Joe Egg in today's West

I have to disagree with you Graeme. As you say, newsrooms get hundreds of press releases every day. If everyone rings to follow up, that's hundreds more phone calls to field. Frankly, it's annoying, especially when we're pressed for time and have stories to file. A journalist can tell from the press release whether it's worth doing something or not. We're quite capable of making that decision; if we think it's of merit, we'll do something, if we don't, we won't. And it's quite possible a journalist *will* do a story, submit it and so on but then the chief-of-staff or news editor decides to go with something else or something bigger and better happens and the story has to be dropped. If this happens - and, trust me, people do this - DON'T ring and say "Why didn't you run my story?" After explaining, someone else made the decision, DON'T demand to speak to them, either. They'll probably tell you where to go. All it does is damage your chances of coverage the next time you have a show or something you want to promote.