Let the public mood be the guide

All journalism is about judgment - what news to give the public and how to give it to them. That's true in newspapers. It's true in radio. But above all, it is true in television news, where the balance between what to report and how to report it, is at its most crucial. In the first few hours of the coverage of the death of the Queen Mother, the BBC's judgment failed.

The immediate issue is whether Peter Sissons should or should not have been wearing a black tie. There is no question in my mind that he should have done so. What is more, when the advice came down from on high that he need not wear one - despite the fact that such a tie is always available in the BBC News studio, we are told - Mr Sissons should simply have worn one anyway. He is a very old hand at all this. His seniority alone allowed him to make his own judgment as to what was fitting.

Why is such a seemingly trivial matter so important? It comes back to that judgment between what the news audience wants and expects, and what those in charge of bringing the news to that audience thinks it ought to have.

Hard and fast rules are impossible. Sometimes, for example, violent scenes are simply too shocking to show. On other occasions, it is the violence itself which makes the most telling point. On this occasion, however, the judgment should have been easy. Wearing a black tie as a mark of respect for those who have passed away is still a deeply ingrained custom in this country. You only have to go to a family funeral, as I did within the past week, to see how many people still hold to the practice. You only had to go to church on Easter Sunday to see, even there, how many people had put on black ties.

Among the younger generation, the habit may be less common, but the BBC seriously misjudged the mood of the nation by assuming that what the young do is what should have guided it. Far better to err on the side of a bit of oldfashioned respect, and to side with that huge part of the audience which, as a recent study has shown, is over the age of 50 and which watches the news more regularly than any other age group. The incident, though, raises deeper questions about who knows best.

Over the past two or three years, I have been among the harshest critics of ITV and its decision to downgrade the status of News at Ten. In the course of that debate, I have praised BBC Television News for the standards it has generally maintained for its flagship bulletins. However, over the years, BBC Television News has had a devastating blind spot when it comes to the royal family.

From the start, it adopted a "holier than thou" approach to Princess Diana. At ITN we covered her activities a great deal, since it was clear from the very start that she was striking an enormous chord with the public.

Just under two years ago, the BBC made another terrible error when it failed to transmit live coverage of the Queen Mother's 100th birthday pageant. ITV leapt at the chance to do so, and commanded a huge audience as a result. Now the BBC has done it again. So let them now do two things. Let them admit that on this matter of the black ties they got it wrong. They should say sorry, not just for their errors of presentation, but also for the more general signs of panicky lack of editorial judgment when the news of the Queen Mother's death first broke.

Secondly, let them, in future, follow the natural instincts of the public, rather than their own "we know best" agenda. If the BBC can get it right in the United States on days like 11 September, it is astonishing that they can get it so wrong here at home at a time of national grief for a much-loved public figure.

During my years at ITN, we always put aside our own inclinations at such moments, and realised that it was our duty to reflect the public mood on such occasions rather than to try and shape it.

The next time, I urge Peter Sissons and everyone like him at the BBC to let the public be their guide and to call for, and put on, immediately and without hesitation, that black tie.