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Adam Raphael
Adam Eliot Geoffrey Raphael (born 22 April 1938) is an English journalist and author. In the British Press Awards of 1973, he was named Journalist of the Year for his work on labour conditions in South Africa, and he has also been a presenter of BBC Television's Newsnight. Since 2004, he has edited The Good Hotel Guide. He is not to be confused with a BBC producer of the same name, Adam Jocelyn Raphael (1937–1999).
The son of Geoffrey George Raphael and his wife Nancy Raphael (née Rose), Raphael was educated at two independent schools: Arnold House School in St John's Wood in north-west London, and Charterhouse in Godalming, Surrey (where he was a contemporary of David Dimbleby), followed by Oriel College, Oxford, graduating with a BA with Honours in History.
Raphael undertook national service with the Royal Artillery, and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant on 1 June 1957, subsequently serving in Germany. After leaving the army, he went to Oriel College, Oxford where he graduated with a second-class degree in history in 1961. After university, Raphael went to the USA where he worked as a copy boy at The Washington Post under Ben Bradlee, its editor. Returning from the US in 1962, he was employed by Westminster Press first on the Swindon Evening Advertiser and then on the Bath Evening Chronicle as a reporter and film critic.
In 1965 he arrived in Fleet Street as a reporter on The Guardian, working as the newspaper's motoring correspondent from 1967 to 1968 before serving overseas as its foreign correspondent in Washington, D.C., and South Africa from 1969 to 1973. On 12 March 1973, The Guardian published an article headlined: 'British firms pay Africans starvation rate.' It is a result of an investigation by Raphael conducted in South Africa into the employment practices of 100 leading British companies. It found only three (Shell, ICI and Unilever) were paying above the minimum for an African family to avoid malnutrition. Among the companies paying below this minimum were Courtaulds, British Leyland and General Electric. The story led to an immediate pay rise for thousands of African workers and the setting up of a British parliamentary committee. This recommended a code of conduct for British companies operating in South Africa. Raphael was named 'Journalist of the Year' in the National Press Awards that year.
On his return to London from South Africa, he was appointed as The Guardian's consumer affairs columnist from 1974 to 1976, before moving to The Observer as political correspondent, 1976–1981, and then as the political editor, 1981–1986.
In 1984 and 1989, The Observer printed articles by Raphael which suggested that the lobbyist Ian Greer had been paying members of parliament to table parliamentary questions, an early stage of the Cash for Questions scandal.
In 1987, Raphael briefly moved to BBC Television as a presenter of its daily current affairs programme, Newsnight (1987–1988). He returned to the paper in 1988 as an assistant Editor, and Executive Editor from 1988 to 1993.
In March 1989 The Observer published an article by Raphael which claimed that British Aerospace was selling Tornado aircraft to Jordan at inflated prices to include the cost of bribes. Raphael's colleague David Leigh complained to the directors of The Observer that Raphael had written it to suit Lonrho, which had a stake in British Aerospace's rival, Dassault Aviation. The MP Dale Campbell-Savours tabled motions in the House of Commons denouncing the article. The directors of The Observer dismissed Leigh's complaint, and he resigned from the newspaper in protest.
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Adam Raphael
Adam Eliot Geoffrey Raphael (born 22 April 1938) is an English journalist and author. In the British Press Awards of 1973, he was named Journalist of the Year for his work on labour conditions in South Africa, and he has also been a presenter of BBC Television's Newsnight. Since 2004, he has edited The Good Hotel Guide. He is not to be confused with a BBC producer of the same name, Adam Jocelyn Raphael (1937–1999).
The son of Geoffrey George Raphael and his wife Nancy Raphael (née Rose), Raphael was educated at two independent schools: Arnold House School in St John's Wood in north-west London, and Charterhouse in Godalming, Surrey (where he was a contemporary of David Dimbleby), followed by Oriel College, Oxford, graduating with a BA with Honours in History.
Raphael undertook national service with the Royal Artillery, and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant on 1 June 1957, subsequently serving in Germany. After leaving the army, he went to Oriel College, Oxford where he graduated with a second-class degree in history in 1961. After university, Raphael went to the USA where he worked as a copy boy at The Washington Post under Ben Bradlee, its editor. Returning from the US in 1962, he was employed by Westminster Press first on the Swindon Evening Advertiser and then on the Bath Evening Chronicle as a reporter and film critic.
In 1965 he arrived in Fleet Street as a reporter on The Guardian, working as the newspaper's motoring correspondent from 1967 to 1968 before serving overseas as its foreign correspondent in Washington, D.C., and South Africa from 1969 to 1973. On 12 March 1973, The Guardian published an article headlined: 'British firms pay Africans starvation rate.' It is a result of an investigation by Raphael conducted in South Africa into the employment practices of 100 leading British companies. It found only three (Shell, ICI and Unilever) were paying above the minimum for an African family to avoid malnutrition. Among the companies paying below this minimum were Courtaulds, British Leyland and General Electric. The story led to an immediate pay rise for thousands of African workers and the setting up of a British parliamentary committee. This recommended a code of conduct for British companies operating in South Africa. Raphael was named 'Journalist of the Year' in the National Press Awards that year.
On his return to London from South Africa, he was appointed as The Guardian's consumer affairs columnist from 1974 to 1976, before moving to The Observer as political correspondent, 1976–1981, and then as the political editor, 1981–1986.
In 1984 and 1989, The Observer printed articles by Raphael which suggested that the lobbyist Ian Greer had been paying members of parliament to table parliamentary questions, an early stage of the Cash for Questions scandal.
In 1987, Raphael briefly moved to BBC Television as a presenter of its daily current affairs programme, Newsnight (1987–1988). He returned to the paper in 1988 as an assistant Editor, and Executive Editor from 1988 to 1993.
In March 1989 The Observer published an article by Raphael which claimed that British Aerospace was selling Tornado aircraft to Jordan at inflated prices to include the cost of bribes. Raphael's colleague David Leigh complained to the directors of The Observer that Raphael had written it to suit Lonrho, which had a stake in British Aerospace's rival, Dassault Aviation. The MP Dale Campbell-Savours tabled motions in the House of Commons denouncing the article. The directors of The Observer dismissed Leigh's complaint, and he resigned from the newspaper in protest.