‘Bristol24/7’s journalism relies on the wonderful support of our members’

It’s a typically busy day at Bristol24/7 HQ when I sit down with Editor Martin Booth over a flat white.

In a reversal of usual proceedings, it will be Martin being interviewed today, telling me exactly what it’s like being a journalist in Bristol.

He also talks about the crucial role that our members play in keeping Bristol24/7’s content local, honest and independent.

Meg: There have been a lot of things in the news recently like journalists being deported from the USA, journalists’ phones being tapped, a lack of funding due to the pandemic. Is there a scary side of being a journalist?

Martin: Before I published a photograph of me being held tightly on either side by two riot police, I made sure to give my mum a call! I said, ‘look, there’s a story with quite a worrying picture but don’t worry, I was released’. The fact that I was targeted on a night where other journalists across the city were also targeted is a worrying trend that I did not think I would be seeing in Bristol. This is the first year that I’ve seen fellow journalists go to jobs with a security guard with them.

We put our content out there and we need to be questioned on what we do, but I’ve seen journalists be physically threatened and that’s not the way to do things. Journalists have been under threat as never before, under physical threat. That is a very worrying scenario. I’m not saying that I wear a flak jacket underneath my cycling top but I did wear a helmet to some of the kill the bill protests because I had bottles flying over my head and fireworks exploding at my feet.

Someone came up to me the other day and said, ‘you’re a war reporter’. I was taken aback but on reflection, it’s an apt description of some of the events we have recently witnessed in Bristol. Myself and my fellow journalists, we were very much on the front line during the riots. If we had not have been there, then the stories and videos and first hand testimonies would not have been able to be told and shared around the world.

How did you get into journalism in the first place?

I’m lucky enough to have always known that I wanted to be a journalist, ever since I was at school. I always thought I was going to be a sports journalist; I still do sports journalism for Bristol24/7 and am very proud of the close relationship that we have with Bristol Rovers Women’s, aka the Gas Girls, who carry our logo on their shorts. I came to Bristol to be a reporter on the Evening Post and came to Bristol24/7 via a blog that I founded that was very much entertainment and culture based, a bit quirky – a lot of things that are still very much at the heart of Bristol24/7. I was and have been the Editor since day one.

We have such a range of national newspapers in the UK. Why is local news important?

People want to know what’s happening at the end of their street; what their neighbours are up to. The pandemic has really showed people the opportunities that are within their local neighbourhoods. I’ve worked on the foreign desk of a national newspaper covering the entire planet. Bristol24/7 is still telling the most amazing stories, just from within the BS postcode.

I think I already know the answer to this, but are there financial challenges facing independent journalism? 

Well, yes: how do you make independent journalism profitable? For a long time, people have been working out how to fund journalism. It’s an incredibly exciting time because no one really knows what they’re doing, everyone is trying to find these new models. Bristol24/7s model is a fantastic one, being able to have the support of our members is absolutely crucial to what we do.

One of the best aspects of Bristol24/7 is that we’re a community interest company so we invest any profits back into our journalism and our social impact projects. We give young journalists opportunities through our work experience programmes. I love it when we get people through the doors who want to be a journalist and we can help give them that first taste. Osob Elmi is a brilliant journalist who came in to do work experience with us in the early days of Bristol24/7. She was quite nervous and quiet, but came out of the week with a real understanding of what it was like to be a journalist. She went off to do a journalism degree, has worked for the BBC World Service and is now a broadcast journalist with BBC News. A story like that makes me inordinately proud to work for Bristol 24/7.

Osob Elmi did a week’s work experience with Bristol24/7 and now works for the BBC – photo: Osob Elmi

Does Bristol24/7 tell the truth? 

I think it’s the job of journalists to tell the truth. If we didn’t tell the truth, we wouldn’t be trusted, we wouldn’t be – hopefully – people’s first point of call for their news within our city. I think it’s incredibly important that we retain that integrity. Truthfulness is a huge part of it. So do we tell the truth? Well, we certainly strive to tell the truth, and if we make a mistake we would hold our hands up and apologise because that’s also telling the truth. We’re only human.

What is your role in local politics?

One of the key roles of local journalism is to shine a light on local politics. We don’t want city governance to happen behind closed doors. With thanks to our colleagues at the Local Democracy Reporting Service, we try our best to report what happens at City Hall. If local journalism isn’t there, we would not know what the people governing our city are talking about. We need to hold them to account.

Whose voices and opinions does Bristol24/7 care about?

Everyone’s. I want to see Bristol as a city, as a population, reflected within our opinion pieces. If someone’s got something opinionated to say, then I would respect their opinion. I think that that’s the crux of it really. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been elected by thousands of people or you’ve just moved to the city and you want to say something about the bus service, I want opinion pieces to cause discussion and promote debate. I respect anyone with thoughtful comments to make, with integrity and who care about our city.

Martin Booth (right) interviewing Aaron Onuora, the co-owner of Hidden Corner in St Paul’s – photo: Sophia Khan

What does being independent actually mean?

The very obvious example is not being told what to do by anybody. Our journalists are not told what to write, I would never dream of telling anybody what opinion piece they should write or what line to take. Our opinion pieces certainly aren’t unbiased but I would want the thoughts and feelings to be reflected across our pages. We’re not under the thumb of any bigger organisation. We’ve got a tremendous amount of editorial freedom.

Why do so many news publications rely on members and subscribers?

I think that it’s incredibly dangerous being reliant on huge corporations. One of the things I value most about my own editorial freedom is that I make sure that I stay well away from those sales conversations because our independence is crucial. We wouldn’t be where we are without the people that read us, listen to us, support us. The more we can work with our members and the more we listen to our members will be for the benefit of Bristol24/7, and it will be for the benefit of Bristol as a city.

What would Bristol look like without Bristol24/7?

It would be a less fun and informed place. One of the things that I always try to show through the pages of Bristol24/7 is a sense of fun. We live in a fantastic city. Saying that, we don’t look at the city through rose-tinted glasses; it’s really important to speak truthfully about some of the problems. From holiday hunger to housing, there are a whole range of problems and we’d be pulling the wool over our readers’ eyes if we just painted a picture of Bristol being the best city ever. We celebrate Bristol while also questioning Bristol. Hopefully we have become part of the fabric of the city. Everyone could absolutely cope without us being there but I think we are an extremely important part of the mix.

If Bristol24/7’s membership grew, what would that enable you to do?

I would love to have reporters embedded within every single neighbourhood. I think our community reporters scheme is such an important part of what we do, but we run that on extremely limited resources. We’re very proud of it, but truthfully speaking we’ve got a very small number of people covering very small areas of Bristol. If we had more resources, we could tell even more stories from our city. The more members we have, the more stories that will be able to be told.

Is there anything you’d like to say to Bristol24/7 readers?

Being a journalist in Bristol is an honour. It’s a city that sometimes never sleeps – sometimes I never sleep. Bristol always has fantastic stories and I want to take this opportunity to say a huge thank you to everybody who reads, listens to, opens Bristol24/7. We would not be able to do what we do without the support of our members.

Become a Bristol24/7 member for just £5 a month. You’ll be supporting our independent journalism, helping us shape a better Bristol and you’ll get exclusive access to freebies, discounts and competitions.