Alison Hastings - the former newspaper editor, BBC trustee and Press Complaints Commission (PCC) member - has gone into PR.
In twin appointments, she has become a “specialist partner” at Alder Media and a member of the advisory board at its sister agency, Pagefield Communications.
Hastings, editor of the Newcastle Evening Chronicle for six years (1996–2002), was a founding member of the BBC Trust from 2006, serving her full eight-year term, which she completed in October last year.
She served as member of the PCC from 1999-2002 and later took up an ambassadorial role for the commission. In that capacity, she gave a yearly (and well received) lecture on the editors’ code of practice to my students at City University London.
She will be joining up with two former PCC luminaries in her new posts. Ex-PCC director Tim Toulmin is the founder and managing director of Alder Media, which works with law firms to advise clients “facing difficult situations”.
Toulmin said of Hastings: “She has senior experience at the UK’s leading media organisations and has been a trusted adviser to many of the country’s highest profile business and media figures.
“Having worked with her before at the Press Complaints Commission, I know that her strategic insight and impressive network of contacts are second to none”.
At Pagefield, which specialises in corporate public relations, Hastings is joining an advisory board chaired by the former PCC chairman, Sir Christopher Meyer.
Its founder and senior partner, Mark Gallagher, said: “Alison and I worked on our first campaign together in 2004.
“Her knowledge of local and regional media has always been exceptional, but she has since built and extended this expertise to cover national press and broadcasting. She’s a really strong addition”.
Hastings spoke of Alder Media and Pagefield having “quickly established reputations as leaders in their fields”, adding: “I am looking forward to working with Tim, Mark and their teams on the broad range of complex issues that clients face”.
The simultaneous appointments underline the growing relationship between the two communications consultancies.