this is bbc news. the headlines: a month coronavirus lockdown is coming into effect in the netherlands. unless the government takes immediate action to control the spread of the omicron variant, hospitals become unmanageable. only essential shops will be allowed to remain open. the brexit minister lord frost has resigned with immediate effect. he said in a letter to the prime minister that he had concerns about the government's �*direction of travel,�* and was sad that the unlocking of covid restrictions had not been as irreversible as promised. the award winning architect, richard rogers, has died at the age of 88. he was best known for his work on the pompidou centre in paris, the lloyd's building and millennium dome both in london, as well as the european court of human rights building in strasbourg.

it has just it hasjust gone it has just gone half past five. now on bbc news, it's time for the media show. hello, good evening. good evening. that distinctive music can only mean one thing. it's time for channel 4 news and one of the most famous faces in broadcasting. jon snow has been the face of the programme since 1989. over the course of three decades, he has grilled every prime minister, from margaret thatcher up to and including theresa may. he drew the iconic words, let bygones be bygones from nelson mandela. he shared a plane with idi amin, reported on wars in iran and crises in vietnam. and it's not all been hard news. he has danced and sung on tv and even got stoned on camera. but he has also been accused of being too partisan, of having political views that were too obvious

and which undermine the network's impartiality. and so, at a time when the future of channel 4 is up for grabs, his words have come under unprecedented scrutiny. jon snow, welcome to the media show, and i guess before we start, the first question is, you've got a few days left at channel 4 news. hoping for an interview with borisjohnson? i'm absolutely standing ready and i have every hope that that phone call will come and i'll suddenly be able to say i have literally interviewed every prime minister since i've started. before we get stuck in, ijust want to get one thing clear, which is how you see yourself. we know how we see you, but how do you see yourself? do you see yourself as a newsreader first and foremost? are you a reporter digging for originaljournalism who just happens to read the news? i see myself as lucky. and on top of that, i'm a reporter. i have nothing else, no other responsibilities than to tell the stories, to tell the truth and to interrogate.

because you love being on the road, don't you? oh, i love being on the road. that's the real arena of retrieving information and ideas and stories that maybe no one else has gotten to. and obviously you spent a lot of your career doing that out on the road as a newsreader. you were in haiti after the hurricane, you were in new orleans after the flooding, you were on the ground outside of grenfell tower. you've been working for a very long time and you went to india over a decade ago. you when i worked together for a long time on channel 4. what do you get from being on location that you would not get otherwise? i think you get totally plugged into reality. there's nothing between you and what you are looking at. it is up to you to try to make something of it and to interrogate anyone who was there and indeed, to interrogate what it is you are being told.

let's go back to where it all began. you went to university to study law, but were thrown out for taking part in anti—apartheid protest. did you grow up in a political household? good heavens no. politically, in the sense that my parents were, what you call, automatic tories. i don't think there was any actual choice. there was no choice. and additionally, extraordinarily, my father was the headmaster of the school in sussex. and it was there that i encountered my first politician. the extraordinary thing was i was in the chapel and i said to my mother, who was that unhappy looking man down there at the end of our pew? she said jonathan, because that's what they called me. this is mr harold macmillan. he is the prime minister. do you know what a prime minister is, young man? and i said no sir. well, i am a conservative politician and i run the country.

so you met harold mcmillan and you didn't from your career, you said that you wanted to be a politician. but there must be some sort of media gene in the snow family because dan snow is also a tv presenter. did you always know you wanted to be a journalist? no, i didn't know that i wanted to be a journailist, i wanted to be a troublemaker. i wanted to change things. after i was sent down from university, i had to find something to do and i went to work and a day centre for homeless and vulnerable teenagers and stayed there for three years and it taught me everything i had not learned at that point. and now you're sitting with me of the media show. i wish i could've said i had worked for the bbc and that made the transformation.

but despite pining to work for the bbc, i never have been invited. there is still time. but of course in that time, the creation of commercial radio was hatched, and the first station on air was lbc, and i applied for a job there, and for some reason, and i think yes, probably peter snow, he may be our ownjon snow, he can be all right. they have peter snow, and it will all make sense. and i had three years of amazing journalism, really. because sadly, the ira went wild bombing their way across london and the lucky thing was that i rode a bicycle. and so i got to the scene of the crime often before anyone

else got anywhere near it. and all i had to do was find somewhere to lock my bike up. other than that i have my tape recorder on my shoulder and dived straight in. and if you are getting raw amazing stuff, right there on the ground, it is much more powerful, even if it is not as good. it may not be greatjournalism, but it was very powerful radio and people thought they were right in the heart of it. and you are thought to be a very good reporter, even though i probably was a terrible reporter. you took over as channel 4 news from peter after he absconded to the bbc. was that always your goal, to read the news? i don't think it was never regarded as student regarded as thejob i do a channel for news as reading the news. it is interrogating the news. of course, you've got to layout the facts and then challenge the people who are involved in those facts and determining whether they really are facts too.

