Just over a year ago, my blog on the subbing howlers made by what I called Newsquest’s ‘hub of horrors’ in Wales attracted more than 70 comments.
Several were from hard-pressed subs arguing that the content they received was so poor to start with they had little chance of correcting everything.
As we know, Newsquest has continued to export production to its centralised unit in Newport, and now one of its senior subs has started a blog-style internal email series headed ‘Damned reporters!’, sharing examples of sloppy copy the hub faces every day.
The sub launched the tirade in December with the note: ‘I will share with you a slap in the face for all those people who have criticised this hub. Steve Dyson, are you watching?’
So popular was the first 3,641-word missive – sent to scores of sub-editor colleagues and several bosses – that two more collections of reporters’ gaffes have been emailed this year, each averaging around 4,000-words in length.
And although the sub’s remark was probably an in-joke, it ended up that I was watching – after a Newsquest insider leaked the email-blogs to Dyson at Large.
For journalists, especially old-school subs, they make for a fascinating read, but I can hardly republish all 12,000 words.
So here are just a few edited portions – minus the details of alleged offending reporters who were named and shamed to Newport colleagues. To start with, straightforward factual errors (with the sub’s comments in italics):
- ‘A report by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums released in August revealed the zoo houses several reptiles fighting off extinction. They include a frog that doesn’t croak…’ South Wales Argus. Frogs are not reptiles!
- ‘Marine Brentley, who is still undergoing rehabilitation and is due to be discharged from the Army next year…’ Telegraph & Argus. Since when were the Royal Marines part of the Army?
- ‘A TONGE in the Haulgh nursery in Bolton has been told it must improve standards…’, Bolton News. The place is Tonge with the Haulgh, not ‘in’.
Next up, badly-written sentences with meanings that surely weren’t meant:
- ‘Ali Al-Habsi, who will be in action for Oman against Korea this January, also represented his country at the 2007 Asian Cup whilst wearing Wanderers colours.’ Bolton News. He’d have stuck out like a sore thumb if he was really wearing Bolton colours while playing for Oman.
- ‘Working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, left little time anything else, especially sport.’ South Wales Argus. In Wales, do people not bother to eat or sleep? And working 24/7 would not leave ANY time for other things, not little time.
- ‘And a car overturned in New Lane, in Oswaldtwistle, after a driver started sliding down the road.’ Lancashire Telegraph. The sentence suggests that a driver exited his or her vehicle and slid along the road on his or her backside, prompting this car to overturn.
- ‘All three members of the family went to Royal Bolton Hospital to be checked over, but miraculously escaped without injuries.’ Bolton News. Apparently the Royal Bolton Hospital injures its patients on a regular basis… and locks them in!
And now for reporters who seemed to lack care and attention when reporting on crime, or from courts:
- ‘Police have arrested one of the men responsible for the break-ins with a second now being hunted.’ Bolton News. All too often I come across instances of reporters convicting suspects before trial.
- ‘Man, 67, held in police paedo swoop,’ Crewe & Nantwich Guardian. A suggested headline condemning him, before trial, as a paedophile. Quote marks around the word ‘paedo’, please.
- ‘A MAN has admitted taking a taxi, while over the drink-drive limit.’ Northern Echo. It would seem the man featured in this court case has done nothing wrong. After all, the police urge you to take a taxi if you’ve been drinking…
- ‘Daly’s barrister, David McGonigal, said he had been addicted to heroin for more than 20 years.’ Telegraph & Argus. An apparently-naughty solicitor – a drug addict for 20 years!
- ‘A FORMER government computer boffin facing jail for building up a library of sickening photos of child abuse killed himself hours before appearing in court.’ Northern Echo. There was a corpse in the dock, according to this story.
- ‘Defending, Michael Davies, said he was remorseful for his actions and that he has offered to immediately pay back £10,000 after his parents agreed to loan him the money.’ Warrington Guardian. Here we have what is apparently another naughty solicitor.
- ‘Prosecutor Neil Usher said he was “a weak and selfish man who regularly drank too much” and this led to temptation when boys were in his care.’ Bolton News. The reporter’s sentence [suggests] that the prosecutor is weak, selfish and is tempted to abuse boys!
Other reporters were guilty of not knowing their homophones, or not understanding that similar words mean different things:
- ‘Deryl Whittaker, the school’s principle, said…’ Bolton News. What makes this one so bad is that the word concerned is one of those whose spelling is drummed into journalists.
