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''World in Action'' was a British investigative
current affairs programme made by
Granada Television
ITV Granada, formerly known as Granada Television, is the ITV franchisee for the North West of England and Isle of Man. From 1956 to 1968 it broadcast to both the north west and Yorkshire but only on weekdays as ABC Weekend Television was it ...
for
ITV
ITV or iTV may refer to:
ITV
*Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of:
** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...
from 7 January 1963 until 7 December 1998. Its campaigning
journalism
Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree. The word, a noun, applies to the occupation (profes ...
frequently had a major impact on events of the day. Its production teams often took audacious risks, and the programme gained a solid reputation for its often unorthodox approach. The series was sold around the world and won numerous awards. In its heyday ''World in Action'' drew audiences of up to 23 million in Britain alone, equivalent to almost half the population.
Cabinet minister
A minister is a politician who heads a ministry, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the ‘prime minister’, ...
s fell to its probings. Numerous innocent victims of the British
criminal justice
Criminal justice is the delivery of justice to those who have been accused of committing crimes. The criminal justice system is a series of government agencies and institutions. Goals include the Rehabilitation (penology), rehabilitation of o ...
system, including the
Birmingham Six
The Birmingham Six were six Irishmen who were each sentenced to life imprisonment in 1975 following their false convictions for the 1974 Birmingham pub bombings. Their convictions were declared unsafe and unsatisfactory and quashed by the C ...
, were released from jail. Honouring the programme in its 50th anniversary awards the
Political Studies Association
The Political Studies Association (PSA) is a learned society in the United Kingdom which exists to develop and promote the study of politics. It is the leading association in its field in the United Kingdom, with an international membership includi ...
said, "''World in Action'' thrived on unveiling corruption and highlighting underhand dealings. ''World in Action'' came to be seen as hard-hitting investigative journalism at its best."
A melodramatic post-trial encounter in 1967 between
Mick Jagger
Sir Michael Philip Jagger (born 26 July 1943) is an English singer and songwriter who has achieved international fame as the lead vocalist and one of the founder members of the rock band the Rolling Stones. His ongoing songwriting partnershi ...
and senior British establishment figures, in which the rock star and his retinue were wafted by helicopter onto the lawn of a
stately home
An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...
, was engineered by then ''World in Action'' researcher and future
BBC Director General John Birt
John Birt, Baron Birt (born 10 December 1944) is a British television executive and businessman. He is a former Director-General (1992–2000) of the BBC.
After a successful career in commercial television, initially at Granada Television an ...
. Decades later Birt himself described it as "one of the iconic moments of the Sixties."
Soon after she became
Conservative Party
The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right.
Political parties called The Conservative P ...
leader,
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. S ...
was said to have told the
BBC Director General, Sir
Ian Trethowan
Sir James Ian Raley Trethowan (20 October 1922 – 12 December 1990) was a British journalist, radio and television broadcaster and administrator who eventually became Director-General of the BBC, Director-General of the BBC from 1 October 1977 ...
, that she considered ''World in Action'' to consist of "just a lot of
Trots. ''
Panorama
A panorama (formed from Greek πᾶν "all" + ὅραμα "view") is any wide-angle view or representation of a physical space, whether in painting, drawing, photography, film, seismic images, or 3D modeling. The word was originally coined in ...
'', however, are bastards."
Its removal after 35 years was seen by some as part of a general
dumbing-down of British television and of ITV in particular. One commercial TV regulatory official privately characterised the ''
Tonight
Tonight may refer to:
Television
* ''Tonight'' (1957 TV programme), a 1957–1965 British current events television programme hosted by Cliff Michelmore that was broadcast on BBC
* ''Tonight'' (1975 TV programme), a 1975–1979 British current ...
'' programme which replaced it as merely "fluffy".
Others saw ''World in Action's'' eventual disappearance as the inevitable consequence of rising commercial pressures. Announcing a £250,000 fund for an investigative journalism training scheme,
Channel Four
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service i ...
said in November 2011 that there had been a decline in the pool of investigative journalism since "the demise of training grounds such as ''World in Action''".
Origins
''World in Action'' was the pre-eminent current affairs programme produced by Britain's
ITV
ITV or iTV may refer to:
ITV
*Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of:
** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...
Network in its first 50 years. Along with ''
This Week'', ''
Weekend World
''Weekend World'' is a British television political series, made by London Weekend Television (LWT) and broadcast from 1972 to 1988.
