00:12:50.520 to do with the newspapers

00:12:51.380 it's partly their fault

00:12:52.340 but I wouldn't say

00:12:53.160 it's all their fault

00:12:53.880 and you don't think

00:12:54.960 part of it is

00:12:55.720 the fact that

00:12:56.460 what we've got now

00:12:57.160 a lot of it is

00:12:57.620 advocacy journalism

00:12:58.560 like you go on

00:12:59.240 to the Guardian

00:12:59.760 you know that

00:13:00.640 they're going to

00:13:01.240 give you a very

00:13:02.160 particular outlook

00:13:03.380 and you know

00:13:04.620 it's not going to be

00:13:05.240 objective

00:13:05.660 the problem

00:13:06.400 is though

00:13:07.500 is that neutral journalism is boring.

00:13:11.340 No one just wants to read neutral journalism.

00:13:13.240 It's dull.

00:13:14.120 It doesn't interest people.

00:13:15.920 It doesn't excite people.

00:13:17.360 The thing is, when you work in the tabloids,

00:13:19.340 one thing tabloids do well,

00:13:21.120 or historically have done well,

00:13:22.200 whether they do so anymore,

00:13:24.240 is it can be debated.

00:13:25.880 But the one thing they did do,

00:13:27.000 particularly the Daily Mail,

00:13:28.020 whether you like it or you hate it,

00:13:30.060 what was always coached

00:13:30.940 when I do my journalism training,

00:13:32.460 is make this story like me.

00:13:37.500 So it's like when you read it and you're like, why are they going to live in a £450,000 house in a leafy suburb?

00:13:43.080 You're like, what does that matter?

00:13:44.660 It does.

00:13:45.320 It's subconscious.

00:13:46.180 It's people going, oh, they're just like me.

00:13:48.580 So you carry on reading it.

00:13:50.680 You know, I was once told, and this is appalling, by the way, I was once told on one of my newspapers that I was working at.

00:13:58.440 If you ever have a story about an Asian lottery winner, put their name in the seventh paragraph.

00:14:05.240 because if you put it in the top paragraph

00:14:07.820 or the second paragraph,

00:14:08.660 whatever it's going to be,

00:14:10.820 people won't read it.

00:14:11.940 And the majority of newspaper readers are,

00:14:13.720 certainly tabloids,

00:14:14.800 are white,

00:14:15.860 generally intently working class people.

00:14:18.280 Now, whether that's true or not,

00:14:19.500 I have no idea.

00:14:20.280 I was appalled by the idea

00:14:21.440 that they would do this

00:14:23.240 and that it might be true,

00:14:24.680 but that gives you an idea.

00:14:26.560 Their writing going,

00:14:27.440 right, we need to angle this story

00:14:29.320 so it appeals to our readers.

00:14:31.000 And that is what tabloids have done

00:14:32.300 historically very, very well

00:14:33.640 and particularly the male

00:14:34.560 under Paul Dacre, long time, you know, particularly, you know,

00:14:37.720 when it's at its pomp, they did, they frame a story so it appeals,

00:14:44.480 you know, and that's why there's lots of sexy stuff in tabloids 1.00

00:14:47.580 because whether you like it or you don't, that does appeal to people.

00:14:51.360 It does interest people.

00:14:52.220 It gets people looking at it.

00:14:53.220 It gets people reading at it, reading those stories.

00:14:56.600 If it's just plain and bland and there are papers,

00:14:59.420 I'm not going to name the paper, you know,

00:15:00.880 there's a particular paper I can think of that is pretty straight

00:15:04.100 and it isn't particularly political

00:15:05.880 and it's not that interesting to read.

00:15:34.100 Yeah, so it's difficult to strike that balance

00:15:41.360 where you've got to be, you know, as objective as possible,

00:15:44.740 but you need a little bit of the flavour.

00:15:46.140 And also, they're owned by people who have political opinions.

00:15:49.320 Yeah.

00:15:49.880 You know, a political view.

00:15:50.800 So, you know, you look at...

00:15:52.500 Well, it was slightly weird with the Times and the Sunday Times

00:15:55.080 because one was Remain and one was Leave,

00:15:57.240 which was always weird, which suggests, actually,

00:15:58.800 that Rupert Murdoch's view wasn't as strong on it

00:16:02.000 as we might have believed

00:16:05.580 because we all know

00:16:06.680 I think we all know

00:16:08.440 that Rupert Murdoch

00:16:09.200 wanted to leave the EU

00:16:10.640 the Sun was very strong on it

00:16:12.460 the Sunday Times

00:16:14.820 I think was leave

00:16:16.620 and the Times was remain

00:16:18.240 but you do have

00:16:20.260 these owners of these newspapers

00:16:23.840 pumping money into it

00:16:25.520 they're not doing it

00:16:26.400 because they might do it

00:16:27.860 partly because they love journalism

00:16:28.760 that's not the reason why

00:16:29.740 they're doing it

00:16:30.300 they're doing it because

00:16:31.260 They want power, influence. They want to make change.

00:16:36.180 And so, therefore, you have to reflect what your owner wants sometimes.

00:16:42.060 Now, sometimes you reflect what you think that your reader wants.

00:16:45.120 So the Sun was very much leave because most Sun readers were leave.

00:16:48.740 But there are factors that influence why a paper writes certain things in a certain way that are beyond just its politics.

00:17:00.320 Well, let's pick up on that, actually, because that's a thing that I think most people don't think about, which is all of these broadcasters or most of the broadcasters other than the BBC, radio stations, newspapers, tabloid newspapers, they're all owned by somebody.

00:17:15.580 And those people usually own them because they have very strong agendas.

00:17:19.300 To what extent do you think that influences the kind of the direction of the publication?

00:17:25.980 They're all different.

00:17:26.940 Yeah.

00:17:27.260 They're all different.

00:17:27.780 But are there people

00:17:29.060 who are just like

00:17:29.860 you know what

00:17:30.260 I bought this thing

00:17:30.980 and you now do

00:17:32.000 whatever you want

00:17:32.720 Who does that?

00:17:34.660 Who buys a business

00:17:36.360 and goes 1.00

00:17:36.700 do what the fuck 1.00

00:17:37.260 you want with it? 0.99

00:17:37.980 Nobody

00:17:38.300 Nobody does that

00:17:39.600 Of course

00:17:40.380 I mean that would be insanity

00:17:41.440 Well probably the owners

00:17:43.080 of West Ham mate

00:17:43.900 Well I mean ultimately

00:17:44.520 also

00:17:44.880 I mean let's be honest

00:17:45.720 they'd like to make money off it

00:17:46.780 but they're not making

00:17:47.880 a huge amount of money

00:17:48.560 off these papers anymore

00:17:49.440 are they?

00:17:49.720 So why do they have them?

00:17:51.040 Yeah

00:17:51.160 When Rupert Murdoch dies

00:17:52.820 what will happen to the son?

