Yesterday was a significant day in the history of journalism as family courts in England and Wales opened their doors to journalists for the first time. They did not open the doors wide. In some cases they opened them only slightly and slammed them closed as if panicking at the prospect of openness. There is a long way to go before cases involving children taken into care, adoption, divorce, emergency protection orders etc. can be reported comprehensively.

An important message has emerged from my recent discussions with Kent Messenger Group editors, news editors and reporters. Centre for Journalism students are wonderful and very talented. The KM Group is delighted to have you, but there is always room for improvement and in this case it involves use of the telephone.

Too many of you remain reluctant to make and receive 'phone calls. Some have even tried to contact interviewees by e-mail. Others have allowed telephones to ring in newsrooms without answering them. This is unprofessional. 

First year student Kelsey Williams has landed the Centre for Journalism's first front-page splash. On work experience at the Gravesend Messenger, Kelsey filed a story about a fatal freight train incident that leads the paper's current edition.

 

Today's Media Guardian seems designed to provoke the sort of mood swings normally associated with manic depression.

Tormented to the brink of sobriety by the atmosphere of gloom and redundancy pervading our beloved news industry, my friends at the Independent asked me to justify creating a degree in journalism. "How can you subject those brilliant, delightful, inspiring young people to academic rigour, editorial conferences and shorthand when job prospects look less healthy than the Zimbabwe Dollar?" they asked.

Last night I chaired a debate at the Frontline Club on the future of regional journalism, with panellists Roy Greenslade (The Guardian), Keith Sutton (former editor of the Carlisle News & Star, Jon Slattery (former deputy editor of Press Gazette and William Yarker (media director of Deloitte).

 

Conservative leader David Cameron has promised to relax cross-media ownership rules if his party wins the General Election. Some in the industry promote this as a partial solution to the crisis in local journalism. A less generous view is that the Conservative Party is courting popularity with local media owners (Political party woos money and votes shocker, man detained!).

At least not in the European Parliament. There may be irony in a Conservative Eurosceptic delivering a brilliant and blistering fusillade against a British Prime Minister in the European legislature in Strasbourg, but Daniel Hannan, MEP for this region, did so on Tuesday. You do not have to agree with his sentiments to appreciate the economy of his language and the panache of his delivery. This is the sort of speech that makes politics fun. Watch and enjoy it here courtesy of YouTube.

Eagle-eyed investigative reporters may have noticed a pair of cute little cardboard boxes lying around the newsroom. They contain promotional board games and, more importantly, the entry criteria for the 2009 Guardian Student Media Awards. These are prestigious prizes.

The briefing for the online assignment is now published here. The deadline is 1pm, Thursday 9 April.

Please do come and talk to me about the story you plan to do, and I'll be happy to give you some guidance. We'll run through the Vuvox technicalities on  Thursday next week.