it's both inquisitorial and reportage. let's talk about your big scoops, and there have been a lot. in 1976, you were flying ini a falcon executive jet along with the owner idi amin who was the dictator in uganda. how did you come to be on that plane? i have to give you little bit of background. when i left school, i went on voluntary service overseas to uganda and never having been out of england. so, it was a big cultural shock, but it was also the most intoxicating and wonderful and amazing way of learning about the world. and i developed this love of uganda and of africa and as soon as i became a reporter, i did a lot of reporting from africa.

i know that you are interested in and indeed go along with much of what enoch powell has been seeing recently. he does not want england to be colonised by africa. and was on one of those trips that we were sent to uganda to try and hunt down idi amin and challenging for the terrible things he was doing. and the funny thing is, idi amin was rather taken with the fact that i had lived in uganda and he thought of me on his side. so he invited us on hisjet to see the country. and there i was with my crew and a rather burly looking security guard clearly with a gun on his hip. as we continued ourjourney, it became clear that he had gone to sleep and i was sitting next to him and i thought, i saw this pistol hanging off his belt, and i thought,

should i shoot him? you really considered it? i don't think i was serious, but also i thought me, pistol, him murderous — me, brave and courageous and looking for the truth. it is time i did something about this. jon snow, there's no possibility. and i thought, he may not actually be asleep, he might be pretending to be asleep. and i looked at the holster and the holster was undone and i could'vejust pulled the gun out, but was it loaded? what idiot would let idi amin on board a loaded pistol? and then i thought, you're an idiot, you're not going to survive this if you try that. and so, i did not. do you regret it? no, thank goodness,

what a stupid thing to try and do. you watch nelson mandela walk to freedom, what was that like and how do you go about reporting the story that was absolutely glorious. it was absolutely, the most glorious, it was liberation. south africa had a terrible record of apartheid and here i was, he was almost a jesus christ figure who had appeared out of prison, an absolute hero of the time and amazing responsibility of being allowed to interview him. because he was no problem at all. it is impossible to say that he was as interested in me as he was in him. kept asking me questions, and i said mr president, i don't want to disappoint you, but i have to disappoint you, but i have to ask you, it is you we want to ask you, it is you we want to hear from. i know nothing and you know everything. can we just do this interview. and we had a beautiful

interview and he was the most lovely and gracious and amazing guy who had been through so much and yet was still the most vivid and affectionate and loving human being. and he said led let bygones be bygones. let byg o nes let bygones be bygones. that was more important to him, harmony and humanity, then taking it out of the people who had taken it out on him. that is what i wanted to pick you up on. the pressure that everyone has exerted and also the fact that apartheid committed so many crimes, or so many crimes are committed in the name of apartheid, what should happen to people who committed those crimes? i have been saying throughout let bygones be bygones. obviously nelson mandela is not the only world leader interviewed, and you also grilled almost every prime minister since margaret thatcher.

do you think politicians are harder to pin down now than when you first started? it is interesting. i think, as the technology has developed, so has the capacity for the leader or politician to evade scrutiny. i think that is a fact. and it is much more difficult. there is no question that the interrogation in the comments is good stuff and interogation in congress, and democracy still functions, but the beauty of the press was that it was able to cut through a lot of stuff and just get to a leader and test, and it is much more difficult today than it was. tehe difficult part is because they've got people who spend their full—time lives preventing you from getting anywhere near doing anything.

yes. and someone like margaret thatcher, she didn't actually need massive defenders. she was happy to be quizzed on the doorstep of number 10, as anyone. and it has become much, much tighter and much more difficult and in a funny sort of way, it has almost left leading politicians looking smaller than their forbearers who used to be able to give amazing accounts, suddenly. you could say �*what�*s going on here �*and you would get an answer. now, it is much harder. they think we are the enemy. it's gotten to a very soft and sad space. argue the enemy? they think you are the enemy. _ of course not. i want truth, i want to know what's going on. i want to know more about on behalf of the viewer and the listener, what is happening? what is your purpose. what is the purpose of this law? what is the purpose

of what you are doing? but it can be very difficult. you can get a background briefing, but there are no pictures. you have nothing to prove that you spoke to anyone, because it is off—camera. your full big—name interviewers kind of a particular approach. andrew neil would adopt a tone of incredulity, how would you describe your interview style? i am much thicker than they are. they are accomplish people university degrees, and i am not, and therefore i have to be much more animal, and i try to ask the questions that the viewer might really want answered. i try to follow up with an intelligent question, but the idea that i know any more than the average citizen, but perhaps that is the joy of this. the average citizen wants you to ask questions their behalf.

