Will the Guardian and the Independent kill the Grand National?

Over the past few years a new trend has emerged in British journalism. Our trade has become over-run with reporters or columnists who are not quite what they seem. They pretend to report objectively on events. In practice the true loyalty of these campaigning reporters or columnists is not just to their readers.

Sometimes covertly, sometimes furtively, they also further the agendas of political parties and interest groups. This confusion of loyalties is a notorious problem at Westminster, but is now spreading beyond the political desks of national newspapers. Last weekend’s reporting of the Grand National was a very troubling example of the muddling of categories between straightforward reporting and campaigning journalism.

Let’s take a look at Chris McGrath, racing correspondent of the Independent. McGrath scarcely bothered to report the scintillating (and for genuine lovers of horses very important) racing on offer on the first day of the Aintree meeting.

For him there was only one event that really mattered: the heart attack suffered by Katie Walsh’s mount Battlefront after the Fox Hunters’ Chase.