Principal of Lady Margaret Hall, University of Oxford
For most of my working life I was a journalist – mainly on the Guardian, which I edited for 20 years from 1995-2015. I am now Principal of Lady Margaret Hall in Oxford.
After reading English at Cambridge I started in journalism, progressing
from local papers to a job as a reporter on the Guardian in 1979. Over
eight years I reported, wrote a daily diary column and features before
leaving to become the Observer’s TV critic in succession to Clive James
and Julian Barnes.
In 1987 I moved to Washington to become the US editor for the (now
defunct) London Daily News. I the returned to the Guardian, launching
its Weekend magazine and G2 section before becoming deputy editor then
editor.
The paper I inherited was print on paper. By the time I left in 2015 we
continued to print a paper (in a different format) but had transitioned
the Guardian into being a 24/7 digital news operation based in London,
US and Australia. We overtook the New York Times to become the largest
serious English language newspaper digital operation in the world.
The journalism won multiple awards, including, in 2014, and Emmy and
the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. The economic model of news was –
almost universally – challenging. By the time I left the Guardian we
were heading for £100m a year in digital revenues and a £1bn endowment
in the Scott Trust, which owns the paper. But – famously – the digital
west coast giants have since moved aggressively to hoover up the
majority of advertising money.
The last five years of editing saw the Guardian breaking many stories
that were followed up globally, including the Wikileaks diplomatic
cables revelations; the phone-hacking story which saw News
International journalists jailed; disclosures about illegal torture and
rendition; tax avoidance; toxic-dumping by Trafigura; and, in 2013, the
Edward Snowden disclosures about mass surveillance.
Three of these stories – Wikileaks, phone hacking and Snowden – would
later become films made, or currently in the pipeline, by Stephen
Spielberg, George Clooney and Oliver Stone.