Jock Gallagher

Jock Gallagher was born and educated in Greenock, Scotland. After two years National Service, he made a half-hearted attempt to become an accountant before stumbling into journalism on a local weekly newspaper. The local became a regional Sunday and that led to quarter of a century at the BBC...as a news producer, award-winning radio documentary-maker and programme head. He was Director of the Radio Show at Earls Court in 1988 (to celebrate the twenty-first birthday of Radios 1, 2, 3 and 4) and represented the BBC at EBU meetings in Berlin and Brussels and at Commonwealth Broadcasting Association conferences in The Gambia and The Seychelles. He left the BBC in 1990 and set up his own production company. His output included the last Milk Race (for Sky) the New Venturers television series(about small businesses)for BBC Scotland and he also provided extensive media services to the NHS, BUPA and other health bodies. Along the way, he wrote several books, including three novels, about The Archers (part of his BBC responsibilities), ghosted the autobiography of Gwen Berryman (who played Doris Archer) and wrote a biography of Lady Isobel Barnett, the first First Lady of Television. He is currently writing a major tome on famous Scots.

He is president of The Young Programme (run by the Institute of Contemporary Scotland, of which is is a Founding Member and a trustee); He won the Magnus Magnusson Medal for services to the institute in 2010.

He is a life-long Liberal/Liberal Democrat and has served the party at every level and launched and edited the first four editions of Who's Who in the Liberal Democrats. He is currently president of the West Midland Lib Dems, editor of NewslineWM (online) and vice-president of the Parliamentary Candidates Association.

He is currently director of the Centre for Media Reform and an honorary lecturer at the School of Journalism Studies, Sheffield.