Adebayor's started so well for Man City
Interrupting one interview for another..
Mickey's complained about the bit of the show on Friday when I asked the Lancashire Police Officer who'd investigated the murder of Sophie Lancaster, if he would be comfortable with pausing while I interviewed the Brirtish Airways Chief Exec Willie Walsh about the chaos at Heathrow...Says Mickey, "So in order of importance a little bit of inconvenience in London is deemed more important that youths kicking a girl to death on the streets of Britain - always nice to have 5Lives priorities confirmed".
This is what happened: we knew from 9.45am onwards that "at some point in the next half hour" we were going to get an i/v with Mr Walsh. We were told that when Mr Walsh arrived at the microphone point it was a case of "use him or lose him" - that is, we do the interview immediately or we don't and he goes off to be interviewed by the dozens of radio/ TV stations and newspapers who also wanted to speak to him. Before I began the i/v with the police superintendant at five past ten, our output editor asked if he would mind us breaking off for a few minutes if we needed to cross back to the Heathrow. D.S. Gradwell very kindly made it clear he was happy with that.
Three quarters of the way through my conversation wtih Mr Gradwell I was told Willie Walsh was now available to do his Five Live i/v. I checked with Mr Gradwell again on air if he would be comfortable with that and he said he was.
Now, I know some think we shouldn't have done that, and maybe we made the wrong call - after all as you know we don't always get it right; but we felt that the alternative of not having any i/v with Walsh was the least acceptable option, which is why we did what we did.
I quite possibly wrote that post when i was still incensed at the way the court case, much more important than Terminal 5 IMO which as various of your contributors said was a pain but hardly life changing, was reported .
Of course my original post does contain a certain amount of facetiosness for which i apologise but the point i was making is that the blanket coverage of T5 on the beeb (and to be fair other outlets) amply shows the metrocentric bias of the beeb.
Whilst acknowledging that T5 is important is it really THAT important it is after all is said and done just another building , for example Doncaster opened a WHOLE Airport in 2005 i can't remember it getting a mention on the national networks.
When placed against the backdrop of continuing war in Iraq and Afghanistan, Genocide in Darfur , The abominable treatment of Tibetan dissadents in China and Tibet and the case that i highlighted in my original post is a badly run Airport Building really worth the hours spent covering it.
I can understand having to occasionally break from an interview in order to cover another story.
However, sometimes it is irritating when what is being postponed is highly interesting only to be replaced by something that can clearly wait with these things almost invariably involving London.
Why not tape the latter interview and broadcast it at a more suitable time, like five minutes later.
Hi Jim
It's a reasonable idea sometimes, but on this occasion how cld the WW i/v be recorded for use later? He was ready to go THEN, and only then.
Thks
Victoria
I understand the position Victoria. I think the point Jim is making is whether it was necessary for you personally to do the interview with Willie Walsh??
Couldn't another reporter at 5Live have interviewed Mr Walsh whilst you continued your discussion with D.S. Gradwell??
Result? You don't need to interrupt an piece on a sensitive issue and 5Live still gets its chat with the man of the moment.
Also, how necessary for every outlet of the ´óÏó´«Ã½ to have its own interview?? I’m sure Mr Walsh must’ve been interviewed by Radio 4 or News 24 that morning. Couldn’t 5Live have used one of those? Surely you'd all be asking him pretty much the same questions?