- ‘Every time any concerns were brought up about the plan it was poo-poo’d.’ Knutsford Guardian. Novel spelling of pooh-poohed.
- ‘London Grammer’s Wicked Game is simply stunning, just as haunting as Chris Isaac’s original.’ Bolton News. Oh the irony of being unable to spell pop group London Grammar’s name! They can’t spell Chris Isaak either…
- ‘A RUNCORN soldier, who served in Iraq, hung himself two days before his close friend’s funeral, an inquest in Warrington heard on Monday.’ Runcorn & Widnes World. Everyone knows that a picture is hung and a person is hanged, don’t they?
- ‘Wednesday and Thursday will see daytime temperatures rising to highs of 6c and 11c respectfully across the region with heavy rain forecast for Thursday.’ Lancashire Telegraph. ‘Respectively’, not ‘respectfully’.
- ‘But immigration officers interrupted the ceremony at Blackburn Registry Office and arrested Shahzad, Ottlyk and Baloggojkovitsne.’ Bolton News. There is no such thing. It’s a register office.
- ‘The pool is complimented by a walk-in shower area, steam room…’ The Herald. Failing to know the difference between ‘complimented’ and ‘complemented’ is shocking.
And there were a variety of ‘and also’ tautologies and other repetitions (did you see what I did there?):
- ‘Miss McIntosh, chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee (EFRA) said the committee is likely to question the FSA, when representatives of the government agency are due to appear before the committee in the near future.’ The Northern Echo. Three instances of ‘committee’.
- ‘A MUM-of three suffered burns after accidentally setting herself on fire in front of her three children.’ Bolton News. Clearly, a mum of three has three children.
- ‘It is believed that weekly paid staff received payment last week for their work in February but monthly paid staff, who were paid at the end of January, will not receive any payment for their work this month.’ Bolton News. Three instances of ‘paid’ and two of ‘payment’ in the same sentence. Groan!
Finally, I just loved bloopers that were described as ‘general ghastliness’ by the email-blog:
- ‘Nineteen honorary doctorates at the Chancellor’s — Rt Hon Sir Ernest Ryder — Installation Ceremony, each one acknowledging a decade in the history of the university.’ Bolton News. The worst sentence I’ve had the dubious pleasure of reading since arriving at Newport.
- ‘The event on December 6 will be preceded the night before by a professionals opening attended by…’ Bolton News. Why not just say ‘On December 5, there will be a….’?
- ‘His body was found on the ground by police hidden in trees at Pennington Flash Country Park on July 1.’ Lancashire Telegraph. Were police officers hiding in trees, or was the body hidden there?
- ‘Lennon saw his side enjoy just 11 per cent of possession at Parkhead and withstand a barrage of 25 shots on target compared to a solitary three…’ Bolton News. Solitary means one – ‘a solitary three’ is bizarre.
- ‘The retired roofer’s daughter-in-law Sandy said she remembered how alongside family, weightlifting and karate were Mr Ainsworth’s number one priority.’ Lancashire Telegraph. You can have only one number-one priority.
When I contacted the email-blogger — who I’m not naming — my request for further comment on what were described as “unofficial documents” was politely declined.
But as well as being a morale-booster for estranged Newport subs, I think the collection of errors forms a brilliant resource for reporters.
It’s just a shame that such learned advice can no longer be given face-to-face in most Newsquest centres.
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This rather makes a mockery of the idea that the subbing hub is to blame for all the things you’ve blamed it for over the last year, Steve.
As for ‘shame this advice can no longer be given in person,’ is it too much to assume a reporter knows the difference between respectfully and respectively? Can you name any other industry where it is acceptable for someone to make a basic mistake, and then that industry pay for a whole tier of staff to be on the look out for mistakes?
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Maybe those of us writing these stories should start sharing the utterly dreadful headlines the subs put on them. One splash involving a pregnant woman who’d been hit by a car came back with ‘Unborn baby in hit and run drama’.
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Let he without a sin cast the first stone.
Surely it is part of the subs job to catch errors.
If reporters were perfect we wouldn’t need subs.
“unborn baby in hit and run drama”, brilliant headline!
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The system on my JP paper: Rookie reporter, unqualified and probably unsupervised, places unchecked story into template, cutting it or padding it to fit pre-designed shape (added source of error). It is now on page, complete with legals, typos, crap grammar etc.
Someone usually called a content editor who doesn’t edit all the content but is a glorified progress chaser supposedly checks the copy on the page before sending page off for printing. That’s all folks!
