- Kevin Bakhurst
- 10 May 07, 04:48 PM
There's no doubt in a week of major news stories, that Madeleine McCann has captured the thoughts and hopes of the British public and there's a real desire for the latest updates. I thought it may be interesting and useful for the audience to have an insight into the decisions on coverage and the arrangements on the ground.
News 24's Jane Hill has been in the Algarve since Saturday morning as part of a sizeable 91热爆 team and we have strived to try to get the tone right as well as the amount of coverage. Both in the Algarve and here in the UK, we have liaised closely with Madeleine's family and the British authorities on the wishes of the family and the facts and tone of the reporting. Early on, both ITV and Sky joined an informal pool operation in the Algarve around the family where we only showed Madeleine's parents and family by consent so as to try to avoid intrusion. The 91热爆 helped to organise the televised statement by Mrs McCann which was pooled to British and Portuguese TV stations. Even in these difficult circumstances, the McCann's know that publicity for Madeleine is important as the search goes on.
We have called Madeleine by her full name (not Maddy), at the request of the family because it is what they call her. We passed on the accurate details of Madeleine's pyjamas, at the family's request, correcting the police's initial description. For several days there were many developments that we reported as they unfolded and large audiences watched News 24 over the Bank Holiday weekend, concerned for Madeleine. For the last couple of days, there have been fewer concrete developments (at time of writing) and the temptation for some seems to have been to report unsubstantiated rumours of which there are many to try to keep the story going - particularly when there is self-evidently high audience interest in the story itself. We have looked into many of these rumours on the ground and that is all they have so far turned out to be.
We all sincerely hope that there is a positive outcome for Madeleine and the McCanns and we will continue to try to provide the high volume of coverage and updates that the audience obviously wants, whilst respecting the family's privacy and needs and whilst striving to separate real developments from rumours.
Kevin Bakhurst is controller of 91热爆 News
- Colin Hancock
- 10 May 07, 04:34 PM
Well, that's what the audience was telling Five Live...
...over on Radio Four we got a few more of the "why are you doing this" style of email (sample: "Tony Blair is NOT DEAD. Please spare us the endless obituaries. Today's programme has been totally dominated - we're NOT INTERESTED, & I suspect many share my opinion. Please do not pander to this man's search for a legacy, & especially do not carry on this for the next 6 weeks").
Well I can assure listeners about the last point - even we have a boredom threshold and I'm pretty close to reaching mine.
However, I still think it was right to take the opportunity today to assess the record... and although other listeners have a visceral hatred of Alastair Campbell, I thought the discussion with him, William Hague and Charles Kennedy was pretty interesting stuff (you can listen to the whole programme 
here). Martha secured us the exclusive, and first, interview with Blair's confidante Sally Morgan and I enjoyed Nick Robinson's account of the Blair speech and his final essay.
Despite the advance notice it was still a hectic morning all round, especially at College Green at the heart of the circus. We tried to make room to stand back and assess the past ten years - maybe you thought we did so too much.
Of course there's now a danger we'll go overboard on the Brown succession. We'll try to avoid that, but I'd be interested to know what it is about him and his likely Government you feel merits airtime.
In the meantime, to the man who found this lunchtime's Scarlatti concerto on R3 more diverting, I'm sorry.
Colin Hancock edits The World at One and The World This Weekend
- Richard Jackson
- 10 May 07, 11:49 AM
At 06:05 this morning, the following text message dropped into the Breakfast inbox.
"I am getting fed up hearing about Tony Blair - change your record. Robert in Cheltenham"
This was not what we wanted to hear. We'd only been on air five minutes. We'd barely mentioned his name.
And we had already got extensive plans for the Five Live Breakfast programme - to reflect on the impending departure of Tony Blair. We wanted to hear from listeners - telling us what they would remember about the soon-to-be ex-PM. But, if Robert in Cheltenham was typical, we could be swimming against the tide.
Fortunately, Robert turned out to be a fairly solitary voice. Plenty of other people wanted to have their say about Tony Blair. The critics were out in force, The same words kept cropping up - spin, Iraq, lies, illegal war, pensions. But there were others who wanted to praise Blair too - for example Valarie in Essex...
Thanks Tony Blair for saving our NHS and hence saving the life of my lovely Granddaughter and Thank you also for saving my life and for the wonderful treatment I received for Breast Cancer, I could not have got better if I had gone private.
And so, hour after hour, the reaction continued to pour in. Even though Mr Blair was not leaving his job straight away, but merely telling the world his intentions, people were armed and ready with the opinions of 10 years under Labour.
It was meaty stuff - there were allegations of broken promises, claims of a new dawn for the NHS, complaints about education standards, celebrations of investments in new buildings.
But when it comes to interaction people like nothing more than a gag. And as John Pienaar stood outside Downing Street telling us about the arrivals of cabinet colleagues for a moment of history, someone was spotted carrying a guitar case into Number 10.
Oh no. He's not going to sing is he? No sooner had the idea been given the briefest of airings, than we were inundated again - this time with the titles of the songs Tony might sing to his chums after he bade them farewell. No more mr nice guy... Tears of a clown... you get the idea.
And then the tone changed again. William Hague - a man who once had his own ambitions to be PM - said there should now be a general election. It should be down to the people not the Labour party to decide who should run the country. This even before Mr Blair had spoken publicly about his plans.
And so a text vote started on Five Live... and within minutes hundreds of people had voted. Eighty percent (in an unscientific straw poll) said yes - there should be an election.
Richard Jackson is editor of Five Live Breakfast
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