On Friday (25 February 2022), Detective Constable Darren Sutton cut an uncomfortable figure in the witness box at the Old Bailey. Little wonder. At the behest of his employer, West Midlands Police (WMP), he was attempting to undermine a journalist’s imperative undertaking …
I was sceptical that a gathering over video could replicate an actual trades union conference. How happy I was then, to find my fears misplaced. A version of what follows appeared in the June 2021 edition of NUJ Informed. The …
Review of David King Designer Activist Visual Historian, by Rick Poynor Like many1970s teenagers, a postal order dispatched to Finsbury Park, London initiated my engagement with politics. I received by return several sheets of lapel stickers, a poster and some …
I danced a jig when Sir Harry Evans (who died in September 2020) responded to my speculative email. Anticipating little chance of acknowledgement, I nonetheless agonised over how best to address a Knight. Formalities, it turned out, were needless. “I …
I observed Julian Assange’s extradition hearings in February and September 2020 on behalf of the International Federation of Journalists and the National Union of Journalists. I was also the only reporter whose daily coverage of the court case appeared in …
Saved by suicide – Assange, self harm and free speech Read more »
Julian Assange’s extradition hearing took its last evidence at the Old Bailey, London yesterday. Closing submissions will be made in writing and Judge Baraitser’s ruling will be handed down on 4 January at The Old Bailey. Until 23 May 2019 …
Unfettered reporting threatened – what Assange extradition hearings reveal Read more »
In the rat-infested basement of The Public Benefit Boot Company in Leeds City Market, Harry Proctor was sacked. His boss had caught him reading a novel. The tattered pages had already worked their magic, however. It was 1932 and Proctor, …
Reporting fictions: a novel start for journalists Read more »
Article originally published in the December 2019 editor of NUJ Informed. Each September, Porthcawl is alive with white jumpsuits, improbable sideburns and gyroscopic hips as 40,000 Elvis impersonators descend on the Welsh resort. “Arrests are very rare, the whole event …
Head hunt: how the search for Elvis signals a threat to journalism Read more »
A report on the general meeting of the European Federation of Journalists in Tallinn, Estonia 9 – 10 May 2019 Listening to Estonia’s president (pictured above), it would be easy to feel optimistic about press freedom and media plurality. Kersti …
Baltic exchange: Europe’s journalists’ confer in Tallinn Read more »
Journalists describe the critical help that they have received from the NUJ’s freelance office.