subsection 5.6 and see with the minister is telling the truth or not. they want you to ask straight on, what is going on here? as you wander around the party here, there is one thing that strikes you in that extraordinary number of people in your own party hate you. why do they hate you? i don't find that, actually. i find travelling around this conservative conference where i've spoken to every area of reception, travelling around the country, supporting conservative campaigns and colleagues. they find you aloof that you're not one of them. ijust do not accept that. i really don't — i don't accept that for a minute. it hasn't all been straight news for you. you have been stoned on tv, you have danced, you have sung on camera. i know you are a former chorister, is that something where is there a case or not a case for saying the news reader shouldn't be a part of the story, that audiences want a more bland figure? i don't think the presenter of news has a responsibility to evade the truth that he or

she is a human being. and i think the attraction in many ways of what we, who had, say, more opportunity to question people is that we remain human beings. we did not become automatons or trapped persons who are doing other people's bidding. the danger is that they will bring their weapons out onto the street and that there will be bloodshed again. moments later, guns actually did appear. order was eventually restored by those who express no sympathy for the women's position. can i ask about your accent? it has definitely changed over the years. we ever told you sounded to posh? often. i am a posh boy. did you change it on purpose? no! i speak as i ever did.

your voice has definitely leveled out. hasit? come on. i would dispute that. ok, i will play you some tapes later. you have been called a pinko, a lefty, has the question of impartiality ever been raised to you by your bosses? never. nobody has ever sat me down and said you are to right wing to left wing or anything else. and i don't think i am. i think i go straight down the middle. for example, you to grenfell tower. grenfell tower is an extraordinary event in our time that speaks so loudly of inequality. now, if i take a position that looks at this from the point of view of a victim, someone who is living up the 73rd floor and lost their husband, child and everything else, ami then to say look, i'm sorry.

i have to be completely objective about this, if they worked hard they would not have been on the top floor. no. you have to be the right person asking the right question at the right time and you're not going to adjust yourself because you think in some way, you are too left to right. don't think of these things. i think the appalling suffering the person on the 12th floor who went to that terrible experience. andrew maher, when he was stepping down from the bbc tojoin lbc — he said he wants to get his own voice back. do you feel constrained but what you can say because you were for channel 4 news? absolutely not. i feel no constraint at all and i have very rarely ever been ticked off over anything like that. it's been heavily criticised by the government, some of them see it as having a left—wing political bias, which channel 4 news entirely disputes. channel 4 disputes absolutely. why do you think they have that impression

about channel 4 news? because the government has changed consultation on channel 4's future. it has the responsibility of not being the bbc. i love the bbc and i listen to it and i watch it far more than i watch any other channel. but the fact is, that given the bbc�*s position and given the fact that it is, in a sense, it runs a very fine and objective operation. but i think the glory of channel 4 is that it is not the bbc and that it actually has the opportunity to roam free and make of the world what we can. can you remember a time whenjournalists came under so much criticism from the public as well as the government? i think there's been many times where it has been tough.

i don't think it has gone on as long as this but this epidemic is an exacerbating factor. but there were times in margaret thatcher's period with the media. it goes in cycles. i've remember harold wilson complaining about the media. it's a part of the furniture. frankly, if democracy stops complaining about the media, and we have reached a bad situation. does cancel culture exist? not so far as channel 4 news is concerned. i am not conscious of it all. everyone is under pressure one way or another — maybe under pressure to tell the truth. and that is our responsibility. if we were to stop telling the truth, then maybe we should be called to attention

and not repeat it. but the fact is, that doesn't happen very often. i think people exaggerate the extent to which there is some sort of a battle going on. i don't really think there is. and i'm really interested in hearing your take on the health of the news industry right now. you work at itn, which makes channel 4 news, channel 5 news, is there a lot of competition? your colleagues at itv had last week as we discussed in the media show joking about downing street party. what was the mood at channel 4 news watching your colleagues could such a big scoop? pleasure. genuine pleasure. because it had come from itv which did not have a great track record of real mass of scoops like that. and it was a real utterly brilliant scoop and a very meaningful one. and we were envious, but we were thrilled. we didn't celebrate very much because we had access to it, but no, it was pleasure that our building, which houses lots of tv channels, had done something that the bbc

