Freelance journalists are being relied upon more and more, it is imperative that they have the resources and training to protect themselves, as well as to help them get the story.

Following our event in New York with the Overseas Press Club of America (OPC), they will be coming to London to continue the discussion.

We will be bringing together a panel of freelance journalists and editors to examine what more needs to be done to make sure freelancers are supported by the news industry and have the resources available to prepare themselves for the risks of front-line reporting.

Chaired by Vaughan Smith, founder of the Frontline Club, an award-winning independent cameraman and a member of the board of representatives for the Frontline Freelance Register (FFR).

The panel:

David Williams is deputy global news editor at Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Marcus Mabry, editor at large of The New York Times and president of the Overseas Press Club of America (OPC). Previously he worked for the The New York Times and International Herald Tribune in in London and Paris, and was the associate national editor.

Ben De Pear is the editor of Channel 4 News and a member of the board of trustees for Rory Peck Trust.

Emma Beals is an independent multimedia journalist covering Syria and Iraq. She is a member of the board of representatives for the Frontline Freelance Register (FFR).

Members of the Frontline Club, the Scientific Exploration Society and all those with a wish to add value and purpose to their travels are invited to a special evening to introduce a new collaboration and to meet some of the foremost pioneering explorers of our time.

With both journalists and explorers operating in high-risk environments with the shared objectives of investigating issues and reporting findings, these two communities, represented by The Scientific Exploration Society and the Frontline Club, are launching an exciting new initiative to begin working more closely together.

The evening’s panel discussion and audience Q&A, identifies the mutual risks, priorities and opportunities for journalism and exploration. Panelists include leading lights from both communities with explorers Andrew Mitchell and Pen Hadow joined by Frontline Club founder Vaughan Smith.

In the months ahead, the initiative will bring together the two communities in a series of presentations, debates, skills workshops, and social events to enhance the safety and productivity of all parties.

Chaired by Vaughan Smith, founder of the Frontline Club, an award-winning independent cameraman and a member of the board of representatives for the Frontline Freelance Register (FFR).

The panel:

Andrew Mitchell is a rainforest explorer & advocate. He is the chairman of the Scientific Exploration Society, a forest canopy explorer, founder of the Global Canopy Programme, co-founder of Earthwatch Europe, and Personal Advisor to HRH The Prince of Wales’ Rainforest Project.

Pen Hadow is an arctic ocean explorer & advocate. He is the founder and leader of the multi-award winning Catlin Arctic Survey (2007-2013), an international research programme on the Arctic Ocean, and the associated environmental research-sponsorship agency, Geo Mission. A decade on, Hadow remains the only person to have reached the North Geographic Pole, solo and without resupply, from Canada.

Ryan Burke is the SES Explorer 2014. Canadian born Burke is a 2nd year DPhil Candidate at Oxford, who is carrying out a detailed study of the Gelada monkey in the Ethiopian highlands to establish their potential role as a keystone species in the Afroalpine ecosystem.  He will tell us about the challenges and benefits of using drones to capture and classify imagery of this stunning ecosystem, and will show some of his fantastic images, a sneak preview of which can be seen at http://ryanjburke.ca/.

Oliver Steeds is an investigative journalist and adventurer. He’s reported for Channel 4 (Dispatches, Unreported World, News), ABC (Nightline), NBC (Today), Al Jazeera (People & Power, Witness, Earthrise). He has led numerous expeditions, hosting 4 series for the Discovery Channels worldwide and the Travel Channel in the US. Steeds is also a director of the educational social enterprise – Digital Explorer – that brings the front lines of journalism and exploration to the classrooms of the world.

The idea behind members’ BookNights is to have a thoroughly good time, encourage reading and discussion of reading. For more information about membership and the other benefits on offer, please contact Membership Coordinator, Sophie Kayes.

After four nights featuring Afghanistan, Bosnia, phone-hacking and Iraq – we’re going to shift into a more literary gear, partly at least, to welcome Robert McCrum. Robert is a former editor-in-chief at Faber and Faber (during crucial years, 1980–96, pioneering and championing the new fiction of Milan Kundera, Paul Austin, Peter Carey and illustrious others – plus the poetry of Seamus Heaney) and now über-literary-editor of The Observer and The Guardian.