Travel back to JP a few years ago before Ashley Highfield:
Rookie reporter submits copy to news editor or editor.(CHECK ONE) Editor returns for rewrite or sends on to sub editor (Check TWO). Pages are printed out and distributed among senior reporters (CHECK THREE). Subs make corrections and send off pages.
There is a variation for the web sites. No checks at all before sending copy out to world.
And it is not just rookies making the errors!
No wonder subbing hubs have such sport with reporters!
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The hub would have even more fun with submitted sports copy, which appears to be completely unchecked before being plopped on a page.
On my JP paper, which has has no sports ed or reporters and relies on 100 per cent submitted (FREE!) copy it is not unusual for reports never to mention the final score or even say whether it is a football or rugby team playing. Chuck that lot to a subbing hub and see what they make of it. Nightmare to read.
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Fare enough, I suppose, but I’m against these sorts of articles in principal as we all make misteaks. Hubs can only sub what they’re given.
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To be fair there’s nothing new in this kind of thing. I recall an office I worked at that had a dusty file of old foolscap with some magnificent bloopers going back decades. The subs would get it out for a giggle sometimes.
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Er, doesn’t this anonymous blogger rather miss the point of his job?
Sifting out all the crap is supposed to be what a sub-editor actually does for a living.
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What a fascinating list of minor errors. Suggested headline: “Subs complain about doing their job”
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Be intriguing to see the future career path of the disillusioned sub who compiled the above gems. For their own peace of mind, I hope they are not long at the sub hub.
The wider issue though is about the level of training now given to journalists – before they are let loose to ‘create content’.
The MEN recently advertised one post, and the lengthy list of desired attributes included an understanding of SEO and social media, the ability to take pix, awareness of what stories were most attractive to readers, a passing interest in every conceivable topic of news and a willingness to work at weekends and outside traditional working hours.
All absolutely fine in 2015, it seems, but once of a day such an ad would also have required that applicants had been trained to NCTJ standards, had their shorthand certificates and relevant experience to underpin their theoretical qualifications.
It’s no wonder that subs (in Newport and elsewhere) are faced with a flood of illiterate, and often nonsensical, drivel when employers pay so little heed to the acquisition of core skills.
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This article makes an excellent case for bringing back/retaining subs – should be required reading for beancounters everywhere.
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Oh dear, the stones and glasshouses curse strikes again!
In the 4th item under the crime and courts heading, the reporter correctly identifies the barrister David McGonigal, but the sub’s comment refers to him as “an apparently-angry solicitor.”
There is a difference, you know. Ask any barrister!
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Oops! That should read “apparently-naughty.” See, it’s catching!!!
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Mr Dyson, what has happened to you?
Your earlier work, which lead to my becoming a fan, was an eloquent tirade directed at fresh faced graduates, many of whom starting their first job and (to paraphrase) in doing so undermining the entire press establishment and single-handedly causing many people to lose their jobs.
Where is the finger of blame Mr Dyson? It is sorely lacking.
Your one-man campaign against giving people a chance was admirable and harked back to a time when jobs were for the ignorant few.
I am disappointed Steve (may I call you Steve?). I am pulling down the shrine in my garden as we speak.
I can only suppose unwarranted finger-pointing and bickering have no place in ‘decent’ society these days. FOR SHAME.
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Considering how these subs constantly moan about their workload I’m surprised this guy even found time to churn out such a lengthy missive.
In my experience this subbing hub’s work ranged from the mediocre to abysmal and their sensitivity to criticism suggested they’d never had to deal with any of the flak, threats and general hassle most of us habitually have to put up with.
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When you consider the vast amount of information a reporter has to obtain, digest and translate into a story that the reader can understand it is little wonder mistakes are made. Subs are not immune either – botched subbing and headlines have cost newspapers dear. There is a churlish school of thought that subs are failed reporters.
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As a “grumpy old sub” I bawled out many a young reporter for the most clueless and stupid mistakes. One memorable one in 1990 was the report of an old soldier returning to the beaches of Dunkirk to commemorate 50th anniversary of the INVASION landings! He had no idea we were going the “other bloody way” at that time. Twenty years later I met him and one of his colleagues at a pub social and both thanked me for the b . . . . . .ings and said they had never forgotten my “educational methods”.
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This was hardly all the subs, green grads and all, gathering round having a right giggle and congratulating each other. More just the crusade of one man, I’d wager.
