Gertie Spurling was doing some of the political reports the other day, so they may be getting her to do it. Court Reporter Deanna Williams was also Nine’s political reporter in the 90s, and often covers for Andrea over summer.
A lot more info on changes piblished here,
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Dunno if making the weekend weather presenter the political editor is a logical step though. Previously I’d have thought they could poach from ABC or something but would assume there’s a hiring freeze.
Kimberly Pratt does politics a fair bit but reckon she’ll have her baby soon.
Tim Hatfield and Tim Yeatman used to as well but both are long gone.
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Whitfeld ‘s return to Australia leaves Ashlee Mullany as Seven’s sole correspondent in Europe , based in London . US correspondents Tim Lester , David Woiwod , and Mylee Hogan will report to the National News Desk.
Looks like Tim Lester will be back in the states soon. Bit poor of Seven though to now only have one UK Correspondent.
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Not with this attributed quote: “The 7NEWS National News Desk will be home to a centralised team of journalists whose responsibility as expert editors in their round will be to deliver exclusive content beyond anything seen on television,”
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To be honest - this national news desk makes huge sense in the current climate.
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That’s a premature conclusion at this point. There’s every chance Hugh will be replaced once he returns to Sydney (perhaps, as already speculated, by Joel Dry who is already based in London).
And of course Seven will now have a dedicated “foreign” reporter based in Australia which may reduce the need to use the correspondents to file stories that fall well outside their patch (ie US correspondents reporting on news in Asia/the Middle East as they often do).
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A lot of this was already happening internally though. Most of the reports between 6.25-6.45am are national based stories / reports where local news directors can add it to their local rundowns.
What I’m concerned with, will this National News desks get in the way of Local News operations (in individual cities) around the country. Local news is what brings in the audience.
I don’t know, it sounds like a bit of bullshit setup to me.
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You also have to wonder how this will impact The Latest. Currently Hugh Whitfield covers nearly all Overseas news via live cross. Presumably because they don’t do any live crosses to East Coast AU now that they are cutting costs.
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Presumably they will just get Ashlee Mullany to do it instead since she will still be in London.
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From memory, Seven had no UK Correspondent from 2004 - 2009. Having two reporters based in the UK was only introduced once the east coast bulletins were extended to an hour and TT being axed in 2014.
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They are not going to have 3 in the US and 1 in the UK. Outside of Trump the UK and Europe has undoubtedly been a busier bureau in recent times.
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I hate to say it, but in these increasingly austere times, much of what the London reporters do could be done from Sydney with vision from ITN. Royal stuff etc.
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I think it’s safe to say they are including Joel as part of their planning but given he’s a freelancer (and it’s cheaper to keep it that way) that they’ll tap when needed they haven’t officially given him the title/included him in that release.
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NBC use Tom Costello for all things aviation and sometimes he will travel to specific airports for reports but most of the time he is somewhere else.
I don’t see an issue with what Seven has done here. They have made some crazy decisions lately but this is all sensible. FTA is dying and consolidating where possible is going to help keep things going for a while longer.
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The flagship nightly NBC News bulletin is surrounded by local news bulletins where for example, NBC LA would be doing the same story on LAX Airport with a local angle that Nightly News would be doing for a national audience.
7 doesn’t have the luxury to do that. Their edge is a local news service. Audiences won’t respond to interstate reporters covering local issues.
I’m also doubtful they have the budget to sustain flying all these people around the country if that is what they aim to do.
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Blake Johnson is in Paris reporting on the Olympics. They might find an aviation report for him there as well.
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Fergo taking a break until September 
thats alot longer than the olympics.
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I came to say the same thing. And he said “I hope to see you”. 
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