Robert is reaching the half-way mark in compiling a vast list of, and guide to, the hundred greatest novels of all time – week by week, one year in, one to go. The books “choose themselves”, says Robert, but how fascinating it will be to hear how he chooses novels that choose themselves; what gets left out, how the public reacts – and we round the table, indeed – to his selection. Here’s the list so far.

And there is something special in this half-way mark for Frontline members. It so happens that numbers 50 and 51 are Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, both of which are intrinsically linked to World War One. (The connection is unavoidable in so many other works of the time, including No. 46, Joyce’s Ulysses.) Virginia Woolf’s Septimus Warren Smith is the first literary character to explore the phenomenon known then as ‘shell shock’, and its impact on how he views war and the society to which he returns from the trenches in 1918. It is only by having been a soldier that Gatsby becomes sufficiently ‘classless’ as to meet a debutante like Daisy, only to realise . . .

So: members might like, for this evening, to read (or more probably re-read) either or both these books, ready to discuss them – and the theme of war and literature – in addition to Robert‘s list generally. The BookNights thereby mark, in their literary and less bellicose way, the ubiquitous commemorations.

The format for for the night will be as tried and tested: drinks from 7:00 PM, dinner at 7:30 PM – getting to know one another over starters before I cue our guest. Robert will then make an introduction, after which the discussion begins. Same ethos as usual: this is not a “book club”, more a 19th century salon after which people leave merrier, better-fed and wiser than when they arrived, having hopefully made new acquaintances, friends, lovers, who knows.

Very best wishes, see you there –

Ed Vulliamy & Pranvera Smith 
Frontline Club BookNights

Menu £25 per person excluding drink

Poached King prawn salad with avocado & marie rose sauce
White onion soup with rosemary crisp
Honey glazed ham salad with puy lentils, apple & dandelion
****
Sea trout fillet with spinach, gnocchi & brown shrimps
Haunch of venison steak, with red cabbage, mashed apple & celeriac
Butternut squash risotto with sage & goat’s cheese
****
Chilled lemon souffle
Mocha pot de creme with shortbread
Pecan pie with banana ice cream

Please ask our barman to mix you up a free gin & tonic or a whisky & ginger ale. The offer is available from 6:00-8.00 PM.

All members are welcome. We hope you enjoy your evening at the Club.

On Monday 15 September, the Clubroom hosted another fascinating night of discussion following the presentation of Patrick Cockburn’s new book, Jihadis Return: ISIS and the New Sunni Uprising.

It was a popular event and those lucky few who booked their tickets left the night, as promised by our exceptional chair Ed Vulliamy, merrier and wiser.

The next BookNight coming up in October will present Robert McCrum and his compilation of the hundred greatest novels of all time. The books “choose themselves”, says Robert, but how fascinating it will be to hear how he chooses novels that choose themselves; what gets left out, how the public reacts – and we round the table, indeed – to his selection. Here’s the list so far.

Robert is a former editor-in-chief at Faber and Faber (during crucial years, 1980–96, pioneering and championing the new fiction of Milan Kundera, Paul Austin, Peter Carey and illustrious others – plus the poetry of Seamus Heaney) and now über-literary-editor of The Observer and The Guardian.

Please watch this space,

The Frontline BookNight Team

Dear Frontline Club Members,

Please find below an update on 31 Norfolk Place, the proposed Frontline Club Annex, explaining how you can help. We need your support to get this.

If you have already sent in letters or emails of support, we will submit them on your behalf. We are very grateful.

Many thanks, Vaughan

Background

The Frontline Club has taken over the lease in the building opposite at 31 Norfolk Place to use as an Annex, mainly to provide nine bedrooms for members. They are badly needed as currently we only have two bedrooms. We will move our offices into the basement and employ the ground floor retail unit as high quality newsagents.

The bedrooms are essential not only for our overseas members but also UK ones who no longer have an office/base in London. The location of this building is ideal, being exactly opposite the Club and we think we are unlikely to get an opportunity like this again.

We submitted a pre-planning enquiry to Westminster Council on 26 November to change the use of three single bedroom flats but were advised on 14 January that the planning department considered the retention of residential use, a Westminster planning priority, to be preferential to the Club’s planned Annex.

We submitted a full planning application for the conversion on 30 January but it is clear that we can only succeed if we persuade the planning authority of our true value to London and Paddington, which I think they don’t currently appreciate.

