Posts Tagged "Journalism"

A short history of Modern Journalism

Some of my friends want to become journalists but I can’t think of a more depressing, meaningless and soul-crushing profession. Bear in mind that I work in politics.

A lot of the journalistic types go into the profession hoping to pose though questions, expose stories and fight corruption but before they know it, they’re speculating about whether Jordan is getting divorced from some bloke.

So here is a gripping illustration of journalism:

Before:

After:

MPs with second jobs are second rate

It is assumed that being a British Member of Parliament is a full time job. One of the reforms being discussed is to regulate and discourage MPs from moonlighting and doing work on the side.

Constituency work, parliamentary business and party roles should add up to enough that an MP is delighted to find a weekend off in between the extra voluntary yet obligatory activities like leafleting and event-attending (less fun than you might think!).

With a salary of about £60,000 and an expenses account on top of that, money should not really be an issue; after all, people don’t go into politics for the money, do they? A significant amount of the Tory party, let alone the Shadow Cabinet, are already millionaires (Osborne!), so there can be no financial necessity like for that of a student who has to spend their weekends working in a café just to be able to survive.

However, if they pay the proper taxes, they should be able to spend their free time as they wish. A particularly energetic MP who can get through all the casework, visit the local university club and turn up to vote whenever required has the right to spend the time left over working elsewhere. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, but being a dull boy can be quite an advantage in Parliament (Again, Osborne!)

The main argument for keeping second jobs is that it gets politicians to connect with the public, and it gives them some knowledge of “a proper job” and how the world works beyond the Westminster bubble made up increasingly of young career politicians coming straight out of Oxbridge.

It’s a compelling point, were it not for the fact that most (though not all) MPs with second jobs are Tories with directorships and consultancies. Don’t expect your MP to knock on the door with a sponge offering to give your car a wash. This is not restricted to Parliament either; the Mayor of London is regularly under fire for the very expensive articles he writes for the Telegraph each week.

Technically, if being an MP is considered a full time job, then being a minister is a second job on top of it. In practice, a minister is required to spend less time doing backbencher activities like committees and Westminster Hall debates. In principle, if second jobs are prohibited, then it follows logically that when an MP is chosen to become a Minister he will have to step down and trigger a by-election.

This leads us to my next post about “unelected” ministers, and how the situation is a lot worse in French politics!

Hadleigh Roberts, as featured in "Nice-Matin" newspaper

Less than a month in France and I have already been making news! Today I was featured in the local newspaper, Nice-Matin, on page 4.

See below the article and below that, my translation:

Un jeune travailliste au stage au PS

La fédération socialiste des A.-M. accueille, pour un stage de six mois, Hadleigh, un jeune Anglais responsable des étudiants travaillistes dans la ville de Bath. << Il arrive avec des méthodes de communication nouvelles, développées par Tony Blair >>, explique Xavier Garcia, port-parole du PS 06 et auteur d’une thèse sur le parti travailliste. A son retour au pays, Hadleigh pourra peut-être donner un coup de main à Gordon Brown dont la cote de popularité est au plus bas.

A Labour student joins the PS

The Socialist Federation of the Alpes-Maritimes welcomes, for a placement of six months, Hadleigh, an English student responsible from Labour students in the city of Bath. “He arrives with new methods of communication, developped by Tony Blair”, explains Xavier Garcia, spokesman for the Parti Socialiste and author of a thesis on the Labour Party. At his return to the country, Hadleigh will perhaps be able to give Gordon Brown, whose popularity ratings are at their lowest, a push in the right direction.

David Miliband and Michael Jackson, Tweet Tweet

You will have already heard the news of Michael Jackson’s death from sources other than myself. I had hoped to refrain from commenting as there won’t be any news in the story for a few weeks, though likewise there won’t be any other stories in the news.

Already in the top Guardian stories:

• Michael Jackson has died
• Police focus on doctor who was with Michael Jackson as he died
• Michael Jackson death: painkillers may have been factor

What did catch my eye though, was a statement from Twitter:

Immediately, there was an outcry on the Internet. “Why is Miliband commenting?” “Degradation of politics!” “As bad as Brown calling Susan Boyle!”

Calm down dear, it’s a hoax. The “real” Foreign Secretary later posted this on his blog:

The death of Michael Jackson is very sad news for his family, friends and fans.  My thoughts are with his family at this time.

But the instant Twitter put out in my name last night was not me.

Admittedly, this probably earned a great deal many more hits than his regular blog posts.

Really though, it goes to show how desperate the media is for any scraps of news on this pretty empty story (empty of details, not of significance, I hasten to add.) The press was all too keen to run with the story, not realising it was a joke until the Foreign Secretary’s next tweet:

CNN has basically become an mj-only version of mtv!

This is why I am glad it’s a hoax, for I don’t want the Foreign Secretary A) to get his news from CNN and B) to have any idea what MTV is.

Another non-story then, though still people persit with inane show-off comments on DM’s blog.

S0 what better excuse to add this little piece of self-promotion?

The Silly Season

Summer is often mistakenly regarded as the best season of the year; the weather is supposed to be better, the days are longer and most people are on holiday. By most people’s standards summer is an easy time to relax. Not for the media.

Journalists frequently describe summer as “the silly season” due to the farcical nature of attention grabbing headlines designed to generate sales when there is no real news, just like when Channel 4 broadcasts Big Brother when they run out of real programs.

Although the term implies that the stories themselves are silly, I think it applies equally to journalists who report them. Without being able to speculate whether the Prime Minister’s new tie is a device to change his image, or being able to expose a Conservative politician’s hypocritical bedroom habits, journalists are the people who really suffer, in the same way students feel when they are told that there is an essay due in a week’s time but have no idea how to approach the question.

This year seems to have been a very quiet season, even for summer. We’ve heard about a shark in Cornwall that turned out not to be a shark (I think it was a catfish?*) and that there has been a book published about how boring British tourist destinations are as well as a story that claims that over half of the cats and dogs in Britain are overweight. You’ll notice they are domestic stories, because for some reason nobody looks across the sea (must be all those Cornish sharks) and as such, I can’t tell you whether the entire world stops because the UK Parliament is in recess (unlikely) or that foreign affairs don’t sell papers.

There are a few stories that can be relied upon each year; it’s entertaining to discuss the political ramifications of a politician’s holiday. Gordon Brown, who usually stays in Cape Cod, USA, decided to stay in Dorset, UK, this year. I’ve never been to Dorset, but I have been to Cape Cod, and yet I have a strong feeling which place he will enjoy the most. I’ll give you a clue: Dorset is on the coast of Britain and as such claims to be a beach instead of a glorified rockery. Président Sarkozy has been the first French statesmen to holiday in the USA in years, and he clearly wants to repair the Frenco-American relationship, which has suffered a series of diplomatic incidents; from Charles de Gaulle’s withdrawal of French troops from NATO in 1966 to Chirac’s non to the Iraq invasion in 2003.
The one debate that emerges every year is the response to exam results; the statistics will climb and so will arguments. The education system is tailored to suit the needs of everyone apart from the people being educated by it, but that’s another story altogether.

*Since this article was written, I have been informed that the shark was indeed a shark, however the photograph was taken on the coast of South Africa, rather than England.]