00:17:55.180 I don't think his kids

00:17:56.100 care about him

00:17:56.760 particularly

00:17:57.120 don't think they're interested

00:17:58.240 so what will happen to them

00:18:00.080 no one knows

00:18:00.720 but it's something

00:18:01.700 that you need to think about

00:18:02.460 because he's

00:18:03.220 what is he 82

00:18:04.680 something like that

00:18:05.300 you know

00:18:05.520 he's not going to be around forever

00:18:06.880 so what happens then

00:18:08.400 I honestly

00:18:09.760 I don't know

00:18:10.400 but I think that

00:18:12.160 that's a very interesting

00:18:13.320 moment for

00:18:14.380 for newspaper journalism

00:18:15.400 because he's one of the few people

00:18:16.260 who does love newspapers

00:18:17.340 it's in his blood

00:18:18.020 you know

00:18:18.260 his dad was a

00:18:19.060 was a newspaper journalist

00:18:20.660 in Australia

00:18:21.340 and stuff like that

00:18:22.220 so

00:18:22.460 but yeah

00:18:23.960 to go back to your question

00:18:26.440 some people do do it because they love journalism because it's important

00:18:31.000 but they also use it for influence you know for lobbying

00:18:34.720 you know all the various different owners like to be like to know the

00:18:39.060 prime minister you know they like to be seen with all

00:18:41.620 these people so therefore it's that and there's many

00:18:44.640 reasons why they would do it but also they you know they don't do it to lose

00:18:47.680 money and just allow someone else to just run it how they want

00:18:49.780 but i would say as well actually is like i i'm not sure

00:18:52.880 because rupert murdoch gets probably not an unfair reputation about

00:18:56.400 how much he influences newspapers and I speak to people who work there I've got very close friends

00:19:01.420 who are very senior on some of that on some of the news UK papers I don't think his influence

00:19:07.580 is as strong as everyone thinks it is these days I think he largely allows it to to exist he might

00:19:14.020 you know once I mean famously you know you Piers Morgan would wrote in his diaries was it back in

00:19:20.300 2006 talks about when he was the editor of the news of the world when he was a kid about being

00:19:24.040 flown out around the world to meet Rupert Murdoch to be anointed and then he would like often ring

00:19:29.700 up I think there was one story I said he had a story about one of the Emmerdale stars shagging

00:19:36.060 someone or something I mean it was a lame story and he was going to put it on the front and Rupert

00:19:40.140 Murdoch rang up as he would do every Saturday and so what are you going to put on the what are you

00:19:45.020 going to put on the front page and he said I've got this story and he was like I can't remember

00:19:49.360 the exact quote but it was like I mean that's a joke obviously isn't it you're not going to do

00:19:52.080 that and he was like

00:19:52.920 I don't think he does

00:19:56.100 that anymore and I

00:19:57.120 wonder whether the

00:19:57.660 news of the world

00:19:58.280 what happened with

00:19:59.080 that he probably was

00:19:59.820 getting a bit his

00:20:00.940 influence or his

00:20:01.640 desire to be

00:20:02.360 influential on it was

00:20:03.260 probably decreasing and

00:20:04.580 then that sort of that

00:20:06.420 was a big paper that

00:20:07.680 went how much of an

00:20:10.240 influence he has I

00:20:11.200 don't know but I

00:20:11.940 don't believe it's as

00:20:12.880 probably as strong as

00:20:13.560 everyone you know your

00:20:15.020 punter on the street

00:20:15.840 believes it to be

00:20:17.300 because I could be

00:20:17.980 wrong by the way you

00:20:18.680 know I mean all of

00:20:19.200 this is just from

00:20:20.340 from conversations I've

00:20:21.380 bad but that surprised me but you know you've got to i've got to believe people who work in that

00:20:27.080 in that building but you look at the times and their journalists are fairly balanced you tend

00:20:32.200 to get someone from the right whether it's a melanie phillips and you get somebody from the

00:20:35.300 left and then you get somebody from the center and all the rest of it they tend to be quite

00:20:39.000 balanced in their outlook which they do what i will say is there's someone you might be able to

00:20:43.740 get might want to get on the show in the future is a guy called mick wright he's uh he's on twitter

00:20:47.160 he's quite a prolific

00:20:48.400 sort of

00:20:50.080 writer

00:20:51.200 he's quite anti

00:20:53.100 papers

00:20:53.720 and he does this thing

00:20:54.980 where he

00:20:56.640 so newspapers always say

00:20:58.000 they want to appeal

00:20:58.500 to a younger audience

00:20:59.540 so he adds up

00:21:00.900 the ages

00:21:01.500 of the columnists

00:21:02.840 and the average

00:21:04.940 is usually

00:21:06.160 men

00:21:07.220 generally

00:21:08.100 white men

00:21:10.000 generally

00:21:10.660 of

00:21:11.660 you know

00:21:12.180 who were

00:21:12.440 in their late 40s

00:21:14.000 early 50s

00:21:14.580 yeah

00:21:14.960 so

00:21:15.840 you say they're

00:21:17.040 balanced but but they may be balanced in terms of their politics but they're not balanced in terms

00:21:20.840 of their ethnicity in terms of their backgrounds in terms of their ages are they and all that is

00:21:27.480 all that is impactful upon what they write of course it is so do you think they need to be

00:21:32.620 more balanced if they're going to appeal to a younger generation i think they've missed the

00:21:35.800 boat i mean i don't think newspapers are going to appeal to younger people i think they missed

00:21:41.040 that opportunity and i and i watched it happen and i was like go on you can do it you can do it

00:21:45.360 You know, and they just missed it as I was watching.

00:21:48.880 I'm like, right, okay, fine.

00:21:50.780 That's that then.

00:21:52.440 I mean, online is a different beast altogether.

00:21:55.040 And actually, online journalism is a fascinating thing to think about.

00:21:59.100 I've never worked in online journalism,

00:22:00.360 so I can't say how it operates on a day-by-day basis

00:22:03.880 in terms of how they select the stories and whatever.

00:22:06.780 But from what I do know is, I mean, I know that they have real time.

00:22:11.300 They can literally see in real time what story is doing well

00:22:13.980 and what story is doing bad.

00:22:14.980 and a lot of the stories you'll see will be based solely around what is trending that day right so

00:22:19.700 or that week or what's big so you know game of thrones always massive anything you can link to

00:22:23.940 game of thrones online because it comes up in the search engines it comes up in the you know if you

00:22:27.800 google game of thrones you know the sun or the whatever game of thrones stories on the carousel

00:22:31.960 on google that's how they do it now what you could say is with that you can so sometimes i'll pitch a

00:22:37.800 story to them and they'll say it's not going to do anything for us and you're like but it's a good

00:22:40.880 story and they're like it's not going to do anything for us and you're like right so what's

00:22:44.640 the judge of what you do how do you judge what story you use this clicks it's clicks so you

00:22:51.980 could say well that is the pure democratization of newspapers of media like for ages we've just

00:22:59.820 been reliant on one bloke or woman but largely usually a bloke uh often white often privately

00:23:05.380 educated sitting in an office uh gets his news list they come in they present in conference they

00:23:11.140 say these are the stories he goes that's the splash that's the page three that's the page five

00:23:15.420 uh you know the four five spread that's the that's the page eight um or the page six or the page eight

00:23:22.460 um opinion piece done and you're like what are you basing that on now you'd hope that they would

00:23:28.640 do some sort of you know they're such massive organizations with such amount of money in them

00:23:32.920 or, you know, that they would do sort of like,

00:23:38.200 what would you call them, group, you know, studies

00:23:41.700 where they ask people, what are you like?

00:23:43.820 What are you interested in?

00:23:44.780 So, you know, you've got a basis.

00:23:46.060 But ultimately, it comes down to one person's decision.

00:23:49.160 So have you been getting it wrong the whole time?

00:23:51.280 Has this person been getting it wrong?

00:23:52.360 And actually, this isn't what people are interested in.

00:23:54.060 Oh, it's a great story, but it's not what people are interested in.

00:23:57.300 Whereas now, you know what people are interested in.

00:24:00.840 It's slightly skewed because some things are shared by Facebook,

00:24:04.540 so therefore, who's sharing that?

00:24:06.460 I mean, I'm on Facebook, but only just.

00:24:09.540 It's my mum, it's my auntie, it's not young people anymore. 1.00

00:24:14.900 They're the ones that are driving the numbers, so is it democratisation?

00:24:18.520 So, you know, it's an interesting sort of thought or discussion to have 0.54

00:24:23.480 about is it pure journalism, actually, or is it slightly bastard? 0.90

00:24:28.680 I don't know. The honest answer is I don't know the truth. But what I do know is that selecting things purely on the basis of one person's view of what is a great story and the best story of the day is not necessarily reflecting what the readers want. 0.85

00:24:42.480 But the downside with that, the other model, which, you know, I write for a couple of opinion pieces for a couple of papers online and they talk to me all the time about, oh, this article did this well and that article did this.

00:24:53.680 i suppose the problem with that is uh it kind of we talked about echo chambers for last four years

00:24:59.760 particularly since brexit and trump and stuff like that it pushes people i think and that's

00:25:04.880 the danger is it pushes people into more and more of the same thing that they already like and also

00:25:10.500 if you look so i don't know what articles you've written and how they how well they did but i 0.85

00:25:14.640 They were fucking amazing. 0.90

00:25:16.180 Of course. 0.99

00:25:16.940 The zingers.