Created by John Birt, not long after he had joined LWT, the series was broadcast on the ITV network at midday ...
'', ''TV Eye'', ''
First Tuesday'', ''The Big Story'' and ''
The Cook Report
''The Cook Report'' was a British ITV current affairs television programme presented by Roger Cook which was broadcast from 22 July 1987 to 24 August 1999. The series featured the journalist investigating corruption, criminals, government soc ...
'' – and the news-gathering of
ITN – ''World in Action'' gave ITV a reputation for quality broadcast journalism to rival the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
's output.
For the first 35 years of its existence, ITV had a near-monopoly of television advertising revenue.
Roy Thomson, who ran
Scottish Television
Scottish Television (now, legally, known as STV Central Limited) is the ITV network franchisee for Central Scotland. The channel — the largest of the three ITV franchises in Scotland — has been in operation since 31 August 1957 and is the ...
, famously described ITV as a "licence to print money". In return for this income, the broadcasting regulator insisted that the ITV companies broadcast a proportion of their programmes as
public service TV. Out of this was born the network's reputation for serious current affairs, eagerly grabbed by programme makers under Granada's founder Lord
Sidney Bernstein.
Some of the most prominent figures in 20th-century British broadcasting helped to create ''World in Action'', in particular,
Tim Hewat
Timothy Edward Patterson Hewat (4 May 1928 – 19 May 2004) was an Australian television producer and journalist. He has been described as the "maverick genius of Granada TV, Granada television's current affairs in its formative years" and "one of ...
, "the maverick genius of Granada's current affairs in its formative years",
and
David Plowright
David Ernest Plowright (11 December 1930 – 24 August 2006) was a British television executive and producer.
Life
Plowright was educated at Scunthorpe Grammar School. He began his career in journalism as a reporter on the ''Scunthorpe Sta ...
: but also
Jeremy Isaacs
Sir Jeremy Israel Isaacs (born 28 September 1932) is a Scottish television producer and executive, opera manager, and a recipient of many British Academy Television Awards and International Emmy Awards.
He won the British Film Institute Fellow ...
,
Michael Parkinson
Sir Michael Parkinson (born 28 March 1935) is an English broadcaster, journalist and author. He presented his television talk show '' Parkinson'' from 1971 to 1982 and from 1998 to 2007, as well as other talk shows and programmes both in the U ...
,
John Birt
John Birt, Baron Birt (born 10 December 1944) is a British television executive and businessman. He is a former Director-General (1992–2000) of the BBC.
After a successful career in commercial television, initially at Granada Television an ...
and
Gus Macdonald
Gus is a masculine name, often a diminutive for Angus, August, Augustine, or Augustus, and other names (e.g. Aengus, Argus, Fergus, Ghassan, Gustav, Gustave, Gustafson, Gustavo, Gussie).
It can also be used as the adaptation into English of t ...
and its most long-serving executive-producer, Ray Fitzwalter. The series developed the skills of generations of journalists and, in particular, film-makers.
Michael Apted
Michael David Apted, (10 February 1941 – 7 January 2021) was a British television and film director and producer.
Apted began working in television and directed the '' Up'' documentary series (1964–2019). He later directed '' Coal Miner's ...
worked on the original ''
Seven Up!
The ''Up'' series of documentary films follows the lives of ten males and four females in England beginning in 1964, when they were seven years old. The first film was titled ''Seven Up!'', with later films adjusting the number in the title t ...
''.
Paul Greengrass
Paul Greengrass (born 13 August 1955) is a British film director, film producer, screenwriter and former journalist. He specialises in dramatisations of historic events and is known for his signature use of hand-held cameras.
His early film ' ...
, who spent 10 years on ''World in Action'', told the BBC: "My first dream was to work on ''World In Action'', to be honest. It was that wonderful eclectic mixture of filmmaking and reportage. That was my training ground. It showed me the world and made me see many things." He later told ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'': "If there's a thread running through my career it's ''World in Action'' – the phrase as well as the programme."
Although its rivals produced many memorable programmes, it was ''World in Action'' "slamming into the subject of each edition without wordy prefaces from a reassuring host-figure"
which consistently gained a reputation for the kind of original journalism and film making which made headlines and won major awards. In its time, the series was honoured by all of the major broadcasting awards, including many
BAFTA, the
Royal Television Society
The Royal Television Society (RTS) is a British-based educational charity for the discussion, and analysis of television in all its forms, past, present, and future. It is the oldest television society in the world. It currently has fourteen r ...
and
Emmy
The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...
