Presenter "took the long way round’

Press, 4 April 1989, Page 11

Presenter "took the long way round’

The "Fair Go” team, which makes its second appearance of the 1989 series on One at 7.30 tonight, includes two new presenters one of whom says she has “taken the long way round to get here,” but adds she is “delighted to have arrived.”

Kim Hill arrived in Otorohanga with her family from Britain when she was 16, and has been moving around ever since. \

A seventh-form year at Stratford High School, two years at Massey University and a year in Dunedin resulted in what she describes as “a sort of mishmash degree, which included all sorts of interesting, though perhaps not terribly useful things.” It was nevertheless good enough to get her into Canterbury University,

where she gained a postgraduate Diploma in Journalism. From there it was on to Radio New Zealand in Gisborne and Greymouth, followed by a period in print journalism with the Nelson “Evening Mail.” The year 1981 found her working in Britain on the staff of the Worcester “Evening Mail.” In 1984 she and her partner started a slow overland trip back to New Zealand, via a stint in Sydney on the “Daily Telegraph,” and as a staffer with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. By that time Kim Hill had decided to make Australia her permanent home but, during a summer holiday in New Zealand in 1985, she and her partner borrowed a truck, and drove from the top to the bottom of the country.

“That was it, really — it was so gorgeous, I just couldn’t make the decision to go back across the Tasman — and I ended up working for Radio New Zealand once again, this time with ’Checkpoint’ in Wellington,” she says.

After some months on RNZ’s "Good Morning New Zealand” programme, it was back to Britain for a long-term stay in London that turned into a short-term visit. She was back in New Zealand within three months, this time to find herself with “Fair Go.” And is this it? “For the moment, certainly. It’s a wonderful challenge, and I’m really excited about the whole thing. “It’s a situation in which, for a start, one has to get a ‘good story’ together — in the sense that it must be ‘interesting’ and absolutely accurate — and then add an element of personal presentation to it. It’s a fascinating medium.” Any worries about appearing on camera for the first time? “I’d be silly if I said I wasn’t keyed-up about it, concerned maybe ... but worried? No. They’ve promised me plastic surgery. “It’ll be a steep learning curve for me, that’s for sure, but I’m looking forward to that, and also of course, being a member of the ‘Fair Go’ team as well.”