00:25:18.440 Writing more, are you?

00:25:20.760 Yeah, always on the phone.

00:25:22.220 Yeah, man.

00:25:23.080 But he's doing very well at BuzzFeed.

00:25:25.360 I don't think BuzzFeed's doing very well.

00:25:27.760 I wouldn't do well at BuzzFeed.

00:25:29.120 Certainly not the news department.

00:25:30.660 Sorry, anyone who's watching is from BuzzFeed.

00:25:32.560 You've lost your job.

00:25:34.480 We don't care.

00:25:35.560 I know what I do.

00:25:36.200 I feel your pain.

00:25:36.920 I've been there.

00:25:37.660 And what I will say is you'll be fine.

00:25:40.340 Hopefully not.

00:25:41.380 But what I would say, you know,

00:25:42.400 those articles that you did,

00:25:43.400 and they said how well or bad they did.

00:25:44.940 I don't know if they said as much as this,

00:25:48.000 but I'd highly bet that the ones that did well

00:25:51.980 were the ones who were incredibly polemic

00:25:53.800 rather than nuanced.

00:25:55.580 So it goes back to your,

00:25:56.500 why don't we write things straight? 0.99

00:25:57.680 Fucking boring, mate. 0.99

00:25:59.020 No one wants to read it. 0.99

00:26:00.360 What people want to read,

00:26:01.200 and actually I think it's unhealthy

00:26:03.000 for public discourse, for starters,

00:26:08.020 but also I think it's unhealthy for young writers

00:26:12.040 because they're told

00:26:13.320 if you write something

00:26:14.420 and when you're a kid

00:26:15.300 and you're like 18

00:26:15.980 when you're 19, 20, 21, 22, 23

00:26:17.580 you'll write anything

00:26:18.600 and because you're like

00:26:19.560 I'm going to get published

00:26:20.180 but what you don't think

00:26:21.440 is you're going to get a backlash

00:26:22.260 that's going to be there forever

00:26:23.160 you're going to get a backlash

00:26:24.460 that could haunt you

00:26:25.620 for the rest of your career

00:26:26.980 and you're told

00:26:28.620 if you don't do this thing

00:26:30.100 then it isn't going to go in

00:26:31.560 and you're not going to get paid

00:26:32.320 so you're like

00:26:32.720 okay I'll write this thing

00:26:33.600 and whether you believe it

00:26:34.240 or you don't believe it

00:26:35.100 because no one likes

00:26:36.280 balanced debate or argument

00:26:37.760 like you say

00:26:38.200 all those columnists

00:26:38.960 you're Melanie Phillips

00:26:39.620 you're David Aranovic

00:26:40.380 none of them are going

00:26:41.360 here's my thoughts

00:26:42.680 but on the other hand

00:26:43.560 that

00:26:43.840 no one does that

00:26:44.780 no one does that

00:26:45.560 of course they don't

00:26:46.140 they go this is what I believe

00:26:47.380 and this is

00:26:48.540 and this is

00:26:48.960 and this is one opinion

00:26:50.200 you know

00:26:50.620 there might be some balance in it

00:26:51.880 but not really

00:26:53.100 so

00:26:54.180 you know

00:26:55.120 I think that's a

00:26:55.720 that's a worry

00:26:56.180 well I mean

00:26:57.020 if I can take the lead

00:26:58.640 in this conversation

00:26:59.240 I think there's a real

00:27:00.360 crisis at the moment

00:27:01.720 we're heading towards

00:27:03.120 a crisis in

00:27:03.900 in journalism in Britain

00:27:05.020 the world

00:27:05.920 but I can really talk

00:27:06.940 specifically for Great Britain

00:27:08.720 because the American journalism

00:27:09.800 is a different model

00:27:11.120 to British journalism.

00:27:12.820 The Wall Street Journal, New York Times

00:27:14.700 do fantastically well

00:27:16.000 because they did a paywall.

00:27:18.360 We basically,

00:27:20.880 the newspaper industry in the UK

00:27:22.140 didn't embrace online journalism

00:27:26.640 soon enough.

00:27:27.840 So therefore,

00:27:29.000 it's hard.

00:27:30.540 They're set up.

00:27:31.960 Newspapers are set up

00:27:33.040 so you go against each other.

00:27:34.860 That's just the natural way

00:27:35.960 that they are.

00:27:36.740 They're organised.

00:27:37.400 Even internally,

00:27:38.420 in the news of the world,

00:27:39.420 news used to go up against features

00:27:40.620 all the time it was it was bonkers we'd be fighting over the same stories and outbidding

00:27:45.560 each other on the same stories and in the end they had to go you've got to stop doing that

00:27:48.040 so basically all journalism is like is set up uh it was certainly story getting you know so

00:27:54.840 breaking of stories it's like it's set up so you you're competing against everybody else right so

00:28:01.520 newspapers are by their nature not collaborative but what it required was back when the internet

00:28:06.640 was was starting was was was becoming clear unfortunately we had people at the top of

00:28:13.400 newspapers who were old and they didn't understand it and they believed that they would always be

00:28:18.880 relevant and powerful now if they've asked a few young people who are you know younger people who

00:28:23.420 actually worked in online what's the future of this what's going to be can you come and work

00:28:28.340 with us and show us what we're doing that would have been the sensible thing to do or maybe set

00:28:31.940 up a task force where they all came together but they didn't because they don't work like that

00:28:35.780 They might talk, but there's no collective movement where they go,

00:28:42.860 right, we need to do this because if we don't, it's going to lead to this.

00:28:45.420 They just went, we're going to be fine.

00:28:47.020 We're fine.

00:28:47.660 We're making money.

00:28:48.340 We're going to be fine.

00:28:49.500 And they're not fine.

00:28:50.860 And so what you've got is some have a paywall, some that don't.

00:28:54.960 I mean, they all pretty much, the Telegraph actually does,

00:28:58.260 and I think the Independent does.

00:29:00.740 Spectator does.

00:29:01.540 The Spectator, yeah, although that's not a newspaper, yeah.

00:29:03.720 but you know the sun doesn't it tried for a bit i think did it did try for a bit the news the world

00:29:09.280 tried for a bit didn't go didn't you know people weren't paying for it um the guardian doesn't

00:29:14.660 there's no across the board thing and as i said to you earlier you know once you've not paid for

00:29:18.660 something you don't want to pay for in the future it's hard to make people then then pay for that

00:29:23.360 so they're struggling to monetize it they didn't get online presences for like 10 years too late

00:29:30.040 I remember in 2008

00:29:30.960 when I was at the People

00:29:31.600 I remember my boss there

00:29:33.200 saying

00:29:33.560 I was saying

00:29:34.120 when are we going to get

00:29:34.960 a website

00:29:35.360 it's 2008

00:29:36.680 and they said

00:29:38.740 oh it's coming on

00:29:39.320 in single digit weeks

00:29:40.520 I'd left by the time

00:29:42.400 it happened

00:29:42.780 it didn't happen

00:29:43.800 and you're like

00:29:44.560 this is bonkers guys

00:29:45.780 this is so mad

00:29:47.080 so they were always

00:29:47.900 playing catch up

00:29:48.400 because they were

00:29:48.860 full of hubris

00:29:49.560 you know the bosses

00:29:50.500 there were full of hubris

00:29:51.480 they were like

00:29:52.760 we're going to be fine

00:29:54.080 we're indestructible

00:29:55.160 we're the best

00:29:55.740 well we now see

00:29:56.500 they're not

00:29:57.000 and they're dying

00:29:57.780 and they were

00:29:58.720 so they were late

00:29:59.400 to get into that point. They don't know how to monetize it. So what you're seeing is newspapers

00:30:04.380 now, they are slashing staff. They are slashing budgets. They're slashing the pagination.

