by Adam Boulton, Political Editor Sky NewsAt Sky News we’ve attached a high importance to our international viewers from the very start. History didn’t wait for us when we launched as Europe’s first 24-hour news channel back in 1989: the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet Empire collapsed. On the streets of Eastern Europe our reporters quickly discovered that they were familiar faces, Europe’s newly freed citizens were hungry for satellite news.
Since then we’ve expanded in a rather more orderly manner. Our satellite footprint can stretch from Nigeria to the Arctic circle, and we have local tv and cable carriage deals all over the world – South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, Scandinavia to name just a few – as well as relationships with News Corp stations Fox in the US and Star in Asia. Working on the road I’ve watched Sky News in my hotel room in every continent except Antarctica, and that’s because I haven’t been there.
It’s two way communication with the viewers too, especially now that the internet is spreading. On air I’ve taken live phone-in calls from Abuja and Adelaide and checking out the comments on my blog just this weekend I find Dubai, Canada, France, Italy amongst the countries represented. When we had the idea of posting the transcript of the Prime Minister and President Bush’s “Yo, Blair!” exchange, we had over 500 comments on the site from all over the world within a matter of hours. That helped us shape our TV news broadcasts.
If you appear on TV you always like flesh and blood evidence that someone is watching. I’m lucky with feedback. A man came up to me at an international conference and said: “You don’t know me, I’m the Prime Minister of Sweden and a big fan of Sky News.” Prime Minister Helen Clark of New Zealand complained directly that we’d switched her country’s feed from Sky News to Sky News Australia. Every few days a foreign tourist stops me for a chat as I wander around Westminster.
There is a big difference between Sky News and our international competitors such as CNNi, BBC World, and EuroNews. Our viewers get the same news service – a breaking news service - wherever they are. We make no apology for being a British based news service with a wide international remit, and bureaux around the globe. I believe viewers want news with a heart and commitment – there’s no secret where we are coming from and our viewers are quite intelligent enough to take account of that. Besides, Anglo-Saxon democracy and journalism have grown up together with one of the best records for freedom of speech in the world – we are proud to belong to that tradition. We offer international news and news about Britain without putting them into boxes. We’re curious about the rest of the world but that doesn’t mean our viewers don’t want to know what’s going on in Britain.
In his farewell speech to the Labour Party Conference Tony Blair said that “showing an African life is worth as much as a Western one would help defeat terrorism”. You can’t do decent job of journalism on a complicated idea like that if your starting point is a neutral, non-committal, pale beige pap. At the same time Sky News is lucky that we are not a National Broadcaster (capital ‘N’, capital ‘B’). Our informal and open style of journalism is welcoming to viewers outside the UK.
In any case Britain and the “rest of the world” are coming closer together. In that speech Mr Blair also pointed out that British politicians can no longer shut the door on the outside world. Unlike a decade ago, the main items on any Prime Minister’s agenda – migration, climate change, terrorism, organised crime, economic growth – are now all essentially global concerns. These issues are also at the core of Sky News reporting and we find time for the less weighty matters which make the world go round such as celebrity gossip, true crime, weather and sport.
Globalization is a reality. I should know, my job is to cover British politics but in just the last 12 months or so, I’ve reported from China, Africa, India, Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Iraq, Russia, the US and around half the countries in the EU. In addition to our seven foreign bureaux we normally have around a dozen teams working around the world.
The first thing a journalist wants to know is that someone is taking notice of their work. At Sky News we value our international viewers, for their attention, their opinions and the revenue they can bring in. We know that our viewers abroad value the service and information we bring them. The more the merrier. Thanks for watching and please tell your friends.
