BBC News: Presenters & Rotas

I love this thread. People spend pages speculating about a minor presenter's holiday plans but when the BBC announces a major reshuffle of its editors and presenters (including the answer to a question people have been banging on about for months) nobody says anything.

Drumroll please... http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2014/news-appointments

- Jon Sopel becomes North America Editor
- Katya Adler becomes Europe Editor
- Mark Mardell moves to The World This Weekend/WATO on Fridays
- Yalda Hakim takes over at Impact
- Shaun Ley to do more BBC World News/World Service/HARDTalk

Quite a big announcement then. Thanks for posting. I hadn't heard any of this until now! It was announced an hour or so ago. Jonathan Munro, head of Newsgathering, has made some excellent appointments so far, with Kamal, Carrie, Penny Marshall and Hugh Pym.

I said Katya Adler would become Europe Editor, and very well deserved. I think she'll be fantastic, always an excellent reporter. Great to see.

Jon Sopel - again, so much better out in the field and great to see that he's been rewarded with a big job.

I'm really surprised by the Sopel move - and I would say the Mark Mardell change looks a bit like a demotion - probably the best London based role they could find for him.

They do need more presenters on r4. There has been a shortage for a while. Think the Ian Pannell appointment is excellent, good to see a wider outlet for his skills though I wonder how senior he will be in comparison to Doucet/Simpson/Bowen. However we do see a lot less of John on TV nowadays.

As for Sopel the appointment makes sense considering how much he has contributed to us election coverage over the past few years. I wonder what will happen to global on world news, and indeed whether the programme will continue to exist as sopel is a big part of its appeal.

Shame that Jon won't be presenting anymore. Or will he?

Wow a lot of very significant changes there. Aleem Maqbool also started in Washington today, so quite a few shifts to the team there. Sopel, Pannell and Adler in particular all excellent appointments. Some changes for BBC World news too, and I think it would be good to compliment them by giving more prominence to individuals such as Rajesh, Christian, Naga, Kasia and Babita.

Would also agree that is a but of a demotion for Mark. But then I would argue he hasn't been especially prominent in his N.America role of late.

With Jon departing and Kate on maternity leave for the rest of the year, I would also suggest they need a new News at One cover in addition to Simon, time to give Joanna Gosling a try I'd suggest.

Also still leaves us presumably waiting for a new economics appointment to join Peston and it will be interesting to see whether there are changes to the health/education reporters with the new Editors.

Agree with this, he has done an impressive shuffle here and his previous appointments have been great too.

Unlikely imho

Not initially, I'd have thought, but he might end up doing the odd shift here and there at some point. Matt Frei did present the Six a bit when he was based in Washington.

I don't think we will see Jon presenting World News America. Remember, he is now becoming an Editor, not a presenter. He will input into WNA as the North America Editor.

Neither of his two predecessors ever presented a news programme while in that role, hence I see no reason why Jon would. He's going to be too busy in the Editor role.

Matt Frei was a presenter rather than a correspondent once World News America started.

Gavin Esler and Sian Williams were the launch presenters of the News 24 weekday 1600-1900 strand from memory.

Would suggest Jane Hill who seems to be in favour again for covering nationals

Yes, but he was a correspondent when he would come over and present the Six O'Clock News sometimes in the Summer. I'm not entirely clear if he was ever officially titled as 'North America Editor'. I seem to remember him being referred as that when Justin Webb took over - although I don't remember Frei ever being called that on air.