Hailed as a wunderkind while at the Beeb, Murphy fared less well at the independent producers, responsible for Wife Swap and Ladette to Lady.”We haven’t had anything commissioned since he joined,” says one disgruntled RDFer. “We used to have brilliant trailer-style presentations when we were trying to sell a new idea to a channel. When Stuart arrived, he decided he should just have his own dictated words projected on a wall when meeting commissioners It went down terribly. He was constantly trying to hire someone from within the BBC to come and be head of a new comedy division at RDF,” adds my source. “He was continually politely declined.”Goodnight from themUsually a backwater, BBC News 24 has been hauling in some prominent presenters. On Thursday Emily Maitlis and Ben Brown were brought in and seated at the same desk.

“They looked like something out of The Two Ronnies,” noted one viewer “There was some tension about who would get the limelight. Both were constantly trying to wisecrack over each other.” One rolling news channel is evidently not big enough for both egos.’Zoo’ and the Zen factorWatch out, Nuts. Anthony Noguera, the editor of its arch-rival Zoo, is taking no prisoners The lads’ mag guru was asked for his personal mantra. “Never had one,” he answered, before adding worryingly: “Although ‘always escalate’ never did any harm to Ariel Sharon.”. Panic over. That was the panic when we were told not to panic because none of us was at risk simply because we were not birds. How have we moved from a pandemic to a complete lack of concern in no longer than it takes a dead swan to float across the North Sea?

I am not one of those who blames the media for everything; indeed I get equally exasperated by mendacious politicians forever blaming those who rightly ask the questions, and by the angry phone-in callers who blame the messengers for all that incenses them.

But in this case the media are not blameless.
Avian flu had been simmering away gently in distant places for some time, and the British media and public were able to treat it with the same detachment as famine in Africa, mildly concerned but unaffected. When the flu came to Europe it seemed to be more a television story that a print one; the cameras developed an affection for emaciated chickens clucking around dirty Turkish yards, surrounded by poorly clothed children putting their hands where it was unwise to do so.The media failed to whip up a pan-panic. Stories appeared from time to time about the inevitability of the disease arriving in Britain, and about our state of preparedness for this chilling moment. Only, we were assured, the moment would not be chilling because we couldn’t catch it. We got on with our lives.Then came news from a place most of us had never heard of, Cellardyke in Fife A dead swan had washed up on the beach It tested positive for H5N1, the deadly virus.