Awards.
''World in Action's'' style was the opposite to its urbane BBC rivals, especially to the London BBC. By repute, especially in its early days, ''World in Action'' would never employ anybody who was on first-name terms with any politician.
Gus Macdonald
Gus is a masculine name, often a diminutive for Angus, August, Augustine, or Augustus, and other names (e.g. Aengus, Argus, Fergus, Ghassan, Gustav, Gustave, Gustafson, Gustavo, Gussie).
It can also be used as the adaptation into English of t ...
, an executive producer of the programme, said it had been "born brash". Steve Boulton, one of its last editors, wrote in ''
The Independent
''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...
'' that the programme's ethos was to "comfort the afflicted – and afflict the comfortable." Paul Greengrass told ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' in June 2008 that the chairman of Granada TV once told him: "Don't forget, your job's to make trouble."
The series outlasted all of its contemporaries in ITV current affairs, killed off as the commercial pressures on the network grew with the arrival of multi-channel TV in the UK. Eventually ''World In Action'', too, was removed from the schedules by its own creator,
Granada TV
ITV Granada, formerly known as Granada Television, is the ITV franchisee for the North West of England and Isle of Man. From 1956 to 1968 it broadcast to both the north west and Yorkshire but only on weekdays as ABC Weekend Television was it ...
. On 7 December 1998, World in Action ceased operations for good after 35 years on air. It was replaced in the schedules by ''
Tonight
Tonight may refer to:
Television
* ''Tonight'' (1957 TV programme), a 1957–1965 British current events television programme hosted by Cliff Michelmore that was broadcast on BBC
* ''Tonight'' (1975 TV programme), a 1975–1979 British current ...
''.
Investigative legacy
From the beginning, and especially from the late 1960s, ''World in Action'' broke new ground in investigative techniques. Landmark investigations included the
Poulson Poulson may refer to:
* Poulson (surname)
* Poulson, Virginia
* Poulson (processor), the codename of Intel's Itanium 9500 processor series
See also
* Polson (disambiguation)
* Poulsen, a surname
{{disambiguation ...
Affair, corruption in the
West Midlands Serious Crime Squad
The West Midlands Serious Crime Squad was a police unit in the English West Midlands which operated from 1974 to 1989. It was disbanded after an investigation into allegations of incompetence and abuse of power on the part of some of the squad ...
, the exposure of the shadowy and violent far-right group
Combat 18
Combat 18 (C18 or 318) is a neo-Nazi terrorist organisation that was founded in 1992. It originated in the United Kingdom, with ties to movements in Canada and the United States. Since then it has spread to other countries, including Germany. ...
, investigations into
L. Ron Hubbard
Lafayette Ronald Hubbard (March 13, 1911 – January 24, 1986) was an American author, primarily of science fiction and fantasy stories, who is best known for having founded the Church of Scientology. In 1950, Hubbard authored '' Dianeti ...
and
Scientology
Scientology is a set of beliefs and practices invented by American author L. Ron Hubbard, and an associated movement. It has been variously defined as a cult, a business, or a new religious movement. The most recent published census data indi ...
and, most notably, a long campaign which resulted in the release from prison of the
Birmingham Six
The Birmingham Six were six Irishmen who were each sentenced to life imprisonment in 1975 following their false convictions for the 1974 Birmingham pub bombings. Their convictions were declared unsafe and unsatisfactory and quashed by the C ...
, six
Irishmen
The Irish ( ga, Muintir na hÉireann or ''Na hÉireannaigh'') are an ethnic group and nation native to the island of Ireland, who share a common history and culture. There have been humans in Ireland for about 33,000 years, and it has bee ...
falsely accused of planting
Provisional Irish Republican Army
The Irish Republican Army (IRA; ), also known as the Provisional Irish Republican Army, and informally as the Provos, was an Irish republican paramilitary organisation that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland, facilitate Irish reun ...
(IRA) bombs in
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...
pubs.
''World in Action's'' appetite for controversy created tension with the
Independent Broadcasting Authority
The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) was the regulatory body in the United Kingdom for commercial television (ITV and Channel 4 and limited satellite television regulation – cable television was the responsibility of the Cable Authorit ...
(IBA), the official regulator during most of the series's run, which had the power to intervene before broadcast. Sir
Denis Forman
Sir John Denis Forman (13 October 1917 – 24 February 2013) was a Scottish executive in the British television industry long associated with the ITV contractor Granada, and with various charitable and governmental bodies in the arts.
