Peter Lowe is a highly experienced news executive, who played a key role in the success of Sky News over 24 years, and is now available for a portfolio of work connected to journalism and communication.  This includes writing, speaking, journalism and TV skills training, advising public relations professionals, and mentoring young journalists. 

 

Peter ran Sky’s political unit during the Blair years.  Then, as Managing Editor, he managed and recruited scores of producers and  presenters, and has also been responsible for compliance and editorial standards of the output. For the last six years he moved to the news-gathering department as Head of Home News, during which he led teams through many tumultuous events, such as the big UK terror attacks in 2017, the Grenfell Fire, Brexit, the Covid pandemic, political and economic turmoil, and the death of The Queen. 

 

Sky News won the RTS Breaking News Award for its coverage of the Manchester Arena suicide bombing and the Home News Award for coverage of the Covid pandemic in the UK.

 

Peter’s Sky News career — after eleven years at the BBC – began in TV output production, but he was soon asked to run the Business Unit, and then, a year after joining, he was appointed to be head the Political Unit with then Politics Editor Adam Boulton.

 

The Blair years were particularly frenetic in 2002 and 2003, during the run-up to the Iraq War and its aftermath.  He and Adam were travelling frequently with the Prime Minister to meet Bush, Putin and leaders in Europe and the Middle East.  The role also took Peter to many EU and G8 summits, as well as organising Sky’s coverage from annual party conferences in the UK. 

 

He’s always demonstrated a passion for journalistic integrity and the upholding of high editorial standards. This led him to become the gatekeeper of compliance and standards issues, and he dealt during his time as Managing Editor with Sky News’ Ofcom inquiries and cases.

 

The Managing Editor role also exposed him to some of Sky’s commercial activity around sponsorship and development of new services.   He also wrote the sections of the Sky News Content Guide, which set out best practice for live TV production, news-gathering in the field, use of words and language, portrayal and diversity. 

 

Peter has very strong skills in managing teams, helping broadcasters to improve their storytelling and performative skills on TV, and rich knowledge and experience of news-gathering and multi-platform delivery.

 

He is also passionate about diversity in newsrooms and it can be demonstrated that, supported by others, he made significant positive change in the Home News department in terms of diverse recruitment.   

 

Previously he was Editor, News and Current Affairs at the BBC in the Midlands Region; launch Editor of the BBC's separate East Midlands region; television news producer/reporter; commercial radio reporter and News Editor, newspaper reporter for the Birmingham Post and Mail, and for a big freelance news agency where he started his career.