A Guy of Our Times

The second half of the twentieth century saw bigger changes in major British industries than any other period beforehand. Thousands of jobs disappeared, never to be replaced as more modern ways were introduced, and outdated practices beloved of trade unions disappeared. 

Michael Guy who was a journalist for nearly 70 years was fortunate to have a front row seat witnessing these changes in his role as editor of the in-house newspapers covering the revolution in newspaper production. 

Originally, Michael was group editor of newspapers owned by the controversial Labour MP, Woodrow Wyatt, whose ambition was to become a major player in the newspaper industry.  

Later on in life Michael became the first editor of a company newspaper who was given complete editorial freedom. He launched The Port newspaper for the 40,000 workforce in the port of London to help combat the regular strikes there, from this he moved on to produce a similar paper for 75,000 British ship builders.

In addition to this Michael was also given the unprecedented freedom to report the day-to-day activities of Rupert Murdoch's publications, and allowed Michael to give equal expression to the unions' point of view, his role was then extended to producing NewsCorp World which was circulated to Rupert's workforce worldwide. 

In between he found time in 1983 to achieve an ambition of his own --to launch his own newspaper, The Leigh Times.