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Phil prepares to leave the Globe

The Wirral Globe looks set to get a new editor as Phil Fleming prepares to leave the paper.

Phil, (51), has been group editor for the Wirral Globe and Messenger series for the past three years and has worked in newspapers for more than 30.

But earlier this year he decided to leave it all behind to set up a family business with his two sons.

He said: “We were planning to buy a shop. One of my sons is coming out of the Navy and the other doesn’t enjoy his job, so we thought a shop would keep the three of us busy.

“However they put the price up so that isn’t going ahead now. But I’m not worried, I have a few ideas but nothing concrete – and I’m not too proud to push trolleys at Tesco’s!”

Phil began his journalism career in 1969 as a trainee reporter at the Lancashire Evening Post. As a senior reporter he worked as a “fire engine chaser” covering the Lake District.

After 10 years at the Evening Post he took a change of pace, moving to the weekly Westmorland Gazette as a sub-editor.

“After working on an evening paper I found it a bit slow,” said Phil.

“I didn’t really get used to it, but I wanted to stay in the Lakes so my hobby became applying for jobs.”

Despite the slower pace, Phil stayed with weekly papers and in 1982 he was appointed deputy editor of the Leamington Spa Courier, becoming editor of the Daventry Express later that year.

After three years at the helm in Daventry Phil moved back up North to launch the Macclesfield and Wilmslow Messengers, two new editions of the Newsquest-owned series of newspapers.

Since then he has stayed with the group, becoming editor of the series’s flagship title, the Sale and Altrincham Messenger in 1989 and group editor of the series in 1997.

For the past three years he has been group editor of the Wirral Globe and Messenger series and now the search is on for a new editor of the Globe, to work alongside Messenger editor Lynn Hughes.

Phil said: “In 30 years I’ve never done a day’s work – I’ve always enjoyed the job and it has been good fun turning in every day.

“There have been some vast changes at the Globe and more are planned, so I’m sorry not to be seeing the job through. But the paper is in a good position for someone to take over.

“I still care about it and will still be reading the paper.

“I’m open-minded about the future and I have no plans to retire!”

  • The Globe is one of the UK’s largest and longest established free weekly papers, with 141,000 copies distributed every Wednesday.

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