Mike MacFarlane, weekend editor of BBC TV news, has been appointed as executive editor for BBC London, plugging the gap left when Jane Mote resigned last year to become controller of charity TV station The Community Channel.
MacFarlane, a former editor of Five Live’s Drive show, has been BBC TV News’s weekend editor for the past two years, and was on the shortlist for editor of Radio 4’s Today programme, before Kevin Marsh was appointed last year. At BBC London, he will be responsible for the station’s television, radio and online output.
MacFarlane joined the corporation in 1984 as a television presenter for BBC Scotland. In 1988, after two years as a trainee, he became a producer for World at One, covering the Lockerbie aircraft disaster and Israeli elections.
He spent the next five years as senior producer at the Today programme and World at One, before going to Washington for network radio, to cover the Clinton/Bush election campaigns.
MacFarlane was one of the launch team for Five Live in 1994 and won two Sony awards for the Breakfast Programme. He has also been Five Live’s political editor, editor of the Drive show and midday news.
By Wale Azeez
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