INTERVIEW WITH AN EDITOR

Press, 21 August 1976, Page 11

INTERVIEW WITH AN EDITOR

At the zenith of his career. Orton Sutherland Hintz was one of the most influential men in New Zealand.

Known as “Budge.” to his friends, Hintz was editor for 13 years of the “New Zealand Herald,” the nation’s largest daily newspaper in circulation. He was regarded as the doyen of New Zealand’s newspaper editors. Orton Hintz joined the “Herald” as a cadet reporter in 1925 and worked his way up to the top. When he retired as editor in 1970 he moved south to Taupo where he now lives in retirement, pursuing his favourite hobby of angling, about which he has

written a successful book. He has become well known as an authority on trout fishing and as a

spokesman for New Zealand’s anglers. On Sunday night Orton Hintz talks to Rodney Bryant in the fifth of Bryant’s seven conversations with prominent New Zealanders in the "Encounter” series on TV2.

Hintz' speaks of what he regards as the greatest enemy of the freedom of the press in New Zealand, the libel laws — which he regards as too strict. He says why he thinks politicians are more likely to take issue with a television news report than a newspaper one and talks

of the different roles of the newspaper industry and television news.

He tells what pressures a newspaper editor has to face and explains how the editorial policy of a newspaper is decided.

Bryant also questions Hintz on the rights of newspapers to probe into people’s private lives, how New Zealand's standards of journalism compare with overseas, how an editor ensures that copy received from overseas news agencies such as Reuters and Tass is not inaccurate or biased, and how the standard of young journalists there days compares with the standard when Orton Hintz started out.