00:30:10.880 Advertising has gone through the floor because people aren't really buying it anymore. The sales

00:30:14.380 are dying, but they're still struggling to monetize online. But what they want with online

00:30:18.780 is lots of stories. So basically, I used to be able to sell, when I was a freelance journalist,

00:30:22.940 I used to be able to sell stories to some of the tabloids and some pay better than others.

00:30:26.320 we don't need to say who paid best but you know i could sell a page lead for sometimes maybe 900

00:30:32.580 pounds and it wouldn't be you know wouldn't be a huge amount of work that's great you know you're

00:30:36.400 like ring them up got a story do you want it yeah right i didn't have to write it you write it and

00:30:40.200 they pay you like 900 pounds maybe for a spread you might get a couple of grand for a splash you're

00:30:45.320 gonna get up to maybe 10 000 pounds and what you're sorry just so just to be clear what you're

00:30:50.800 bringing in is the information yeah i mean sometimes i'll write it if they're busy or

00:30:54.660 whatever but i mean i did i mean the ideal situation is you get a tip and you ring out

00:30:57.880 ring someone up and you say do you want this and they go yes we do and i go can i leave it with

00:31:01.480 you and they say yes so all you do is you're passing on a bit of information and you're getting

00:31:04.620 paid you know yeah but sometimes i'll write them i tend not to have my name on them because

00:31:08.720 it you know whatever i'm i'm beyond that i don't i don't need my name on stories anymore it's

00:31:13.600 irrelevant and actually to be honest i don't really sell anymore i'll come on to that why i

00:31:16.620 So you used to be able to get that for page lead in those papers.

00:31:22.400 Now, I mean, I think there's some papers you have to get a sign-off

00:31:26.660 on anything over 100, 200 quid.

00:31:31.300 Really?

00:31:31.800 Yeah.

00:31:32.460 So, you know, if you're thinking, once upon a time,

00:31:34.260 I was able to make one storey, 900 pounds,

00:31:37.240 you know, that's a pretty decent week's wage.

00:31:39.280 You know, I mean, if you get a couple, you're laughing.

00:31:42.120 now you have to sell five or ten of those to make the money and that's in the paper alone

00:31:48.020 but they're not paying as much so it's all being done internally therefore their stories are less

00:31:53.080 good and it's just this sort of vicious cycle and it goes down and down and down um payments are

00:31:58.040 less pagination is less just down and down and down online some online places pay for a really

00:32:07.440 good story they'll pay good money but for a just a standard online story they might pay 250 300

00:32:14.160 quid so you've got to get three of those but it's harder to keep them exclusive because online

00:32:20.220 journalism it's you know everyone's you know churning out stuff finding stuff on the internet

00:32:23.980 you know churning them out it's harder to get stuff and so actually it becomes harder for

00:32:29.600 freelance journalists and agencies who have historically provided an awful lot of stories

00:32:35.500 to newspapers good quality stories it's harder for them to make a living so therefore they leave

00:32:40.480 journalism and they go into pr or whatever but a lot of them will go into pr and they're still

00:32:45.120 putting in stuff and people like the newspapers will take pr stuff because it's free but it's

00:32:51.140 not journalism is it it's pr dressed up as a journalistic story but it's but it's ultimately

00:32:56.260 pr and so therefore you're getting fewer journalists working in the industry you're getting

00:33:01.480 more PRs. So therefore, it's the rise of PR. And that I don't think is healthy for British

00:33:07.980 journalism. So if you look at local newspapers have had this over the last 20 years, whatever,

00:33:13.880 20, 30 years, totally cut to shreds, virtually don't exist. And a really good example of where

00:33:18.740 they failed was Grenfell Tower. So for ages, the locals have been saying, this is a death trap.

00:33:25.640 This place is a death trap.

00:33:27.620 And had it been 20 years ago,

00:33:30.240 there would have been local journalists on that patch

00:33:32.620 covering that story,

00:33:34.360 holding the local council's feet to the fire

00:33:37.200 and saying, this is dangerous, you need to change this.

00:33:41.180 And they might have changed it.

00:33:42.640 It didn't happen because they don't exist anymore.

00:33:44.700 If there even is a local paper,

00:33:47.360 it's one person who is just knocking out press releases.

00:33:52.460 Again, PR, knocking out PR.

00:33:54.040 or fire reports

00:33:56.060 or whatever

00:33:56.380 but they don't have time

00:33:57.540 to do any investigating

00:33:58.380 they don't have any time

00:33:59.380 to go along

00:34:00.280 to your council meetings

00:34:01.120 to go to your local

00:34:01.840 court hearings

00:34:02.560 to find out

00:34:03.880 when someone's behaving badly

00:34:05.300 and needs to be

00:34:05.840 you know

00:34:07.160 that needs to be highlighted

00:34:08.180 so that was what happened

00:34:09.700 on local papers

00:34:10.500 we're starting to

00:34:11.640 you'll start to see that

00:34:12.660 on national newspapers

00:34:13.500 and we also

00:34:14.800 we know what happened

00:34:15.440 at Grenfell

00:34:15.900 you know

00:34:16.380 dozens and dozens of people

00:34:17.640 died

00:34:18.100 in this horrific fire

00:34:20.000 and there's been inquiries

00:34:21.220 that have lasted years

00:34:21.920 people are like

00:34:22.260 why?

00:34:22.800 how did this happen?

00:34:23.520 well newspapers used to be able to help prevent these things from happening they were important

00:34:27.820 you know it was an important part of society you know an important an important piece in the jigsaw

00:34:34.540 of civil of civic society right well that doesn't exist in locals anymore and we're starting to see

00:34:39.120 it in national newspapers now people like me now i'm not saying i'm not saying me because i

00:34:43.360 generally historically i started as a news reporter but i ended up being a showbiz writer

00:34:47.800 and I've done sport, whatever.

00:34:49.900 I've never been an investigative journalist.

00:34:52.480 I do do some news stories

00:34:54.180 and some of them are valuable,

00:34:55.540 but I'm not really talking about me personally,

00:34:57.660 but I'm a good example of this.

00:34:59.120 I can no longer make a living

00:35:00.820 out of being a freelance journalist

00:35:02.920 in newspapers.

00:35:04.640 It's just not possible.

00:35:06.640 You require too many stories

00:35:08.840 for too little money.

00:35:10.540 It's just not possible.

00:35:11.240 I've got a family,

00:35:11.980 I've got a mortgage,

00:35:12.680 I've got kids.

00:35:13.320 I can't rely on selling stories.

00:35:15.860 It's happened in the last three or four years

00:35:17.340 since I went to talk sport I stopped selling stories come out the back of it and it's now

00:35:21.160 not possible the situation has changed so that means this you're going to get someone like me

00:35:26.200 leaving not investigating the stories not chasing down those leads that they get because they know

00:35:30.420 it's not worth it financially to to be able to live a life right agencies are the same they'll

00:35:36.760 have had their budget slashed because newspapers aren't paying them the same amount of money that

00:35:39.880 they used to so you've got fewer people out there on patches looking at stories you know going to

00:35:45.340 court finding out that someone's been bad or whatever and therefore what will happen is

00:35:52.480 inevitably it's happening this is a good example another guy i spoke to investigative journalist

00:35:55.960 did stuff for the times he was in his 60s so it was fine for him he was able to do these stories

00:36:01.160 but he used to do these investigative stories which were really in-depth stuff for the times

00:36:05.120 and i asked him how much you get paid for a page lead and he said 350 quid this was like four three

00:36:10.020 years ago right he's like 350 quid i was like what so you have to make at least two maybe three a

00:36:15.700 week to make this you know your weekly wage really now he probably didn't have a mortgage so he was

00:36:21.240 fine but there are younger people who who won't be able to do that so it does mean that people

00:36:26.180 aren't you know bad people are going to be able to get away with bad things on a national level now

00:36:30.480 whereas before it was it was more local and i think we're in a real we're a really worrying

00:36:35.540 point where if that function of civic society isn't functioning properly what does that lead to

00:36:42.100 that allows people to get away with bad things be it the government or you know or any of the

00:36:47.480 public bodies or the police or criminals or whatever and that that's a worry i mean that's

00:36:52.720 a real worry and i don't know how you know i can't give you an answer about what we do to improve

00:36:58.320 this situation but it's sincere we should all be seriously worried about that whether you look

00:37:03.160 Whether you think journalism and mainstream media is not doing its job or not, it did a job.