Career
Fo ...
, one of Granada's founders, wrote that there was "
trench warfare
Trench warfare is a type of land warfare using occupied lines largely comprising military trenches, in which troops are well-protected from the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery. Trench warfare became a ...
" between the programme and the industry regulator, the
Independent Television Authority
The Independent Television Authority (ITA) was an agency created by the Television Act 1954 to supervise the creation of "Independent Television" (ITV (TV network), ITV), the first commercial television network in the United Kingdom. The ITA exi ...
(ITA), in the years between 1966 and 1969 as ''World in Action'' sought to establish its journalistic freedoms.
The most celebrated dispute was in 1973, over the banning of ''The Friends and Influence of John L Poulson'', the definitive film about the
Poulson Poulson may refer to:
* Poulson (surname)
* Poulson, Virginia
* Poulson (processor), the codename of Intel's Itanium 9500 processor series
See also
* Polson (disambiguation)
* Poulsen, a surname
{{disambiguation ...
Affair, itself one of the defining scandals of British political life in the 1960s. Poulson was an architect, who was jailed a year later for
corrupting politicians and civil servants to advance his construction business. The regulator, which was then the IBA, banned the film without seeing it and without giving official reasons other than "broadcasting policy". As a protest, Granada broadcast a blank screen – which, bizarrely, recorded the third-highest TV audience of that week. After a public furore which saw newspapers from the ''
Sunday Times
''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...
'' to the ''
Socialist Worker
''Socialist Worker'' is the name of several far-left newspapers currently or formerly associated with the International Socialist Tendency (IST). It is a weekly newspaper published by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) in the United Kingdom since ...
'' unite in condemnation of "censorship", the IBA held a second vote, having by then seen the film. By a single vote, the ban was lifted and the programme, by then retitled ''The Rise and Fall of John Poulson'', was transmitted on 30 April 1973, three months after it was first scheduled.
In January 1980 the programme examined the business practices of the then chairman of
Manchester United football club
Manchester United Football Club, commonly referred to as Man United (often stylised as Man Utd), or simply United, is a professional football club based in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England. The club competes in the Premier League, ...
,
Louis Edwards
Louis Charles Edwards (15 June 1914 – 25 February 1980) was an English businessman from Salford, Lancashire, who was most notable for being chairman of Manchester United from June 1965 until his death in February 1980.
Early life and busin ...
. Edwards ran a wholesale butchery business that supplied schools in
Manchester
Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
; ''WIA'' exposed practices of bribery of council officials and the supply of meat that was unfit for human consumption to such institutions; Edwards' businesses were subsequently prosecuted and lost their contracts. Louis Edwards himself died of a heart attack a month after the show was broadcast.
''World in Action'' tackled the British
intelligence service
An intelligence agency is a government agency responsible for the collection, analysis, and exploitation of information in support of law enforcement, national security, military, public safety, and foreign policy objectives.
Means of informatio ...
s, as well as the Royal Navy, over their recruitment practices: senior navy personnel famously
door-stepped the director of ''World in Actions film in question. The programme broadcast revelations by
whistleblowers
A whistleblower (also written as whistle-blower or whistle blower) is a person, often an employee, who reveals information about activity within a private or public organization that is deemed illegal, immoral, illicit, unsafe or fraudulent. Whi ...
from both
GCHQ
Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Unit ...
, the government's electronic eavesdropping and surveillance headquarters, and from the
Joint Intelligence Committee.
Its most audacious investigation of the intelligence community was, perhaps, an extended edition in July 1984 titled "The Spy Who Never Was", the confessions of a former
MI5
The Security Service, also known as MI5 ( Military Intelligence, Section 5), is the United Kingdom's domestic counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), G ...
officer,
Peter Wright. ''
Spycatcher
''Spycatcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer'' (1987) is a memoir written by Peter Wright, former MI5 officer and Assistant Director, and co-author Paul Greengrass. He drew on his own experiences and research into ...
'', Wright's subsequent account of the period when he and colleagues had, as he put it, "bugged and burgled our way across London", revealed what had in effect been a planned coup against the then Labour government of
Harold Wilson
James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, (11 March 1916 – 24 May 1995) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from October 1964 to June 1970, and again from March 1974 to April 1976. He ...