Please support the Frontline Club’s application by using the link –

http://idoxpa.westminster.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=makeComment&keyVal=N084VCRPI5X00

– or writing directly to Westminster City Council 9 (WCC), City Hall, 64 Victoria Street, London SW1E 6QP quoting reference number 14/00855/FULL. It is important that your support shows WCC the positives the Frontline Club brings to you, London and Paddington. If you have already submitted a letter we will put it online for you.

We only have one shot at this and we need to gain as many letters of support and/or online comments as possible to ensure that the application is presented to the Planning Committee Members (Councillors) rather than being determined by officers, so that our application can be more fully assessed.

If you need further information please contact Vaughan at vaughan.smith@www.beta.frontlineclub.com.

• If you are a local resident or work in the Westminster area, please state this. The council will appreciate more highly the value to residents and local area concerns.

• For 10 years, the Frontline Club has been good for the local area. Our destination restaurant brings people into Paddington and has won awards. Before the Frontline Club, Paddington was not included as an area on its own in the restaurant guides.

• We have run 2,000 well-attended public events since launch in 2003. Over 500 members and guests come to Paddington each week to use the club facilities and attend the events.

• Frontline events are listed in Time Out and other London event listings, again putting Paddington on the map for theatre, exhibitions, lectures, events and screenings.

• Frontline runs training courses for journalists, has a unique standing photojournalism exhibition open to the public, regularly collaborates with many educational establishments and gives out all of our event recordings for free. We offer student discounts at our events and we host the UK’s annual student newspaper meeting.

• FC is an internationally regarded social enterprise that exists to support diversity and professionalism in journalism, promote safe practice and hold public meetings. The Frontline Club delivers a programme of events that promotes freedom of speech in nine other countries.

• Most other clubs in London have bedrooms – it’s considered to be a service normally expected by club members and since the Frontline Club’s members travel a great deal they have particular need of them.

• Paddington is an ideal place for the Frontline Club because of its excellent communications, including its fast link to Heathrow Airport. This will only improve with Crossrail.

• Few members choose to stay in local hotels, which provide for businessmen and budget travellers. When members can’t stay in their club and either can’t or don’t want to stay in the area, then the Frontline Club’s value to them is diminished.

• The Frontline Club bedrooms are decorated as part of the club and are therefore full of character. Members feel home from home. It’s ideal for keeping up with friends and contacts, which is hard for people often on the road.

• British press clubs don’t compare to those in North America or most other countries in Europe. There is a press club in pride and place in most US cities. Washington’s press club overlooks the White House.

• The Wig and Pen Club went under, the Foreign Press Club has lost it’s building and is temporarily homeless. The London Press Club lost its premises years ago and currently rents space from the Adam Street Club. The Frontline Club is the only press club in London with its own clubroom.

• As a social enterprise we need the funding that the bedrooms will deliver to reduce our reliance on volunteers and secure the Frontline Club’s future.

• We have been looking for a local hotel that we could improve for four years without result as they rarely come available in the area. We were very lucky to get 31 Norfolk Place though it is not a hotel – especially as it is directly opposite. It could not be more suitable.

Over the course of three evenings, an impressive and challenging line up of speakers will debate issues ranging from the current situation in Ukraine to the role of social media in journalism. These first events mark the start of regular discussions and screenings that will take place in Bucharest as part of the Frontline Club’s International Parters programme.

Full line-up of events and speakers:

Screening: Ukraine – From Democracy to Chaos + Q&A with Jill Emery
Tuesday 18 February, 6:30PM
Ukraine – From Democracy to Chaos explores this complex country, its geopolitical importance in Europe and its unfinished struggle for democracy. The film explores the political divisions between east and west Ukraine that gave rise to the Orange Revolution in 2004 and still have deep roots in dictating today’s political reality.

The screening will be followed by discussion about the recent developments in Ukraine, moderated by Stefan Candea, co-founder and director of the Romanian Centre for Investigative Journalism. He will be joined by: Vlad Mixich, journalist and senior editor of HotNews.ro; multimedia journalist, Laurentiu Diaconu-Colintineanu; and Paul Radu, investigative journalist and director of Rise Project.

Screening: Fortress + Debate
Wednesday 19 February, 6:30PM
Over 20 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union directors Klára Tasovská and Lukáš Kokeš travel back in time on their visit to the unrecognised Pridnestrovian Moldovian Republic. A separatist region within Moldova, it has its own passports and stamps, an elected president and a legal system.

