David Dimbleby is presumably feeling more gutted than most at the moment, seeing as how the election’s been cancelled and his chance at playing results night anchor for the eighth successive time has been postponed. Perhaps indefinitely.
For will Dave really be in the running come 2009 or 2010? If Gordon Brown had gone to the country this month there’d have been no question Dimbleby would have been marshalling the small screen count. He’s still in command of Question Time – just – and he’s on a break from driving his giant jeep round yet another batch of fells. Nobody else would have got a look in behind his giant election desk.
Fast forward two or three years, though, and chances are some pugnacious junior controller or panicking top floor suit will want to see “a fresh new look” to the BBC’s election coverage. They might even bypass Dave’s obvious successor, Huw Edwards, for somebody of even younger hue. Nicky Campbell? Adrian Chiles?
Though that might not sound like an unreasonable idea, it’d be a shame if Huw didn’t get a shot at the big one. And while David will want to cling on in the hope he gets to celebrate his 30th anniversary in 2009, you can’t help wondering if, thanks to Gordon, he’s seen his last post-hustings dawn.
Steve Williams
October 9, 2007 at 7:02 pm
Dunno if you noticed the piece in The Guardian about what the election coverage would have been like if we were having one now. Intriguingly it said that Mark Austin would have been doing the ITV coverage, so presumably Jonathan’s no longer bothered. So what will Old Ma Dimbleby get to do on election night now?
I know nobody ever watches it on ITV, but if Austin does do it that would make it even more just like a bog standard news bulletin, which was why it was so dull last time, with the usual people on the usual news set.
Anyway, the good thing about all this is that I now don’t need to use up a day’s holiday on November 2nd.