- Headline news - 9th January 2026
- Huwge mistake by a TV celebrity - 8th January 2026
- Action NOT words - 8th January 2026
During 23 years with the BBC, and in a 42 year journalistic career (when he was trained to use clear and simple language, avoiding jargon), for our Editor, Welshman Phil Parry, it has always been massively important to look behind headlines and see what the real story is, and this is now put centre stage by major questions being raised today about how migration figures have been reported.
Perhaps we only hear half the story.
It is vital to question publicised information, and to understand the background of these details – a case in point came recently with the way that UK migration figures were reported.
Statistics released on November 27 bothered commentators in certain right-leaning papers, because they apparently showed that the number of UK citizens emigrating had gone up.
The Times and The Daily Telegraph called it an “exodus”, while the Daily Mail called it a “brain drain from Starmer’s socialist chaos”.
They could not be more wrong.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimates that emigration did indeed rise from an average of around 150,000 a year before Brexit to 250,000 today, BUT that is simply because of switching statistical methods.
The Economist has done some number-crunching of its own, and come up with a completely different result, using data on the flow of UK people to overseas countries, as published by the OECD (a club of mainly rich countries), and the United Nations (UN). They found that emigration of UK citizens is, in fact, likely to be LOWER than it was several years ago.
Estimates suggest that in the years before Brexit, emigration averaged around 275,000 compared with about 220,000 today.
Another example of how the real story is slightly different (or only half-told) to what we have heard, comes with the appalling news about Neil Foden the former headteacher, from Old Colwyn in Conwy, who was jailed for 17 years after being convicted of 19 charges involving four girls.
He was described as “depraved”, “arrogant” and a “bully” by the trial judge when he was sentenced in July last year following a month-long trial, and a Child Practice Review commissioned by the North Wales Safeguarding Board, with prominent expert Jan Pickles appointed to lead the independent investigation, painted a terrible picture of what had occurred.
Foden was a school head teacher who was able to sexually abuse girls for years, and Ms Pickles’ report found there were more than 50 “missed opportunities” to intervene and stop him.
The judge in the shocking case, Rhys Rowlands, said Foden was a “bombastic and domineering character” with “an obsession with young teenage girls“.
He suggested during sentencing that the lack of action may have “emboldened” him to continue his behaviour.
Why then did the abuse go on for so long?! What did the authorities know and when?! What, if any, measures have been put in place to ensure awful cases like this do not happen again?!
There are a huge number of questions left unanswered, because while the dreadful initial news has been reported, there are few Current Affairs media outlets left now to examine in detail what took place.
The board proclaimed worryingly: “There were many concerns raised about Foden from: * staff at both schools * different social workers from various local authorities * professionals from many organisations including NSPCC, CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services), and health care staff * parents and carers.”
Sadly these are not the only examples of horrific actions by individuals in Wales where professionals may have been at fault.
For example the lobbyist Daran Hill was used extensively by the news media, but was found by police officers with 62 indecent images of children, among them eight in the most serious category after being arrested by the National Crime Agency (NCA) in 2021.
This was the opening sentence in the website WalesOnline’s (WO) report about his imprisonment: “A paedophile who used to work as a top political consultant distributed sickening images of child abuse as young as three years old to others on the internet”.
As this hard-hitting item makes clear, Hill shared many of the images with other users on a social messaging platform, and even after admitting his crimes, he was jailed for three years and four months, with only half of this sentence to be served on licence.
When police arrived at Hill’s home in Cardiff, he told them: “I know why you’re here. I made a mistake”.
Hill was the national organiser of the Yes for Wales campaign for the devolution referendum in 1997, then campaign director of the Yes campaign in the 2011 vote on giving the assembly primary legislative powers.
He was managing director at Positif, which advised companies seeking to lobby Welsh politicians.
The month after his arrest he resigned as director of the company, which was renamed Camlas later.
As with Foden, his jailing has prompted huge inquiries into past behaviour.
The former Plaid Cymru (PC) Assembly Member and Director of Deryn Consulting (a Public Relations [PR] outfit) Nerys Evans tweeted a news item about Hill, saying: “This makes me sick to my stomach and makes my blood boil. This evil man, his crimes, his behaviour, and the people around him, who enabled, supported and kept quiet about him in welsh politcs and in the welsh media should be ashamed”.
Cathy Owens, another Director of Deryn, wrote on Twitter/X accompanying a different report about the antics of Hill said: “A decade of crap from this guy, amplified by chums and acolytes across politics/media. Might not have known extent of depravity, but they knew about his misogyny, bullying, appalling influence. Thinking about his victims, and those dismissed and denigrated when they spoke out”.
But enormous concern has been shown on social media that, like Foden, Hill had managed to sway opinion-formers for a long time.
Linking her comments to a piece in WO, an angry Ms Owens also proclaimed on Twitter/X: “I’d be fascinated to know exactly how many times this fella and his cronies worked on stories with @WalesOnline to try and take us out. It’s not as if we didn’t lay it out for you”.
Even before Hill had been exposed for the crimes he had committed, he had been one of those who had abused me (there have been many!), calling me “bitter”, and a “misogynist” (misspelt) on Twitter/X forcing me to take legal action after which a fulsome apology was forthcoming.
His public insults of me are as nothing compared to what he has been found now to have done and (like Foden) been jailed for, but they do, unfortunately, fall into a familiar pattern and a personal statement has had to be issued.
So the message is clear: LOOK BEHIND THE HEADLINES!
Details of Phil’s astonishing decades-long journalistic career (when accurate stories often prompted abuse), as he was gripped by the rare neurological condition Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in an important book ‘A GOOD STORY’. Order it now.
Next week – how police officers could be about to turn to new technology meeting massive challenges, with a pilot being conducted by the biggest force in Wales – as they are plagued by a series of enormous scandals, clear up rates have become appalling, and public confidence has reached near an all time low.
