and finally...


Missing Mandelson and a load of other scoops


There’s a story to be found wherever you go. So why do I overlook so many? asks Chris Proctor


“And last Sunday,” I complained, E


arly this year, I was on a train from Leeds with my friend David Felton. David is a news man through and


through – one of those who trod the path from local to national papers, and his career culminated with the role of news editor. Our different outlooks – I was more PR and features – became vividly apparent as we chatted. I was moaning about how lazy it was


for early morning news programmes – especially the Today programme – to constantly call in completely irrelevant has-beens to comment on the day’s events. “They might as well call it Yesterday,”


I grumbled. It seemed that most mornings of the


Corbyn era featured some footnote from the Blair government bleating on about how different it was in their day, which is frankly unsurprising given that their tenure was in a pre-decimal age. You had to get out a history book to find out who they were, even if they had been anybody then. “What are they on the news for?”


I demanded. David raised his eyebrows. It was


obvious to him. They were engaged to air the criticisms that current politicians would like to make but the timing was inconvenient. No one wants to be seen to be disloyal to the leader: much better to get someone else to do it for them. Everyone from Jack Straw to Neil Kinnock was cabbed in to say what they would do if they were in government, rather overlooking the fact that, even when they were, they didn’t.


“they had Mandelson on the Sunday telly show. Mandelson! I mean, if you want a definition of ‘yesterday’s man’ you need look no further. He’s been sacked more often than a football manager, and now added US ambassador to his list of places he’s been given the pokey. He’s a nobody. Why doesn’t anyone want to interview him?” David’s eyes widened. “Because he’s


news,” he told me. In David’s newshound approach to life, you couldn’t go wrong with Mandy. “He’ll either make himself look


shifty, make someone else look awful or come up with some terrible indiscretion,” he told me. “I’d have him on every day.” “Nonsense,” I told him. “He’s chip paper. You’ll never hear of Mandelson again.” In this matter I concede I was not


entirely accurate. The attentive will have noticed his name has cropped up in the ensuing six months. Mind you, I should have reconciled


myself to the fact that my mind didn’t fit a news desk some years ago when I was in Brighton at a TUC conference. I’d been working like a fish and felt in need of a break and a breath of fresh air so, after lunch, I skipped the guest speaker in favour of pottering off to the pier with a lady friend. I hasten to add that this was a long-standing relationship, not someone I had met between motions. I try to steer clear of clichés in life as in writing, avoiding them like the plague. The pier was pleasantly empty; even the dodgems were queue free. We took in the sea air and the waltzers before ambling back toward the centre – where we were faced with a deluge of


“ ”


delegates scuttling away from the hall and marching towards us like an invasion force. Even I realised something was up. I had missed the prime minister announcing that the United States had been attacked more shockingly than at any time in its history. A world- changing atrocity had taken place and I was the last person in the county to find out. I was licking an ice-cream while the Twin Towers collapsed. Rather less dramatically, I was once


invited to a press gallery lunch which was addressed by the chief of the defence staff, Baron Stirrup, who I regretted, as an airman, had no cavalry background.


All I recall of his address was his


frightening clipped precision, and the way he dealt with questions. He snapped out answers like they’d been posted in advance and he’d practised them in front of a mirror for a month. I was fascinated, but also thought it


A world-changing atrocity had taken place and I was the last to find out. I was licking an ice-cream while the Twin Towers collapsed


was easier to find an unfinished bottle of wine than a line of copy. Not so the correspondents, who were buzzing. I’d missed all kinds of references to budget cuts, service pensions and military housing. I’d heard the mentions but missed the stories. I consoled myself by thinking it wasn’t my field. But then, did I have a field? If only I’d listened at the National Trust open day.


All this is rather disturbing. It sounds


like the CV of a journalist who is desperate not to be employed. But it all reminds me of advice I was


given when I ushered myself into the business of writing: there is a story everywhere you go: and there is an interesting tale to be told by everyone you meet. I still believe that implicitly. But it does worry me how many corking scoops I’ve missed on the road.


theJournalist |23


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