Toby, left, succeeds Dave Murdock, who left in the summer to join the PR agency started by former Bournemouth Echo editor Gareth Weekes.

It is the third editorship for the 35-year-old father-of-one who edited both the Wiltshire Times and before that London Docklands weekly The Wharf before taking up his current role in Oxford.

He told HoldtheFrontPage: "I am absolutely thrilled to be joining the Dorset Echo. It is a terrific paper and I've got a raft of plans and ideas which will hopefully take its success to new heights."

Added Toby: "It has the added bonus of being in one of the most beautiful places in the world. My wife and two-year-old daughter are just as delighted as I am to be moving to live by the sea."

He is already looking ahead to 2012 when the Olympic sailing will be based in Weymouth. "It will be a real boost for the newspaper and its readers," he said.

Toby spent two years editing The Wharf, winning the Press Gazette weekly newspaper of the year title in the process, before moving to the Wiltshire Times where he also spent two years.

He will join the Newsquest-owned Echo on January 1.

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