View all newsletters
Sign up for our free email newsletters

Fighting for quality news media in the digital age.

  1. News
March 14, 2007updated 23 Aug 2022 6:53pm

The Grey Cardigan 02.03.07

By Press Gazette

WHAT IS it with this latest trend of turning the features pages of our national newspapers into a very public marriage guidance session?

We're already sick to death of the tit-for-tat Me and Mrs Jones saga of the sloth-like Nirpal and his mad woman wife. I'm weary of poor Tom Utley's tales of how school-fee poverty drove his wife to take to the streets… in a double-decker bus. Now others are muscling in on the act.

Step forward Lauren Booth, a woman whose entire career is based on step-name dropping, wailing away in the Daily Mail about the pressures of being her family's principal bread-winner under the heading: Can a marriage where the woman earns more than the man ever work?

"I'm not saying this situation is putting our marriage under threat," she writes, "but it has brought tensions which simply wouldn't exist if the situation was reversed." And it soon is, on paper at least.

Enter stage left Mr Lauren Booth (aka Craig Darby, actor and scriptwriter and therefore unemployed) who gets his Daily Mail spread two days later to moan about the humiliation of having to ask his wife for money to buy a couple of CDs or enjoy a pint with his mates. Do we care? Not a jot.

And so the cash-generating confessional continues, with some unexpected contributors. As editor of The Daily Telegraph, Martin Newland was a motorbiking Action Man figure. Now he's showcasing his journalistic skills, again in the Mail, by ungallantly whining about how untidy his wife is.

He even empties out her handbag and details its contents for the delectation of readers. (Perhaps this is his way of enjoying life-threatening thrills these days.)

Content from our partners
MHP Group's 30 To Watch awards for young journalists open for entries
How PA Media is helping newspapers make the digital transition
Publishing on the open web is broken, how generative AI could help fix it

Lo and behold, two days later it's Mrs Benedicte Newland's turn to have her say in rather insipid fashion, perhaps prompted by the fact that she has a book to publicise.

Had enough yet? Tough. On the same day in Femail we had to endure Mr and Mrs Ross and Diana Appleyard complaining side by side about their waning sex life. (A double header, perhaps?) I won't bore you with all the details, but apparently he's fat and can't get it up, while she prefers big knickers to dressing up in stockings and suspenders.

Can we please just stop this tiresome marital mayhem? I know we're being had over for an easy cheque. You know you're being had over for an easy cheque. They know we're being had over for an easy cheque. Has no one pointed out these connubial con-tricks to Lord Dacre?

"GREY, COME quick," called Mrs Cardigan on Sunday morning. (Do you see what I've done there?) "Cameron's been nicked for smoking dope."

"Tcch, stupid woman," I thought, with one eye on her getting a lucrative Press Gazette follow-up rebuttal next week. How can even the most vindictive cold case team have conjured up a CPS file from a youthful indiscretion? All soon became clear. The problem lay with those running straplines on 24-hour news channels, in this case Sky News.

"… David Cameron arrested for possession of cannabis…" had indeed scrolled across the bottom of the screen. What she hadn't seen — until the sentence came round again — was what preceded it, namely: "Teenager who made gun gesture at Conservative leader…"

STANDARDS DON'T just slip at The Daily Telegraph — they plummet. Cobbling together a cuttings job on the forthcoming Liz Hurley wedding, Adam Edwards waffles on about the glamorous ceremony, the myriad guests and the sumptuous feast before informing us that "A pheasant shoot is planned for Sunday."

A pheasant shoot? In Gloucestershire? In March? On a Sunday? I don't fucking think so.

You can contact me, should you be minded, at thegreycardigan@gmail.com

Topics in this article :

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

Select and enter your email address Weekly insight into the big strategic issues affecting the future of the news industry. Essential reading for media leaders every Thursday. Your morning brew of news about the world of news from Press Gazette and elsewhere in the media. Sent at around 10am UK time. Our weekly does of strategic insight about the future of news media aimed at US readers. A fortnightly update from the front-line of news and advertising. Aimed at marketers and those involved in the advertising industry.
  • Business owner/co-owner
  • CEO
  • COO
  • CFO
  • CTO
  • Chairperson
  • Non-Exec Director
  • Other C-Suite
  • Managing Director
  • President/Partner
  • Senior Executive/SVP or Corporate VP or equivalent
  • Director or equivalent
  • Group or Senior Manager
  • Head of Department/Function
  • Manager
  • Non-manager
  • Retired
  • Other
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
Thank you

Thanks for subscribing.

Websites in our network