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I think you’ll find it should be ‘led’ not ‘lead’ bandwagoneer – a common reporters’ error.
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Did Bandwagoneer REALLY mean to write: “Your earlier work, which lead to my becoming a fan”?
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I for one am delighted that this “sub” – they’re actually called copy editors in Newport, don’t you know – is spending so much time compiling this regular email. It explains why we wait so long for stories to be subbed, only being marked as complete moments before deadline making it near impossible to change their awful headlines before publication.
My favourite headline of them all was on a racing review of the year. What pithy headline did the copy editors come up with for this feature?
“HORSE HAS A GOOD YEAR”
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Subns are supposed to be polishers, not first fix!
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Well the arrogance expressed here by Newport staff explains a lot! Yes reporters make mistakes, so also do subs, we all know this but the catastrophic nose dive in quality since the advent of the Sub Hub can lead to only one conclusion. That the staff there are hapless and poorly trained with little or no actual newsroom experience.
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The real point seems to be lacking here: that is that neither subs or reporters are better than each other but that both are important in the journalism process. The real culprits are the media corporations like Newsquest who proclaim “good enough” is the watchword for quality as they swing the axe on journalists’ jobs – yet pick out selected volunteers for making an example of when it goes wrong. Even if it is in their deepest recesses, the directors know quality counts but refuse to be willing to pay for it. Newport does not have the resources it needs for the gigantic and impossible job it has been given. Equally, reporters in the regions have a workload piled high from the redundancies of colleagues and extra tasks grafted on to their jobs such as engaging in social media. This is just asking for errors to occur to the detriment of the reputation of newspapers. Pitting worker against worker is exactly what the bosses want. Don’t be suckered into that game Steve.
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The industry employs subs who have no experience and couldn’t check a bus timetable.
And they are checking under-supervised young reporters who are OK at IT and useless at writing. What a combination.
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Given Chris Morley seems determined to try and make everyone believe there is no digital future in this industry, as demonstrated by his lamentable column in the otherwise excellent NUJ magazine, is he really the best placed person to comment on newsrooms, their structures, or the people running them? Anyone who really thinks that social media should be viewed as an extra task rather than a way of actually being better at your job shouldn’t be held up as someone fighting for journalism. help us all.
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So much puerile bitterness in these comments.
You’d do better to look at wider issues involved, rather than making swiping remarks at one and other.
Yes, subs and reporters should be in the same newsroom, though, the people above have decided that not to be the case. Neither side made the crucial decision. Warring solves nothing either, especially in the dismal days of regional news.
Embarrassed to read adults post such playground nonsense.
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Do managers care that the standard of English in local papers, especially weeklies, is probably the worst since papers began? Honestly , my weekly proclaims regularly the council are and regularly reports stuff like “there were less accidents”. Such basic stuff uncorrected.
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I really don’t often agree with the NUJ but Chris is right. Two sets of overworked, underpaid and underpraised staff bicker with each other. The pigs at Animal Farm will be snuffling with delight to hear it.
No one goes into work to do a bad job. If a service as a whole is poor then look at the system and the structure, not the individuals.
It’s only a small step but if I was on a paper I would send some thank you notes, at least the stuff is being done on time.
If I was in the hub, I too would try to create team spirit against a relentless tide of criticism. Someone mentioned that if there was a power cut in Newport, most of the papers wouldn’t get out. They are doing an amazing job really – who thought it might work?
This memo is no more controversial or unusual than a football manager pinning up a press cutting on the dressing room door … for goodness sake, guys, start to appreciate each other.
You’re all you’ve got. The suits don’t care.
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“His body was found on the ground by police hidden in trees … ”
This reminds me of a sentence I once read in a national, no less (which shall remain nameless) concerning “an art dealer who was arrested by police wearing only underpants”. Kinky cops, perhaps?
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My favourite headline (on a rushed propery page) was:
Looks like a bungalow.
We also forget that in the olden days, compositors sometimes had a hand in producing howlers. I recall one sub scrawling the splash heading “BIG DRIVE TO SAVE LEYLAND”. Inevitably, no-one spotted, until it was too late, that the comp had set: BIG DAVE TO SAVE LEYLAND.
This led a puce-faced editor to charge into the newsroom and demand to know: “Who the f*** is Big Dave?”.