The screening will be followed by a debate with: Marian Voicu, producer Romanian Public Television; Michael Bird, journalist and editor of The Black Sea; and Lina Vdovîi, online editor at TVR and member of the Romanian Centre for Independent Journalism.

One World Romania Preview Screening: High Tech, Low Life + Debate
Thursday 20 February, 6:30PM
High Tech, Low Life follows Zola, a smart, tech-savvy and playful youngster, and Tiger Temple, a 50-something citizen reporter, as they each travel the country to report stories that would otherwise remain unknown. A unique peek behind the notorious Great Firewall of China that captures the fearlessness of a new digital generation.

The screening will be followed by a debate moderated by multi media journalist Brăduț Ulmanu. He will be joined by: independent journalist, Radu Ciorniciuc; human rights activist and coordinator of the FreeEx program of ActiveWatch, Liana Ganea; and journalist Ioana Moldoveanu.

Your wonderful and kind messages mean so much to us, as has your friendship, council and support over so many years. There is no prize in our trade that we could ever value as much as your belief in us.

– Vaughan and Pranvera Smith

 

Thank you to Stewart Purvis, Richard Gizbert, Tina Carr, Emma Beals, Allan Little, Mani, Stuart Hughes, Richard Sambrook, Jon Snow, Marina Litvinenko, Martin Bell, Tom Fenton, Anthony Loyd, Lyse Doucet, Bill Neely, Lindsey Hilsum, Charles Glass, John G Morris, Salim Amin, Liz Palmer Gary Knight, Jon Lee Anderson, Jeremy Bowen, Matt Frei and Jean-Jacques Gonfier.

In October the Frontline Club held a tenth anniversary exhibition at the Prix Bayeux Awards and on 13 November they welcomed Prix Bayeux to London for an event to celebrate their twentieth anniversary. The event brought together past winners who each presented their distinguished pieces of reporting and looked back on 20 years of reporting conflict.

The evening was opened by Jon Swain, award winning journalist and guest president of the Prix Bayeux jury, who explained how the awards are very much about the work produced rather than, as is often the case, who knows who. The discussion was chaired by Frontline Club founder and 2011 Bayeux-Calvados award winner, Vaughan Smith.

L-R Vaughan Smith, Adrien Jaulmes, Neil Connery, Christina Lamb and Jeremy Bowen

Jeremy Bowen, BBC Middle East editor and winner of the award in 2009 for reporting on the aftermath of the 2009 Gaza War for BBC1’s Panorama. He accompanied a doctor from Gaza who lost several daughters and a niece in an Israeli shelling, the terrible irony being that he had spent a lot of his career working for peace with Israel:

“I went around the room and he told me where they were laying. I thought that if I’d put it in a more factual manner, it would have more impact. It worked out in that sense but as ever, one of the ambivalences [of war reporting] is that we report on the back of someone else’s tragedy.”

Great panel with @PrixBayeux winners @frontlineclub tonight, note the temporary exhibition with winning photos. pic.twitter.com/T9Wx25Efqc

— wotienke (@wotienke) November 13, 2013

Christina Lamb, author and journalist with The Sunday Times and winner of the award in 2009, read from Mission Impossible, an account of her time as an embedded journalist with the British military in Afghanistan. Mentioning the Green Book that requires reporters to have their copy pre-approved by military press officers, Lamb reflected:

“There’s a fine line between that and censorship. We [journalists] failed because we should have gotten up against it, all of us.”

Prix Bayeux exhibited photographs from previous winners of the award during the evening. [picture credit: Caroline Schmitt]

“The vast majority of people involved in news-gathering who are injured or killed are locals to that country. They’re not only journalists, but drivers, translators. . . . We as an industry have a huge moral responsibility for those people and I wonder whether we really deliver that as much as we need to.”

Adrien Jaulmes, reporter with Le Figaro and winner of the Bayeux-Calvados award in 2007, he said of reporting in Syria:

“Your moral duty is to share the dangers while you’re there. Journalists suddenly become the targets in big cities because they have money, and that changed the game for us within weeks.”

Watch and listen back here:

https://soundcloud.com/frontlineclub/twenty-years-of-war-reporting