00:37:07.780 It did do a job.

00:37:08.480 It reported bad things.

00:37:09.540 It reported on bad people.

00:37:10.540 It held people to account.

00:37:11.840 It got, you know, it did a lot of that stuff.

00:37:14.540 And it's not able to do that anymore, I don't think.

00:37:16.920 Certainly not in the same way it used to.

00:37:18.160 And that should worry us all.

00:37:19.660 And do you think part of it as well is that, especially tabloid journalism, it relied on the big scoop.

00:37:23.980 Like we take the Ryan Giggs incident where, you know, he cheated.

00:37:28.520 Well, he had sex with his brother's wife and it was all covered up.

00:37:31.420 and everyone was like, who was it, blah, blah, blah. 0.94

00:37:34.340 All you need to do now is go on Twitter.

00:37:36.640 So this way of funding itself on the scoop

00:37:38.740 and all the rest of it simply doesn't exist.

00:37:41.340 Some scoops have not necessarily moved the dial financially.

00:37:44.180 I did a story on a footballer sleeping with a sex worker

00:37:49.580 and it was, I'm slightly ashamed to say,

00:37:52.120 the best story I ever did.

00:37:54.880 And it cost us like 50 grand, I think.

00:37:57.720 I don't need to say it was again, it doesn't matter.

00:37:59.540 But it cost us like 50 grand to do the whole story from start to finish,

00:38:02.780 including paying the sex worker.

00:38:05.840 Didn't do anything for the sales figures.

00:38:08.620 Nothing.

00:38:09.540 But what it did was it showed that that newspaper was a newspaper

00:38:12.460 that did deliver scoops and is worth buying.

00:38:15.300 So it was worth that money, you know, in that sort of sense.

00:38:18.180 It's sort of like a pride splash.

00:38:21.260 But there are some splashes that do move the dial.

00:38:23.260 Like I remember when they did Michael Jackson's deathbed at the News of the World.

00:38:26.560 it put on 250,000 extra readers that morning

00:38:29.780 when it was selling just around about 3 million

00:38:33.380 or just under 3 million.

00:38:34.560 It put on 250,000.

00:38:35.940 So some do move the dial.

00:38:37.840 But I speak to people who work in newspapers now

00:38:40.040 and they're not getting ringings anymore.

00:38:41.460 No one's ringing them.

00:38:42.580 They just, and I don't know why that is.

00:38:44.440 Is it because newspapers aren't trusted?

00:38:47.160 Is it because they're not really paying

00:38:49.440 the same sort of money anymore?

00:38:52.020 I think partly there's a lot of it is

00:38:53.800 is that you can't get people to do stuff with newspapers anymore

00:38:57.640 because it's a bit shameful.

00:38:59.780 The idea that someone would sell an interview to a story

00:39:03.400 is, I mean, for instance, The Sun,

00:39:08.180 a lot of celebrities do do stuff with The Sun

00:39:10.880 because they know that it has a value,

00:39:12.500 but a lot of them won't anymore for various reasons,

00:39:15.520 the many reasons that we all know about over the years

00:39:18.280 that people have had a problem with The Sun for.

00:39:20.920 They won't do it anymore.

00:39:21.840 So is it just that people don't want to deal with newspapers so much anymore?

00:39:25.860 And again, that means that those stories aren't being told.

00:39:28.400 You know, whistleblowers aren't coming.

00:39:30.140 They're not ringing up.

00:39:30.740 You know, they've seen some terrible stuff happening at a hospital that they work at.

00:39:35.740 And they're like, you know, in years gone by, they'd have rung up The Sun or one of the bigger papers.

00:39:41.100 But now they're not.

00:39:42.420 Why is that?

00:39:43.380 I don't know.

00:39:44.000 Well, yeah.

00:39:44.340 And it's interesting you mention that because we get a lot of people contacting us.

00:39:47.720 With stories?

00:39:48.400 Yeah.

00:39:48.840 Or you should bring The Sun.

00:39:49.700 because they're desperate

00:39:52.300 I mean

00:39:52.680 they're just waiting

00:39:53.180 by the phone

00:39:53.760 they're like

00:39:55.260 yes yes yes

00:39:56.380 hello

00:39:56.760 story

00:39:57.580 that'll go down

00:39:58.920 really well

00:39:59.540 with our viewers

00:40:00.160 in Liverpool

00:40:00.620 won't it

00:40:01.180 yeah yeah

00:40:01.600 we can resell our story

00:40:02.780 well you don't tell anybody

00:40:03.720 yeah

00:40:04.280 and just sell them a lead

00:40:06.740 how much do you think

00:40:08.100 part of that

00:40:09.260 undermining of trust

00:40:10.240 and I think it's such

00:40:10.960 an important point

00:40:11.700 that you made

00:40:12.360 which is that

00:40:13.540 and I've always thought

00:40:14.360 this about the mainstream media

00:40:15.440 and I criticise many aspects

00:40:16.860 of what the mainstream media

00:40:17.880 do now a lot

00:40:18.700 But I've always thought that investigative journalism was the one thing that no one else can do, right?

00:40:24.280 Francis and I aren't going to do investigative journalism.

00:40:26.940 Absolutely not.

00:40:27.680 Yeah.

00:40:28.560 You could do.

00:40:30.280 Don't do yourself down.

00:40:33.020 Do ourselves down.

00:40:34.240 I mean, you're not struggling here.

00:40:36.040 Yeah, yeah.

00:40:37.020 But you know what I mean.

00:40:38.320 So I actually have always thought that the mainstream media, newspapers and other broadcasters, et cetera,

00:40:44.820 They have a crucial function in society, which you described, which they're now less able to do.

00:40:49.800 I should say that investigative journalism is one of the things that has held up.

00:40:54.500 And, you know, some of it's not necessarily particularly being done by May.

00:40:57.280 Look at him rowing back.

00:40:58.480 But it is being done by, you know, the Times does.

00:41:02.740 The Times does stuff. You know, the BBC does stuff.

00:41:04.720 But less. Your point was it's done less, right?

00:41:07.200 So this is my point.

00:41:08.020 But I think, let me ask you this, because I think part of it may be the undermining of trust had happened with the news of the world, with the phone hacking, with the Leveson Inquirer, which unveiled quite a lot of other wrongdoing, not just phone hacking.

00:41:23.500 You know, one of my schoolteachers was, I've forgotten his name, Christopher Jeffries, right?

00:41:30.460 Oh, right, yeah.

00:41:30.980 Yeah, so he's a guy, for people who don't know, he was wrongly accused of being a murderer.

00:41:36.680 The newspapers, because it was just before Christmas, there was nothing else to write about.

00:41:39.960 So every newspaper wrote about him.

00:41:41.980 Well, he looked a bit strange.

00:41:42.960 And he looked very strange.

00:41:43.620 And that was what the headline was, I think.

00:41:44.980 It was on The Sun, wasn't it?

00:41:45.720 It was the weird world of Mr. Jeffries or something like that.

00:41:49.280 He was definitely weird.

00:41:50.400 Yeah, but I mean, that's not a crime, is it?

00:41:51.720 It's not a reason for ending up on the front page of The Sun.

00:41:53.900 Well, I think it should be prostituted. 1.00

00:41:54.980 But you know what I'm saying?

00:41:56.820 There was one thing after another where I think people felt like, oh, this is this dark, nefarious world, which I'm sure always was.

00:42:04.820 But that was never really revealed to the public in quite that way.

00:42:07.760 I think more is coming out regarding the sort of dark arts that was used on newspapers over the years.

00:42:17.960 I mean, you've seen there was a Channel 4 documentary recently that we've seen it, but Murder in the Car Park, which featured the Daniel Morgan murder.

