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Name: John Sergeant
Field:
Broadcaster
Productions:
An Audience With John Sergeant
An Audience with Peter and Dan Snow
An Audience With Arthur Smith
An Audience with Nicholas Owen
Biography: John Sergeant is Political Editor for ITV News. Last year he reported on his fifth General Election campaign – his first for ITN.
John was voted the Best Individual Television Contributor of the Year at the Voice of the Listener and Viewer Awards for 1999.
John was the BBC's chief political correspondent from 1992-2000. He joined the corporation as a radio reporter in 1970 and covered stories in more than 25 countries. He worked as a war correspondent in Vietnam, Cyprus, Israel, and Rhodesia. He also regularly reported from Northern Ireland.
For two years he covered European affairs and the first sessions of the directly elected European Parliament. He wrote and presented a BBC TV documentary series called 'The Europe We Joined'. He has also, at times, presented all the main current affairs programmes on Radio 4, including Today and The World at One. In 1981 he became a political correspondent for television and radio.
Before joining the BBC news team John appeared, in 1966, in the award-winning BBC TV comedy series On the Margin with Alan Bennett. Alan chose him from the cast of the Oxford University comedy revue at the Edinburgh Festival. He went back to journalism the year after and spent three years as a reporter on the Liverpool Echo before coming to London to join the BBC in 1970.
John Sergeant’s career in light entertainment lay dormant for many years while he built up his image as a serious political correspondent. Among his notable journalistic achievements was his encounter with Margaret Thatcher at the Paris Embassy days before she resigned as Prime Minister in 1990. He won a British Press Guild award for the most memorable broadcast of the year.
John's comedy career was revived in 1998 when he appeared in an edition of Have I Got News For You on BBC 2. Ian Hislop said recently he had been one of the funniest guests in the history of the programme.
He has been married for over 30 years to Mary who is Head of the Sixth Form at Notting Hill and Ealing High School. They have two grown up sons who are both working in television.
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