Articles

Operation Bullfinch: how to handle a tricky story

Publication date: 
April 2012

Regular reporting is tough enough to get right – but when you’re covering a crime story involving the sex trafficking of underage girls, it’s a legal and ethical minefield. And that’s before you think about how to handle your relationship with the police. But when the Oxford Mail newsdesk found out about Operation Bullfinch, the police investigation into an Oxford child prostitution ring, reporters rose to the challenge.

Cutting carbon begins at home

Publication date: 
May 2011

The current government promised to be the “greenest government ever”, but the UK’s carbon emissions are still too high, risking catastrophic climate change. However, many people don’t realise that 80% of emissions are as a result of local activity. We talk a lot about government action, but it’s time to bring the discussion closer to home.

Trouble in the hub

Subject: 
Why Newsquest’s “regional operation” could mean big job losses
Publication date: 
February 2011

Sub-editing jobs at the Oxford Mail and Times are under threat from plans to centralise. Subs were recently told of plans to create a “regional editorial production operation”, combining the subbing departments for for Newsquest Oxfordshire and Newsquest Wiltshire. The new regional operation would be based in Oxford.

The good news station

“I liked The Stig. He came round my house, he had drinks... and all the time he was writing a book.” For the first time since “Stig-Gate” unfolded, Jeremy Clarkson publicly shared his feelings of betrayal. But the interview wasn’t with a national paper or broadcaster. He was talking to Witney TV, an online news station that didn’t exist six months ago.

NUJ ADM: a first-time delegate's view

Publication date: 
December 2009

Written for the December issue of the Oxford & District Branch NUJ newsletter.

When I set off for this year’s ADM, I had a jumble of different worries in my head. Would people be unfriendly to me as a newbie? Would it be a world of Machiavellian backstabbing, or a snooze-inducing bureaucratic slog? Would I have to actually stand up and speak?