Visiting Professor Neil Benson reflects on journalism career in new memoirs

Neil Benson, Visiting Professor in Journalism in the School of Arts and Humanities, and the former editorial chief of Britain’s biggest news publisher has written a memoir telling the story of his 45 years in journalism.

He began his career as a 19-year-old trainee reporter on his hometown newspaper, The Star, Sheffield, in 1974. He went on to edit the Coventry Evening Telegraph and the Newcastle Evening Chronicle before being appointed regionals editorial director at Trinity Mirror (later Reach plc).

In 2019 he was appointed Visiting Professor and regularly works with journalism students at the University, delivering master classes in journalism investigation and writing, and also collaborates with the media industries research group.

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His memoir, titled You Can’t Libel the Dead, begins on a freezing night in January 1977, when Neil was one of the first reporters on the scene of an infamous mass murder. Eight years later, he was features editor at the Telegraph & Argus when the Bradford City Fire claimed the lives of 56 football fans.

From his time as editor at in Coventry, he tells the inside story of the unmasking of a popular priest as a serial paedophile, and a face-to-face meeting with a notorious armed robber.

Neil, 67, also recounts a mission to Pakistan in 2002 to plead for the release of a Trinity Mirror reporter, held in a Peshawar jail on suspicion of spying.

Neil said: “Our reporter had travelled to the region with a group of journalists under the auspices of the UK Foreign Office. With my agreement, he stayed on to chase up a couple of leads - he had heard that a Western backpacker had been held in jail and he had also managed to secure an interview with a Taliban leader.

“The problems started when he was held by the Pakistani authorities because of a discrepancy in his paperwork. After questioning, he was taken to a jail in Peshawar, near the Afghan border. Our company lawyer and I were despatched to the capital, Islamabad, to try to secure his release. After a few days we were granted a meeting with a high-ranking government official, to plead for the reporter's release and to ask if we could see him.

“A couple of days later we were driven to Peshawar, where we met the reporter in jail. He was visibly shaking and later revealed that death threats had been made against him.

“When we left Pakistan, we didn't know if our pleas had been successful but we were delighted when he was released a couple of weeks later, having spent a month in jail.”

Since leaving Reach, Neil has worked as a media consultant specialising in leadership development. He also chairs the Editors’ Code of Practice committee, the organisation which sets the national code the majority of press journalists in the UK are expected to comply with.