CBC London correspondent Ann MacMillan retires
CBC’s London correspondent Ann MacMillan is retiring after more than 40 years in the business. Her last day is Dec. 16. MacMillan has worked in the London bureau since 1981 when she signed on as a correspondent for CBC’s flagship show, The Journal, with Barbara Frum.
CBC’s London correspondent Ann MacMillan is retiring after more than 40 years in the business. Her last day is Dec. 16.
MacMillan has worked in the London bureau since 1981 when she signed on as a correspondent for CBC’s flagship show, The Journal, with Barbara Frum. According to her online bio, she started her reporting career with CHIN Radio in Toronto and joined the CBC in 1972 as co-host of New Directions, a weekly program about senior citizens. She then joined Global Television as a news reporter in 1973 and CTV in 1975, and later moved to Montreal for CTV as its bureau chief. In 1976, MacMillan became CTV’s London bureau chief. MacMillan is married to retired BBC journalist Peter Snow.
She reflected on how coverage of Canada has changed in the U.K. during her time there.
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“When I first came to London, I could not get over how little coverage Canada got in the British media. Journalists used expressions like ‘as dull as a Sunday in Canada’ or ‘as improbable as a funny Canadian,’” MacMillan wrote. “Very few people had heard of writers like Alice Munro, Margaret Atwood, Robertson Davies. I remember a snooty book reviewer saying, ‘Canadian literature? Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?’ Nobody would dare say that these days.”
[node:ad]She also said getting her film back to Toronto in the mid-1970s used to be a major hurdle, before satellites and computer technology made it easier. “When When CTV News moved me to London in 1976, I used to take cans of film out to Heathrow Airport and ask Air Canada passengers if they’d mind hand-carrying my news story back to Toronto. It’s hard to believe but back then, very few people said no.”
Her retirement was “bittersweet, because I have enjoyed this job so much,” MacMillan said in a CBC segment.
“I think it’s time for me to move on, and make way for other people to be in London and do wonderful work,” she said. “I’m really looking forward to this next chapter.”
Video courtesy of CBC
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Tamara Baluja is an award-winning journalist with CBC Vancouver and the 2018 Michener-Deacon fellow for journalism education. She was the associate editor for J-Source from 2013-2014.