A multi-award-winning journalist who left a weekly newspaper on Friday after eight years has hailed a campaign to change the drug-driving laws as his proudest achievement there.
As previously reported on HTFP, chief reporter Gareth Davies opted to take voluntary redundancy from the Croydon Advertiser amid a restructure by new owner Trinity Mirror.
In a farewell piece, Gareth, who has won the Weekly Reporter of the Year award at the Regional Press Awards for the past four years, highlighted some of the campaigning work he has undertaken with the newspaper.
During his time there, the Advertiser’s Lillian’s Law campaign successfully brought about a change to the drug-driving laws, following the death of schoolgirl Lillian Groves at the hands of a driver who took cannabis before getting behind the wheel.
The paper was also successful in helping to catch an arsonist who burnt down a furniture store in Croydon during the 2011 riots.
Gareth also recently secured a notable victory for press freedom after the police agreed to revoke a harassment order issued against him for doorstepping a convicted fraudster.
Wrote Gareth: “All this was far from what I expected when I took a job at the Croydon Advertiser in August 2008. I had just finished training as a journalist and there were no jobs available so I decided to apply to work in the first place that sounded like there might be news.
“I remember being apprehensive when I stepped off the train at East Croydon for the first time. I’d heard the jokes and read the stories. The best part of a decade later I’m proud to call Croydon my home.
“The town has changed a lot during that time; it’s no longer a byword for teenage knife crime or – whisper it – failed developments. Progress is in the air, though much work remains to be done to make sure this new-found potential doesn’t go to waste and, just as importantly, is shared by all.”
“Sadly, it will no longer be my job to help make sure that happens. It’s been a privilege writing about Croydon for the Advertiser; I’ve loved pretty much every minute.
“It’s rarely felt like work, as if being paid to talk to people and write down what they say was somehow cheating. I feared someone would realise as much and make me do a “real” job. Fortunately no one ever did.
“Croydon is more than just one of the best news patches in the country; it’s one of the best places too. I’m not exactly sure what I’ll do without it.”
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I’m afraid Gareth has become something of a self publicist. Now is the time for him to stop the repeated tales of his stories – and for htfp to stop promoting him with continued articles.
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Hardly a self-publicist. He made news for his work, his awards, and his issues with the police. He’ll be missed at his paper.
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Observer50 – I was asked by my editor to write something about my time at the paper. Initially I said no, because I thought it might come across in the way you’ve interpreted it, but eventually I agreed because I wanted to say how much I’d loved the job and I thought I might regret not doing it. I didn’t ask HTFP to write something about it. As for being a self-publicist, I guess I’ll probably have to become one now I haven’t got a job.
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All we need is for Peter Barron to comment on this and HTFP will have ticked all its boxes
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Best of luck Gareth.
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One of the best journalists in Britain. His departure is a colossal own goal for the Advertiser.
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I don’t know this fellow personally.
But I have noticed that his name always seems to bring out the worst in some people who make comments on this site.
It would seem to me that a good few aspects of his career have been genuinely newsworthy.
So why shouldn’t he have been featured?
I’ve said it before: the comments strand on this site is steadily venturing beyond the bounds of fair comment and is in fact, becoming far too snarky.
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The sad fact he won’t be missed. The loss of talented people like him is just met with a shrug of the shoulders. That’s why story-finding and well crafted stories in weekly papers are rare.
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Gareth will now hopefully be featuring on other websites as a national journalist, something some of us have expected for a while. Good luck, sir; you won’t miss the embittered Observer50 at any rate. I wonder what their problem is.
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Some ridiculous comments on here. Gareth is a talented young men doing his job well. Peter Barron is a talented old man who has always done the job the right way. Isn’t that what we want?
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Go get ’em, Gareth. You are a REAL journalist whose talents will find a market. The big regionals ought to be gagging for your services.
The nationals? Not so sure – they don’t need proper reporters to write about Kim Kardashian’s boobies. And I suspect celebrity trash is not your scene.
Anyway, have a great future – you deserve it. Forget the naysayers – a bit of self-promotion doesn’t go amiss in the newspaper business.
If I were still editing, I’d snap you up. Damn good operator, as we used to say in the old days.
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Gareth,
Did your departure from the Advertiser have anything to do with the Press Gazette interview you did where you criticised local papers for allowing advertising departments to hold the whip hand over editorial departments and called them to pay journalists more?
Or was that all a spectacular coincidence?
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The future is high quality independents Gareth, the regionals are all on the ropes going round in circles trying to monetise web and grasping hold of what few paper buyers remain and all with very limited sell by dates so an opportune time to jump ship.
The emergence of some truly superb local targeted lifestyle magazines across the uk has come on the back of the better regional journalists making the switch.
Plenty of work for talented people so good luck in all you do in the future
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