Veteran Uk Broadcaster John Stapleton Dies At 79

John Stapleton, nan esteemed journalist and broadcaster famed for his activity connected BBC’s Watchdog and GMTV’s News Hour, has passed distant peacefully successful infirmary astatine nan property of 79, his supplier Jackie Gill has confirmed. 

Stapleton, who talked astir his Parkinson’s illness test successful October 2024, yet succumbed to complications from pneumonia. His boy Nick and daughter-in-law Lisa were by his broadside during his last moments.

The illustrious profession of Stapleton lasted complete 5 decades, opening arsenic a interrogator connected ITV’s This is Your Life and later reporting for ITV’s Today. He gained prominence presenting Watchdog from 1985 to 1993 alongside his wife, Lynn Faulds Wood, who passed distant successful 2020 aft battling bowel crab and a stroke. In 2004, Stapleton was honoured arsenic nan Royal Television Society’s Presenter of nan Year for his sum of nan Iraq War.

In 2024, Stapleton said candidly astir his Parkinson’s, revealing early symptoms for illustration manus tremors and a weakened voice, which he recovered peculiarly distressing fixed his profession relied connected it. Reflecting connected his mother’s acquisition pinch nan disease, he expressed support for nan Assisted Dying Bill and said he would see Dignitas if his information worsened significantly. “If I’m suffering, I’d want to go,” he told The Times.

Despite his diagnosis, Stapleton maintained a affirmative outlook, saying, “I’ve had a awesome life. Whatever happens, I really can’t complain.” He leaves down a bequest arsenic a pioneering broadcaster and a much-loved fig successful British journalism.