Gerard Tubb – special correspondent
Tuesday, September 4, 2012 at 11:40
Simon Clark

Further to my previous post I urge you to read an excellent piece by Nannying Tyrants:

Trust no one, especially the media includes an extraordinary exchange of tweets between Sky correspondent Gerard Tubb and our old friend Chris Snowdon.

Tubb is the reporter who wrote UK could be a 'no smoking nation' by 2032 (Sky News).

Although the IEA's Mark Littlewood and I were both interviewed on Sky News on Saturday morning (thankfully, not everyone at Sky is as one-eyed as their bullish North East correspondent), Gerard Tubb's report featured not a single balancing comment.

In contrast (and off air), the Sky News presenter laughed and spoke of having "grilled" me. As it happens I laughed too because in a one-to-one interview that's his job and I wouldn't expect anything less.

Tubb, however, believes that his laughably one-sided report is an example of "good journalism". Personally I think he's in denial.

Bizarrely he also claims that he had to "persuade" Ailsa Rutter, director of Fresh (Smoke Free North East), "to go public".

Yeah, right. Tobacco control campaigners like Rutter live for publicity like that. She would have bitten his hand off for the exposure.

Anyway, do have a read.

H/T Nannying Tyrants

Update: NT has today tweeted a link to this Daily Telegraph report: Sky News faces investigation for email hacking.

Article originally appeared on Simon Clark (http://taking-liberties.squarespace.com/).
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