Quote

I'm not certain that the BBC can claim to be making a wide enough range of distinctive programmes to make the case convincingly.

Television has created a nation of news junkies who tune in every night to get their fix on the world.

You know it's always amazed me - I think the most startling thing that's happened in the last couple of decades is that there is no sort of objective reporting anymore.

In the United States, the mainstream news outlets like to portray themselves as observers, content to let events play out without interference. But in Britain, where crusading journalistic campaigns are part of the tradition, it is far more acceptable for reporters to become active participants, with a specific outcome in mind.

The BBC fulfils a wonderful cultural function. Maybe the problem is that it feels it needs to be everything to everybody.

I don't know how much you follow current events. For some, there's not enough time to keep up on what's happening; for others, the news is too depressing, and peering too deeply fills one with boiling frustration all too quickly.

We journalists are a bit like vultures, feasting on war, scandal and disaster. Turn on the news, and you see Syrian refugees, Volkswagen corruption, dysfunctional government. Yet that reflects a selection bias in how we report the news: We cover planes that crash, not planes that take off.

I often get letters, quite frequently, from people who say how they like the programmes a lot, but I never give credit to the almighty power that created nature.

With news, especially investigative pieces, you've got to be really smart and really lucky to be timely and to not get beaten by the big guys. You can't go head-to-head with the networks.