CHAIR: PETER YORK Peter York published a series of essays in social and cultural observation in the magazine Harpers & Queen during the late 1970s. Written in the style of Wolfe's new journalism, these were collected in the book Style Wars (1980). Following the enormous success of The Official Sloane Ranger Handbook (1982) Peter became a sought-after media commentator on English social trends and traits. A further collection of essays, Modern Times, was published in 1984. Peter York's Eighties (1995), co-authored with Charles Jennings, was both a book and a BBC television series.

CHRIS ATKINS  is a British documentary-maker. His films include Starsuckers (2009), an attack on celebrity culture which involved Atkins and his researchers selling fake stories to Britain's tabloid press, and Taking Liberties (2007), a polemic against the New Labour government's record on civil liberties. This summer he fooled the tabloid press (and the BBC) about the prevalence of urban foxes.

 

BILL HAGERTY was an assistant editor on all three of the Mirror Group’s titles – the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and The People. Leaving the Group in 1985, he ran the features department and then the Sunday edition of Today newspaper before rejoining Mirror Group in 1987 as deputy editor of the Sunday Mirror. He filled the same role at the Daily Mirror before editing The People, 1991-92.Since 2002 he has edited the British Journalism Review, He is currently editing Alastair Campbell’s Downing Street diaries for publication.

 

BRIDGET ROWE worked for a succession of magazines: 19, Petticoat, Club, Look Now and Woman's World, before becoming Assistant Editor of The Sun, then editor of "Sunday", the News of the World's magazine. In 1986, Rowe became editor of Woman's Own, then edited TV Times. Rowe edited the Sunday Mirror from 1991 to 1992, then moved to edit The People. In 1995, she became managing director of both newspapers, and in 1997 she returned to editing the Sunday Mirror for a year.