Is that Royal News?

Nothing provokes irritation in viewers more than a story they don’t care about leading the news. Nothing seems to do that with a particular set of viewers quite like a Royal story and the engagement of William and Kate was typical. Judging from twitter and the liveblog a vocal section were furious that other news was relegated down the running order, or that Channel 4 News would cover a Royal engagement at all. Well in all honesty it was discussed through the day at Channel 4 News, and up until lunchtime wasn’t the lead story on the draft running order. The revelation that Britain was to pay millions in compensation to the former Guantanamo detainees was up there. That’s the kind of awkward story we like to dig away at. And my worry all day was what ‘bad news’ was going to be slipped out in the gush of Royal excitement that might just get missed.

But the government did not reveal a great deal about the Guantanamo deal that we didn’t know already (which was rather the government’s strategy in the whole story), the juggernaut of the Royal romance grew all day and the admittedly bizarre decision to call in ITV News (on air at 6.30pm) to perform the engagement interview but then embargo it until 7pm was the clincher. Unseen material on the story much of Britain is talking about is a pretty big reason to lead on anything. We couldn’t really say we had that about any other story.

Is a Royal engagement ‘tittle tattle’? Well it isn’t ‘life and death’. It has a celebrity feel to it, certainly. And we didn’t want that usual cast list of Royal watchers and former PR people coming on to talk about the dress and whether Elton John or Sean Combs should sing at the ceremony. But a Royal wedding of the future King has big cultural and political reverberations. On a simple level it matters to huge sections of the country, who will come out in their thousands and millions and stage street parties, or come to London or watch avidly on their televisions. Beyond that it matters whether or not William and Kate can strike a chord with Britain and help modernise the monarchy and keep it relevant to ordinary people. That is important as long as Britain has the constitutional arrangement it has.

In the distant past Channel 4 News had an editorial policy essentially to ignore the Royal family whenever possible. Even a story such as the Windsor Castle fire in 1992 provoked a newsroom debate about whether this was something Channel 4 News should go big on. But the disintegration of the Royal marriages and the annus horribilis put paid to the notion that the Royals could be ignored. The death of Diana and what happened afterwards reinforced that. Our criteria on such stories now are simpler (although equally subjective perhaps) – is it new?  Does it matter? Do we think enough people care? Is there a bigger question about Britain to explore in this?

As we roll towards the wedding itself there will be an awful lot of coverage across the media in general, and magazines and newspapers and iPad apps will be sold on the back of all manner of related stories. Our test will be to discern the ‘tittle tattle’ from the important stuff – and with apologies to those who were sincerely cross I’d say the engagement was a ‘must do’. Whether or not it was a lead is always a matter of opinion, and there is no correct answer. But the success of the marriage will have direct impact on whether or not the monarchy itself survives. It isn’t like any other romance – apart from the need for them to carry public support for the monarchy with them William and Kate will also one day be expected to produce their own heir to the throne. Of course if they do that too quickly the talk of “born to rule” might start to sound a bit hollow as long as great grandma is still wearing the crown.