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No matter what the medium, or the cause of changes in working practices, the reality of often inexperienced individuals having to cover a wider range of tasks than in the past, within an often rapidly changing working environment, means that for the sake of all stakeholders, more and stronger, not fewer and weaker (through staff being overstretched), checks are needed. It may be misplaced optimism but I get the impression that the word ‘subbing’ is starting to reappear in more job adverts – maybe the penny is dropping in some quarters, either that or I’m being delusional again.
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I agree with Chris, it is the publishers that are at fault.
The strain on the system was clear to me when I was made acting editor of a weekly paper a couple of years ago.
I had a tiny reporting staff who didn’t produce half the copy I needed to fill the editorial pages and the stories I did get were often arriving far too close to deadline due to the time spent travelling to and from the patch (our branch office having already been shut).
Scarcely having time to check copy I had to send it across to an over stretched two-man subbing hub, working remotely, who were juggling three other substantial weekly titles and needed to plough through as much content early in the news cycle as possible
I took to taking pages home to proof knowing many would be literally riddled with errors. But of course come press day and the front 10 pages, time was up and it was a case of just praying there wouldn’t be any major mistakes.
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Re. ‘Big Dave to Save Leyland’, I once handwrote a bill poster to be typed up that said ‘Meningitis alert at city hospital’. If I hadn’t checked before it went out, it would have hit the streets as ‘Men in tights alert at city hospital’!
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My favourite headline howler (which actually made it into print) was in an astronomy article many years ago and read: “New Way to See Uranus.”
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Out now. You summed it all up beautifully. Just cobbling together papers. I am reading my own local weekly. The cracks show everywhere, sadly.
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As a deputy chief sub on a national, I can confirm that the standard of copy submitted by both staff and agency reporters is often dire – not so much the spelling and grammar (the correction of which, as a few people have pointed out, is indeed part of ‘our job’), but the actual facts and figures of a story. I’ve had writers confuse 3% with a third, one who managed to file the ‘scoop’ that a rural council area had a higher murder rate than Glasgow (it turned out he had added that police division’s figures to those of the neighbouring division, then compared them with only one of the city’s three divisions), and someone just today who confidently asserted that Britons drink 60 billion cups of tea a day. Another vehemently defended his ‘fact’ that a man had suffered an ‘invertebral prolapse’ (which of course meant he did not have a spine, which then prolapsed anyway), while several file their stories under such obscure catchlines (‘scotsversio’ is a favourite) that finding them in the first place takes longer than to sub them. No, we are not perfect; of course we aren’t, and I have indeed had to improve some horrendous headlines (‘Knife stuck in head’ was one such), but if you want your straw spun into gold, the shinier it is to begin with, the better it will turn out.
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I presume publication of a similar dossier exposing subbing errors, factually inaccurate or hopeless headlines, incorrect captions, wrongly-used pictures etc will be the subject of Mr Dyson’s next post.
Or are the damned reporters too busy actually working all hours to have time for such bitter, pathetic larking about?
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This week, browsing through one of the local papers that I used to work for, I discovered that a café owner had been fined for “flaunting health laws”. That was down to the reporter, and to the recently-established subbing hub.
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> incorrect captions, wrongly-used pictures etc will be the subject of Mr Dyson’s next post.
If it is, I hope he realises what you don’t: hub subs don’t touch pictures and don’t create captions.
I don’t see any merit in a tit-for-tat blame game.This original emails were never intended to be shared with the world: they were just one person’s collection, shared with colleagues.
When there are 1,000+ stories in the subbing queue, not every headline will be well-crafted. Just as over-stretched reporters will word things clumsily.
Sweeping generalisations about subs (or reporters) as some homogeneous mass don’t help, either.
But, if you are going to bash Newport subs, at least let it be for things we actually do.
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Confused said: ” Can you name any other industry where it is acceptable for someone to make a basic mistake, and then that industry pay for a whole tier of staff to be on the look out for mistakes?”
It most industries it is called ‘quality control’. For example, I sincerely hope may car was made by a company with “a whole tier of staff to be on the look out for mistakes”.
Most industries would be shocked at how little quality control there now is in newspapers (eg stuff going straight to web with nobody else looking at it first).
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The last gasp of newspapers.
When subs are too far removed from reporters and the newsroom it will always spell trouble. People who devise these set-ups rarely have a clue about newspapers. Proper communication is the key.
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Grammar Police and Old Sub stand up please and hang you heads in shame.
recently-established subbing hub.
wrongly-used pictures.
They do not take hyphens.
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Yep, hang you heads in shame guys!
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