00:42:25.220 He was a private investigator who was murdered in a car park of a pub

00:42:30.560 who was apparently just about to blow the lid on police corruption

00:42:33.700 by ringing the papers.

00:42:35.900 And his business partner has been a prime suspect for a long time

00:42:39.800 and he's stood trial and been acquitted, et cetera, et cetera.

00:42:43.240 He gave interviews as part of this documentary.

00:42:45.640 It's a brilliant documentary.

00:42:46.400 If you haven't seen it, it's fascinating.

00:42:47.920 I mean, the two main suspects are both interviewed at length throughout it,

00:42:53.000 which is just really, really interesting

00:42:55.140 just as a sort of anthropological study.

00:43:00.780 I mean, just watching it is fascinating.

00:43:02.320 But it's an interesting topic.

00:43:03.480 The UK's most investigated murder,

00:43:06.580 £30 million has been spent investigating it

00:43:08.400 and they've never convicted anybody.

00:43:10.260 And now I suspect they probably won't

00:43:11.880 because you'd need fresh evidence to do that.

00:43:13.860 And I don't think you're going to get that

00:43:14.800 from 33 years ago,

00:43:17.280 which is a crying shame because it was appalling.

00:43:19.300 But it brought up lots of police corruption and a whole range of things.

00:43:26.720 And I think that a lot of that stuff, so Jonathan Rees and Daniel Morgan,

00:43:32.620 they owned a company called Southern Investigations,

00:43:35.360 and they were one of the early adopters of dark arts on newspapers, it's alleged.

00:43:42.060 I mean, he's been done for various things.

00:43:46.160 So, I mean, you know, we're probably legally safe to say this.

00:43:48.160 to say this but you know there are receipts that exist that show that he was delivering stuff for

00:43:53.640 national newspapers uh which were questionable he was wiretapped saying you know telling a leading

00:44:00.820 reporter at the daily mirror you know what we're doing is illegal so you know this goes back to the

00:44:05.660 mid-90s and through the mid-90s and then phone hacking came to pass i mean if you want to talk

00:44:10.260 about phone hacking it's interesting i've never hacked a phone but i know how you do it um and i

00:44:15.440 think that what happened was if i mean if this is what this is my take on what happened in the news

00:44:20.200 the world um i think that there was a an ongoing budgets get cut they were still massive then but

00:44:30.440 they were being cut they weren't as massive as they were in the 90s so they're being cut

00:44:33.200 there is a um still that sort of atmosphere where you've got to deliver a story and i don't care

00:44:40.400 I don't care how you do it just do it right so that then with that combined to the shrinking

00:44:47.080 budgets once upon a time I think they probably didn't hack phones de rigueur I think they

00:44:52.540 probably used them as a last resort of standing up a story right but what they would do is they

00:44:56.620 would probably use other methods that were nefarious and then they might hack a phone at the

00:44:59.760 end and what they would do is they'd often pull a phone they'd blag a phone bill so they'd pretend

00:45:07.020 to be an employee of the phone company and say can you send me that person's bill please

00:45:10.440 and they'd send it celebrity whatever and they would see who they were calling late at night

00:45:16.140 and they would go who's that number and they turn that around and they'd be like oh look those two

00:45:21.860 celebrities are dating so then they put a watch on them because they knew that was happening so

00:45:26.320 that's illegal to do that they put a watch on them which isn't legal but you know the way they got

00:45:31.380 there was and then they might hack a phone after that to know that they've been doing messages or

00:45:36.000 whatever but then with the um budgets going down and the still that sort of like you must get the

00:45:42.320 story you must deliver regardless i think that engendered a culture whereby we you know the

00:45:49.500 most important thing is getting the story and we don't care how we haven't got huge budgets to do

00:45:53.240 these watches because they're really expensive to put a photographer on a job 24 7 for a week

00:45:58.640 that's really expensive all right well and then it started with journalists going well let's see if

00:46:04.500 we can find a story

00:46:05.460 by hacking a phone.

00:46:06.360 So that was how,

00:46:07.220 I think that's how

00:46:07.980 the journey was made

00:46:09.780 and then at that point

00:46:11.060 it became,

00:46:11.980 you know,

00:46:12.180 they started hacking,

00:46:13.540 as we know,

00:46:14.680 people close to the royalty

00:46:15.820 and that was how

00:46:16.360 the balloon went up

00:46:17.220 and, you know,

00:46:17.980 the news of the world

00:46:18.460 said one rogue reporter

00:46:19.380 which was later proven

00:46:21.180 not to be true.

00:46:23.360 And then there's a lot

00:46:24.740 coming out about it

00:46:25.680 and I think that,

00:46:27.220 I think there's more to come.

00:46:29.840 I mean,

00:46:30.060 Prince Harry at the moment

00:46:31.040 is suing

00:46:33.480 a couple of newspapers

00:46:35.520 over phone hacking

00:46:36.680 he believes he's been

00:46:37.980 surveyed his entire life

00:46:39.540 phone hacked

00:46:40.660 and

00:46:41.120 various things

00:46:43.000 Will that surprise you?

00:46:45.080 I think it's brazen

00:46:46.180 but

00:46:46.460 probably not

00:46:47.980 I mean

00:46:48.360 this is the thing

00:46:49.360 when you've been in it

00:46:50.380 so this is the thing

00:46:51.680 I never hacked a phone

00:46:52.560 but one of my

00:46:53.980 one of my best friends

00:46:55.440 at the News of the World

00:46:57.420 one of my colleagues

00:46:58.220 is sort of a mentor to me

00:46:59.420 is a guy called Dan Evans

00:47:00.240 he was the whistleblower

00:47:02.340 who moved from the Sunday Mirror

00:47:04.200 to the news of the world

00:47:04.940 and brought phone hacking with him

00:47:06.280 from there

00:47:06.620 onto the features department

00:47:07.920 and basically

00:47:09.720 my former boss there

00:47:11.480 got a suspended sentence

00:47:13.680 for conspiracy to hack phones

00:47:16.640 because of his work with Dan Evans.

00:47:18.220 So Dan,

00:47:19.380 I used to sit next to him

00:47:20.600 but I had no idea.

00:47:21.440 I had no clue this was going on.

00:47:23.020 And I remember him

00:47:23.700 sort of saying stuff to me.

00:47:24.520 He was like,

00:47:24.620 oh God, you're really good, Tom.

00:47:26.100 You're a really good reporter.

00:47:27.660 You get some great stories.

00:47:29.320 Fair play.

00:47:30.380 I'm really impressed by you.

00:47:31.560 And I was like,

00:47:31.880 you know so do you but looking back now i'm like how about he was hacking phones so actually you

00:47:38.760 know he was envious that i was able to generate some stories without hacking phones but the

00:47:44.140 pressure was on him he was brought in on the basis that he was going to do this so then he had to do

00:47:48.840 it and so it sort of enveloped his world but from knowing dan and and from reading widely around the

00:47:56.660 topic and and all that sort of thing no it doesn't surprise me really um it saddens me but it doesn't

00:48:03.740 surprise me what saddens me as well is that so you know the thing is with celebrities we sort of

00:48:09.240 you i'm not saying that hacking a celebrity is okay it's clearly patently not okay but some

00:48:16.560 people might say well they're just celebrities right the thing was they weren't just hacking

00:48:20.500 celebrities phones you know it was anyone who came into um as we as we knew mini dowler etc etc

00:48:26.500 all that sort of stuff it was anybody that came under the glare of newspapers anyone who happened

00:48:31.800 to find themselves in you know of interest in newspapers would basically have their lives

00:48:38.440 ransacked their private information ransacked phones hacked whatever and can you I mean that

00:48:44.440 must have ruined relationships it must have ruined mental health uh ruined careers lives you know 0.71

00:48:52.460 because people are going you leaked that you must have leaked that you know and what an awful thing

00:48:56.960 to have gone through and that makes me really sad that makes me sad that that that the idea

00:49:01.780 that getting the story was more important than than people's than other people's lives you know 0.99

00:49:09.260 it was like the story is king well it's bollocks isn't it and it's just fucking bollocks you know 0.97