must�*ve been, well, flipping their ears about. and there has been a lot of talk about old guard. andrew neil has had his own well—publicized exit from broadcasting — for the moment, anyway. what do you make of all these big news beasts — yourself included — going all at once? i think the big thing is to say how old are we? and we look at the age, the age that we emerged from in many ways, the naive youthful period of the media's development in which there was — we were all finding our way. and the media today, obviously is quite different from the very odd and confused and rather posh outfits that used to exist in the 50s and 60s. and all male. and now it's multicultural and it's men and women and it's a different world. we've been lucky enough to be

born in the right years, the late 40s and early 50s and we have come of age, and the media have come of age and we have blossomed and enjoyed it and given back. and ifeel very proud to be part of it. how do you feel about leaving channel 4 news after three decades? it's been a long time. it's like leaving the marriage. you know, i mean, there are the kids and all the links and the rest of it. you know, you are all interdependent in so many ways of the workplace and use each of the day after day, week after week and month after month and year after year. and it's a big wrench. and it's your routine. your routine is channel 4 news. my routine hasn't changed in 33 years. looking back over your time and the role, a lot of people,

you know, certainly that i have encountered, because they feel jaded. they say, you know, the same stories keep coming up again, it is depressing, nothing changes. do you feel that your journalism has made a difference? you were talking earlier on about your background and what you wanted to do when you came to journalism. do you think yourjournalism has led to change for the better? because i'm tall and have funny ties, people are terribly nice to me in the street and you get this feedback. and that is wonderful. you do get feedback and you do get a sense of why people watch and why they enjoy it and the rest of it and it's notjust me. we are different from other opportunities in other options. and obviously, i'm going to miss that. jon snow, thank you for coming on the media show today. it is wonderful to hear from you and thank you to our studio engineer. everyone out there,

thank you so much for listening and goodbye. hello there. the weather is stuck in some sort of a rut, a lot of dry weather around but a lot of grey weather too, thanks to this area of high pressure and its low cloud trapped underneath it. there has been some pressure around, sunday is looking sunny again across more northern parts of the uk, further south it'll stay rather grey and gloomy once again. here is the area of high pressure sitting to the north of the uk, barely any isobars on the chart around the uk. that means winds will be lighter and fresher there across southern england and through the channel. so where we have the cloudy skies, lows of four or seven degrees, but really cold under the clearer skies, scotland and northern england, these are city temperatures, in rural spots we could be as low as —7 or —8 celsius. so a really cold start to sunday, some freezing mist and fog around, some fog through the central belt of scotland, but some sunshine, as you can see, stretching down into the north—western parts of england.

wales doing well in the sunshine, parts of south—west england, maybe northern ireland seeing sunnier spells than we have seen of late, so not bad here. eastern, central and eastern england, southern england again, rather grey and drab, gloomy, some mistiness, a bit of drizzle here and there. it will be a chilly day wherever you are. sunday night, we hold onto lots of cloud generally, clearer spells further north and west, here it will turn frosty again with some freezing mist and fog patches. temperatures holding out around 3—7, where we have the cloud, and it will be breezier along some north sea coasts. into monday, maybe some subtle changes. i think for many, we're holding onto the cloud, but we could see clearer skies or sunnier breaks appearing across central and eastern england, parts of southern england haven't the sunshine for a good week or so now, so that will be a welcome change. probably the best of the sunshine again across the north of the uk, and again, whatever you are, it will be chilly whether you have the grey and gloomy skies or even the sunshine. now, as the run—up to christmas has been giving us a headache. at the moment it looks like we could see this area

of low pressure push in from the atlantic. that will have some weather fronts, some rain bands and some milder air which will push into the south and west, but colder air will want to continue to dig down from the north—east. so we're in a bit of a battleground between these air masses around the christmas period. it does look like the upcoming week to start with, certainly for the first few days, will be chilly and bright, and then it will turn more unsettled around the christmas period and with some cold and we could see some sleet and snow in places.

good morning. welcome to breakfast, with chris mason and nina warhurst. our headlines today: another blow for borisjohnson as the brexit minister, lord frost, resigns, saying he is concerned about the government's direction of travel. omicron cases continue to surge in the uk as a major incident is declared in london. the mayor of london says he is extremely concerned. he is warning that hospitals like this one face a difficult christmas. eastenders actor rose ayling—ellis dazzles on the dancefloor to become

the first deaf contestant to win strictly.