. Wright appeared to have been in charge of the technical side of things. 'The Wilson Plot', as it became known, was corroborated to varying degrees both before and after the film's transmission in various other books by journalists and in volumes of memoirs by others involved in the conspiracy. Wright's book was the most explosive of them all. Wright, embittered by a still unresolved pension dispute, fled to Australia where the book was written and finally published – to the fury of
Mrs Thatcher – with the assistance of the original programme's chief researcher,
Paul Greengrass
Paul Greengrass (born 13 August 1955) is a British film director, film producer, screenwriter and former journalist. He specialises in dramatisations of historic events and is known for his signature use of hand-held cameras.
His early film ' ...
. Publication in Britain was initially banned outright by the government of Margaret Thatcher.
The series was rarely away from the courts and the threat of legal action. The Scientologists tried – and failed – to stop ''World in Actions broadcasts about them through the courts and in 1980, members of the programme's staff and senior executives at Granada TV announced that they would be prepared to go to prison rather than submit to a
House of Lords
The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the Bicameralism, upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by Life peer, appointment, Hereditary peer, heredity or Lords Spiritual, official function. Like the ...
ruling that the programme reveal the identity of an informant who had supplied ''WIA'' with 250 pages of secret documents from the then state-owned steel company
British Steel Corporation
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
which was at the time locked in an
industrial dispute
Strike action, also called labor strike, labour strike, or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to Labor (economics), work. A strike usually takes place in response to grievance (labour), employee grievance ...
with its workforce.
In 1995,
Susan O'Keeffe
Susan O'Keeffe (born 18 September 1960) is an Irish journalist and former Labour Party politician.
Personal life
She was educated at Mount Anville Secondary School, Dublin, and at University College Cork. She lives in Collooney, County Sligo w ...
, a ''World in Action'' journalist, was threatened with prison in Ireland for refusing to reveal her sources. She had investigated scandals within the Irish meat industry in two films in 1991, setting in motion a three-year
Tribunal of Inquiry
A tribunal of inquiry is an official review of events or actions ordered by a government body. In many common law countries, such as the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, Ireland, Australia and Canada, such a public inquiry differs from a royal ...
in Dublin, which found that much of her criticism of the industry was substantiated. The tribunal, though, demanded that she name her informants, and when she refused to do so, she was charged by the Irish
Director of Public Prosecutions
The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is the office or official charged with the prosecution of criminal offences in several criminal jurisdictions around the world. The title is used mainly in jurisdictions that are or have been members o ...
. The case became a
cause célèbre
A cause célèbre (,''Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged'', 12th Edition, 2014. S.v. "cause célèbre". Retrieved November 30, 2018 from https://www.thefreedictionary.com/cause+c%c3%a9l%c3%a8bre ,''Random House Kernerman Webs ...
in the
Republic of Ireland
Ireland ( ga, Éire ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 counties of the island of Ireland. The capital and largest city is Dublin, on the eastern side of the island. A ...
, and in January 1995 she faced trial for
contempt of court
Contempt of court, often referred to simply as "contempt", is the crime of being disobedient to or disrespectful toward a court of law and its officers in the form of behavior that opposes or defies the authority, justice, and dignity of the cour ...
but was cleared of the charge. O'Keeffe was honoured in the 1994
Freedom of Information Awards for her stand.
In its last few years, the programme was involved in two high-profile
libel
Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
cases. It won the first (along with
the ''Guardian'') against the former
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
cabinet minister
A minister is a politician who heads a ministry, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the ‘prime minister’, ...
Jonathan Aitken
Jonathan William Patrick Aitken (born 30 August 1942) is a British author, Church of England priest, former prisoner and former Conservative Party politician. Beginning his career in journalism, he was elected to Parliament in 1974 (serving unt ...
, and lost the second, against the
high street
High Street is a common street name for the primary business street of a city, town, or village, especially in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth. It implies that it is the focal point for business, especially shopping. It is also a metonym fo ...
chain
Marks & Spencer
Marks and Spencer Group plc (commonly abbreviated to M&S and colloquially known as Marks's or Marks & Sparks) is a major British multinational retailer with headquarters in Paddington, London that specialises in selling clothing, beauty, home ...
.
On 10 April 1995, Aitken, himself a former journalist for
Yorkshire Television
ITV Yorkshire, previously known as Yorkshire Television and commonly referred to as just YTV, is the British television service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the Yorkshire franchise area on the ITV (TV network), ITV network. Until 19 ...