00:49:13.860 no story i mean this is a public interest you know then i'm i'm i'm more sanguine about it 0.98

00:49:20.780 but just doing it on the basis that you want you need a story on the latest you know you need a

00:49:26.780 news line on the latest story is just awful and also what upsets me is that there are a lot of

00:49:33.280 people who were doing all this stuff who've gone on to be incredibly successful in their industry

00:49:39.200 and good people who just who who who did good quality journalism without having to ruin anyone's

00:49:45.980 life without having to turn to illegal or illicit news gathering techniques didn't and that's 0.98

00:49:54.880 bullshit you know that's that's real that's a real that's a shame and actually it comes back 0.91

00:49:59.420 to the point of why sometimes people now don't trust newspapers anymore because there are people 0.99

00:50:04.500 who are claimed to have been doing this or known to be who were still who were promoted and became

00:50:08.840 the bosses um yeah so that's that that that's slightly frustrates me but you know whatever it

00:50:15.160 is it is what it is you know they're private companies they do what they want and actually

00:50:18.480 you know what i should say as well newspapers isn't the only place that this goes ahead you

00:50:21.580 know there's all sorts of illegal activity that goes on in banking that goes on in law that goes

00:50:26.600 on in whatever but i don't work in them so you know well i don't agree with them i think it's

00:50:31.100 wrong but i don't work in those areas so i don't have the same passion or upset about that happening

00:50:37.800 that I feel happened in newspapers,

00:50:40.840 which I hold very dear to my heart, historically.

00:50:43.760 Before you jump in front very quickly,

00:50:45.460 there's also another small distinction there,

00:50:47.100 which is we don't expect the banks or lawyers

00:50:50.740 to hold the government to account

00:50:52.420 or to hold the powerful to account.

00:50:54.980 Whereas the job of journalism, for some journalism,

00:50:57.960 is to be kind of vigilant against misbehavior.

00:51:03.460 Corruption, right?

00:51:04.460 And I think that's why there's a double disappointment

00:51:07.500 sometimes with elements of journalism

00:51:09.520 where it's like not only are these people

00:51:11.520 not necessarily doing the job that we want

00:51:13.540 them to do, but they're also corrupt themselves

00:51:15.680 while they're criticizing others

00:51:17.660 I think. And also, you know, there's not many

00:51:19.580 people

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00:51:48.580 at mirvish.com who have worked in newspapers or historically who there's a sort of a bit of an

00:52:01.120 murder you know you don't criticize newspapers and i criticize them on the basis a i don't work 0.54

00:52:07.580 there anymore but but but more importantly because it's because i care you know someone

00:52:13.360 might look at this like someone i used to work with or whatever or people i still you know work

00:52:17.240 with and go oh you shouldn't be doing this you shouldn't be saying this stuff i say it because i

00:52:20.360 care i say it because because because i'm passionate about it because it's important to me that you

00:52:25.560 know because i know what newspapers can do i know the good that newspapers can do i know how

00:52:30.820 important they can be crucial in fact for a civic society as we spoke about earlier and i and i've

00:52:37.560 done things that were important i've done stories that were important i've done stories that changed

00:52:41.420 people's lives and that is the good that they can do and so to see it you know see people who

00:52:47.860 who work in it behaving that way in that way it upsets me so i say all this stuff not because i'm 0.80

00:52:53.340 bitter about newspapers it's because i give a shit because i care because it's important and 0.90

00:52:58.820 And I think that often newspapers or too often newspapers aren't fulfilling the function that they should be fulfilling. 0.97

00:53:04.940 I think the moment with phone hacking, I'll be honest with you, I don't think people care that much about celebrities.

00:53:09.820 I think there is a general attitude in the UK of like, well, you put yourself in the public eye. 0.71

00:53:13.940 Which, by the way, is wrong and that's bullshit, but I do believe that is true. 0.90

00:53:17.580 Yeah, and they feel that way. 0.93

00:53:20.200 And like you said, it's not right.

00:53:21.740 But I think the moment people got really angry about the phone hacking scandal was Millie Dowler.

00:53:25.980 where, I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, Tom,

00:53:28.900 her mobile phone was missing

00:53:30.640 and then there were messages from her parents on the phone.

00:53:34.500 I mean, her phone would have been missing

00:53:36.460 because it would have been with her.

00:53:38.320 But it was basically, the claim that The Guardian made

00:53:42.020 was that the News of the World hacked the voicemail,

00:53:48.060 which they did, but they also deleted it.

00:53:51.420 So they deleted voicemails.

00:53:53.200 and that gave the Dowler family false hope

00:53:57.180 that she was still alive

00:53:58.380 because it was like,

00:53:59.420 oh, she's listened to her messages.

00:54:01.920 But she hadn't.

00:54:03.300 They were wrong.

00:54:04.080 That was what shut the news of the world, by the way.

00:54:05.760 That claim, that one claim,

00:54:07.560 was ultimately the straw that broke the camel's back.

00:54:11.000 Rupert Murdoch might have closed it eventually.

00:54:12.300 He might have closed it.

00:54:12.920 It might have been something else.

00:54:13.680 If it wasn't that, it would have been something else.

00:54:14.620 But they were wrong in that.

00:54:15.720 The Guardian were mistaken in that.

00:54:18.540 They got that wrong.

00:54:21.000 Do voicemails delete themselves automatically?

00:54:23.200 after a certain amount of time,

00:54:24.440 and that's what had actually happened.

00:54:26.720 But The Guardian ran this,

00:54:28.320 and I actually went on TV afterwards

00:54:30.120 defending this and saying,

00:54:31.960 actually, you know what?

00:54:33.340 The Guardian are saying all this stuff,

00:54:35.740 and they're holding themselves up

00:54:37.460 as a sort of...

00:54:41.000 Paragon of virtue.

00:54:43.140 It's not like The Guardian is.

00:54:44.560 But they're saying...

00:54:46.680 Look, if you're going to criticise,

00:54:48.900 you need to make sure that you're right.

00:54:51.240 If you're going to criticise ethics

00:54:52.940 in journalism you need to make sure that your stories are right and it wasn't right and i went

00:54:56.200 on and i said actually i think that that was the moment so for me when the news the world shut

00:55:00.120 i i remember ah so the week that it happened the week the news the world shut um that story broke

00:55:08.860 and people i was always you know do showbiz interviews and they started dropping out they

00:55:15.240 were like i don't want to do anything with the news world i was like i don't know i'm going to

00:55:18.680 do my job here i was getting loads of grief on twitter for you know being scum news the world

00:55:23.520 journalist but there was a diktat that we weren't able to send in or rather we weren't getting any

00:55:28.180 guidance over what we could say so i was just people were just attacking me on twitter and i

00:55:32.020 couldn't defend myself and it's weird to just go oh you know something else and ignore all that

00:55:36.820 stuff because so i just withdrew i also boycotted the office uh along with one of my other colleagues

00:55:43.660 because I wanted to send a message out

00:55:45.680 as one of the more senior reporters

00:55:47.960 at the News of the World,

00:55:49.380 the TV editor.

00:55:50.240 I was like,

00:55:51.040 you need to tell us what's going on.

00:55:52.880 You need to give us some guidance

00:55:53.940 because this is unacceptable.

00:55:55.140 What has happened here is unacceptable

00:55:56.480 and we're just being left to hang.

00:56:00.440 And then,

00:56:02.000 and it was that.

00:56:02.820 It was the mini-douder piece.

00:56:03.980 And I remember ringing my dad

00:56:05.120 who never really liked the fact

00:56:07.080 I worked for the News of the World,

00:56:09.540 for Rupert Murdoch.

