News Shopper's new editor (From News Shopper)

News Shopper's new editor

5:10pm Wednesday 23rd April 2008

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As the new editor of your local newspaper, I thought it only fair to introduce myself.

My name’s Richard Firth, I’m 35-years-old and I’m a Northerner. Originally from Brighouse in West Yorkshire, I worked in Stoke-on-Trent and Shropshire before returning to my home county to take on the deputy editorship of the Wakefield Express and then the editorship of the Dewsbury Reporter.

I know what you’re thinking – why the hell would anyone give up the rolling dales and the company of the country’s friendliest people to live in the south of England? Well, as is becoming the norm with many of the important decisions in my life, the wife bullied me into it.

Julie is originally from Gillingham and had ached to return to Kent pretty much ever since I persuaded her to make the move up north. She got her chance when this job came up and here we are.

As mentioned higher up, the furthest south I had lived prior to this move was Stoke. Stoke, as I see it, is the last northern outpost. Ten miles down the road and you’re in Stafford, where the unmistakable Potteries burr is replaced by the first traces of that all-consuming West Midlands whine.

Down here, as far as I was concerned, everybody was a Cockney. People spent their Friday nights round the piano, singing raucous songs about the Blitz, drinking from pewter tankards and gorging on jellied eels.

The reality, I quickly realised, was somewhat different.

Large swathes of Kent are essentially the same as Yorkshire. OK, there’s a bit more coast and the houses are dearer, but it’s all reasonably familiar. The people too are basically the same – some of them have the same problems, many of them wear similar clothes and pretty much all of them watch Britain’s Got Talent.

As a result, after initially feeling a little bit like a fish out of water, I’m just about starting to settle in, despite the dire predictions from my friends in the north who insist I’ll be back inside two years.

I have two children – Isla, who is two-and-a-half, and Charlie, who is three months old – who will now both grow up with southern accents. I don’t know how I feel about that. Culturally, they will be different to me and I find that difficult to deal with.

I have no qualms however about insisting they both support Huddersfield Town. An underwhelming, and in their case utterly impractical, experience I know, but I really couldn’t reconcile seeing my son or daughter in a Charlton shirt or – even worse – a Chelsea one.

I’ve suffered a lifetime of despondency and gloom following the Terriers from Carlisle to Exeter and I’m going to do everything in my power to ensure they do the same.