, called a televised press conference three hours before the transmission of a ''World in Action'' film, ''Jonathan of Arabia'', demanding that allegations about his dealings with leading
Saudis
Saudis ( ar, سعوديون, Suʿūdiyyūn) are people identified with the country of Saudi Arabia. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. The Saudis are composed mainly of Arabs and primarily speak a regional dialect ...
be withdrawn. In a phrase that would come to haunt him, Aitken promised to wield "the simple sword of truth and the trusty shield of British fair play ... to cut out the cancer of bent and twisted journalism." Aitken was subsequently sentenced to 18 months in prison for
perjuring himself in the resulting libel case. ''World in Action'' followed the collapse of Aitken's libel case with a special edition whose title reflected the MP's claim to wield the "sword of truth". It was called ''The Dagger of Deceit''.
Television techniques
Although the series's lasting reputation is for its investigative work, it also led the way in introducing other techniques to mainstream TV. In 1971, years before the rise of "reality" programmes on TV schedules, ''World in Action'' challenged the
Staffordshire
Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...
village of
Longnor to quit smoking, a forerunner of many of the popular-challenge documentaries which enjoyed success in the 21st Century reality television boom.
In 1984, ''World in Action'' caused a sensation by challenging a rising young
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
Member of Parliament,
Matthew Parris
Matthew Francis Parris (born 7 August 1949) is a British political writer and broadcaster, formerly a Conservative Member of Parliament. He was born in South Africa to British parents.
Early life and family
Parris is the eldest of six childre ...
, to live for a week on a £26 unemployment benefit payment to test the reality of his own critical views on unemployed people – Parris subsequently abandoned parliament for a career as a broadcaster and writer. The same year, ''World in Action'' revealed the tricks behind political
oratory by coaching a complete beginner, Ann Brennan, to deliver a speech which won a standing ovation at the annual conference of the
Social Democratic Party
The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology.
Active parties
For ...
, using techniques developed by Professor
Max Atkinson. The eminent political commentator
Sir Robin Day
Sir Robin Day (24 October 1923 – 6 August 2000) was an English political journalist and television and radio broadcaster.
Day's obituary in ''The Guardian'' by Dick Taverne stated that he was "the most outstanding television journalist of ...
, covering the conference for BBC television, described Mrs Brennan's performance as "The most refreshing speech we've heard so far."
''World in Action'' helped to pioneer the technique of using
covert cameras, not just in investigative work but also in social documentary, including, from the earliest days, the treatment of gypsies, the old in care ("Ward F13") and poverty in England. The arrival of high-quality miniature cameras allowed ambitious projects such as
Donal MacIntyre
Donal MacIntyre (born 25 January 1966) is an Irish investigative journalist, specialising in investigations, undercover operations and television exposés. He has also worked as a presenter of both television news and documentaries on various U ...
's award-winning programmes in October 1996 on the
illegal drug trade
The illegal drug trade or drug trafficking is a global black market dedicated to the cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of prohibited drugs. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs through ...
, and the future
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
MP
Adam Holloway
Adam James Harold Holloway (born 29 July 1965) is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Gravesham since 2005. He served as Lord Commissioner of the Treasury from September to October 2022, and as A ...
's disturbing reports on the reality of life among the homeless in 1991. In 1998 ''World in Action'' took advantage of the new technology to equip an entire house with secret cameras hidden in anything from coke tins to fish tanks to catch out shoddy builders. The success of the two-part series called ''House of Horrors'', produced by Kate Middleton, led not only to the ITV series ''House of Horrors'' and to the BBC's ''Rogue Traders'' but to a whole new genre of programming, around the world, based around hidden camera footage of dodgy tradesmen.
''World in Action'' also gave rise to a number of other spin-off series, most famously the ''Seven Up!'' documentaries that have followed the lives of a group of British people who turned seven years old in 1963. The most recent, ''63 UP'', was shown in 2019.
Michael Apted
Michael David Apted, (10 February 1941 – 7 January 2021) was a British television and film director and producer.
Apted began working in television and directed the '' Up'' documentary series (1964–2019). He later directed '' Coal Miner's ...
directed most episodes; parallel series have also started in South Africa, the US and Russia.
More recent current affairs series on other channels, such as the Donal MacIntyre, MacIntyre series on
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
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and Five (channel), Five, and Channel 4's ''Dispatches (TV series), Dispatches'', commissioned by Dorothy Byrne, a former ''WIA'' producer, may be seen as having inherited certain aspects of ''World in Actions hard-hitting journalistic style.