00:56:09.920 He was proud that I was there

00:56:10.980 but he didn't

00:56:12.540 he didn't like it

00:56:13.700 I ring him

00:56:14.700 and I was in tears

00:56:15.600 I was like

00:56:15.900 I've got to leave this paper

00:56:17.040 I can't

00:56:17.940 as a

00:56:19.340 just as a

00:56:20.040 personal

00:56:21.060 thing

00:56:23.040 I can't

00:56:24.460 stay at a newspaper

00:56:25.320 that has

00:56:26.080 that has paid

00:56:28.020 someone else

00:56:29.620 to do this

00:56:30.400 and made the

00:56:30.860 you know

00:56:31.320 potentially impacted

00:56:33.000 in a criminal investigation

00:56:33.760 but also

00:56:34.460 that has done this

00:56:35.820 to those poor parents

00:56:36.520 I've got to leave

00:56:37.480 so I boycotted the office

00:56:38.800 and

00:56:39.460 so yeah

00:56:40.920 For it to not be true.

00:56:45.060 But you know what?

00:56:45.860 They did hack her voicemail.

00:56:48.400 Yeah.

00:56:48.680 So, you know, it's sort of semantics, really.

00:56:51.780 It's unforgivable.

00:56:52.520 I mean, it's indefensible, unforgivable, and all the rest of it.

00:56:55.300 But, Tom, it's been a pleasure chatting with you, man.

00:56:57.260 Really fascinating stuff.

00:56:58.700 And I think it gives a context to a lot of the stuff that people feel

00:57:02.320 when they look at newspapers, when they look at their TV screens,

00:57:05.180 when they look at broadcasting.

00:57:06.980 And they feel certain things, but they don't necessarily know why.

00:57:10.140 And I think the point you made particularly about the fact that it's becoming harder and harder to hold people to account for things that are going wrong, I think that's so true.

00:57:20.260 Well, the government, right, would have fallen.

00:57:22.440 In normal times, the government would have fallen again and again and again.

00:57:26.120 There would have been resignations all over the place if they still had that power.

00:57:31.820 But I don't think they do.

00:57:33.760 They have some power.

00:57:35.420 They have the ability to, I mean, even EU stuff.

00:57:39.860 they exert a lot of power over that

00:57:41.800 but I don't know

00:57:42.340 did they lead people to that

00:57:44.180 or did they reflect people's view on that

00:57:47.140 but yeah

00:57:47.780 the nuclear government

00:57:48.560 and the way they're behaving at the moment

00:57:49.760 there are plenty of opportunities

00:57:52.800 where there would have been people

00:57:53.560 who would have resigned in normal situation

00:57:54.880 10-15 years ago

00:57:56.800 but they're not now

00:57:57.880 is that to do with the media?

00:57:59.260 I don't know

00:57:59.480 possibly

00:58:00.160 people aren't

00:58:01.300 they're not as powerful

00:58:01.960 people are getting their news from elsewhere

00:58:04.120 social media etc

00:58:05.100 I don't know

00:58:05.640 Brilliant

00:58:07.100 and like I said

00:58:08.360 great interview

00:58:09.100 And the last question we always ask is,

00:58:11.020 what's the one thing that we're not talking about as a society

00:58:13.440 that we really should be?

00:58:14.700 Well, I don't think we're talking about this enough, actually.

00:58:16.960 You know, I sort of...

00:58:18.780 You said I was going to get asked this question at the end,

00:58:21.240 and I didn't have an answer, but actually I'm talking about it.

00:58:23.460 I think this is important.

00:58:24.600 This is something that we should be talking about.

00:58:26.680 I'm sick of people actually saying that journalism is, you know, is...

00:58:34.100 The MSN is this or it's that.

00:58:37.640 it's like it look it's just part of a wider media and it all has its value and it all has its merits

00:58:43.140 and i think that we need to talk about this more and we need to work out how we're going to fund

00:58:48.020 this because at the moment it isn't going to fund itself so if you want if you want a free and fair

00:58:55.960 media then you will need someone you need something to fund it you know like and otherwise

00:59:03.180 it's going to be someone that you might not like the politics of or someone that you think might

00:59:07.900 not be doing it for the right reasons you know rather than just being campaigning journalism

00:59:13.540 or you know or exposing journalism i think that's what we need to talk about where's the money

00:59:17.720 coming from for journalism in this country how are we going to get over this and what we're going to

00:59:21.960 do because if we don't the results are going to be incredibly worrying i don't know where it goes

00:59:28.220 I honestly don't know

00:59:28.960 where it goes

00:59:29.420 but it doesn't

00:59:30.940 seem positive

00:59:31.760 I don't see a positive

00:59:33.000 outcome to it

00:59:33.700 well on that cheery note

00:59:34.880 we're going to wrap up

00:59:38.060 Tom thank you so much

00:59:39.180 for coming on

00:59:39.660 have you been chased

00:59:40.720 off Twitter

00:59:41.340 by those mobs

00:59:42.560 or are you still on there

00:59:43.300 I'm still on there

00:59:45.200 but a little bit

00:59:46.300 I can't be bothered

00:59:47.500 to be honest

00:59:48.020 when I was presenting

00:59:48.840 on TalkSport

00:59:49.500 I would just get 1.00

00:59:51.840 so much shit 1.00

00:59:53.060 yeah we both 1.00

00:59:55.140 just like our football fans

00:59:57.180 I'm like, guys, I'm only pretending to care.

01:00:00.500 I don't care.

01:00:01.380 I don't care.

01:00:01.940 I remember Tom and I used to co-host with you on the overnights.

01:00:06.560 I remember because I said I voted Remain.

01:00:08.640 I think someone called me, what is it?

01:00:10.880 A pro-Remain pedo-apologist or something.

01:00:13.600 Yeah, something like that.

01:00:14.180 Yeah, I get a lot of that stuff.

01:00:15.840 I mean, they nailed it.

01:00:16.660 I got one person texted me once to say,

01:00:19.440 your brother's a much better broadcaster than you.

01:00:24.180 Which I thought was lovely.

01:00:25.340 I was like, well, that's cost you 50p.

01:00:26.620 So, you know, you obviously cared enough to message me.

01:00:30.020 So I am on Twitter, but I won't bother giving you my handle.

01:00:34.020 All right, don't follow him. 0.99

01:00:35.000 Don't send him any shit. 0.99

01:00:36.020 And I'm sorry that someone called you a pro-remain. 0.99

01:00:38.080 But if you do want to follow anything, so Raw, R-O-A-R,

01:00:44.680 the 90s rave podcast, if you've got even a vague interest in,

01:00:48.600 you don't have to be into rave music in the 90s.

01:00:50.540 If you're into dance music, if you're into culture and British society

01:00:53.640 in the 90s, there will be something in it for you.

01:00:56.280 and I'm hopeful

01:00:56.980 it's going to be journalistic

01:00:58.060 there's going to be

01:00:58.540 loads of interesting stories

01:00:59.400 it's not all just going to be

01:01:00.200 about rave stuff

01:01:01.060 so that's my new project

01:01:02.280 if anyone wants to

01:01:03.180 you know we're on Facebook

01:01:04.220 Twitter

01:01:04.600 Instagram

01:01:05.480 by the time this is out

01:01:07.380 I think the website

01:01:08.140 will be live

01:01:08.700 so it's Raw

01:01:09.480 the 90s rave podcast

01:01:11.300 it looks great man

01:01:12.140 you showed us a few pictures

01:01:13.040 before we started

01:01:13.700 it looks really cool

01:01:14.440 yeah we'll see

01:01:15.060 I mean it's whether

01:01:15.620 I can monetise it

01:01:16.400 if I can come anything

01:01:17.580 close to you guys

01:01:18.720 then you know

01:01:19.840 I'll be a happy man

01:01:20.960 you're doing very well

01:01:21.560 yeah it might take a few years

01:01:22.440 no man it'll be great

01:01:24.300 well I'll have run out

01:01:24.900 of subjects

01:01:25.320 it's only limited to be honest

01:01:27.580 but yeah thanks very much for coming on

01:01:29.500 we'll make sure to put all that stuff in the description

01:01:31.700 I really appreciate your time thanks man

01:01:33.440 cheers Tom

01:01:34.120 and we'll see you very soon with another brilliant episode

01:01:36.500 or catch us on the live stream

01:01:37.940 absolutely take care and see you soon guys

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01:02:25.320 You

TRIGGERnometry - August 19, 2020

＂Journalism Is in Crisis＂ - Tom Latchem

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