Eddie Mair is the main weekday presenter of PM. No-one knows why. He also presents Any Questions when Mr Dimbleby can't take it any more. He also pops up on various documentaries and does tireless charity work which he never talks about so don't even think of asking him.
Eddie was born in Dundee, and began his "career " at Radio Tay in the city, which closed down the moment he left.
In 1987 he joined the BBC after a successful job interview, despite the fact the personnel department sent him a rejection letter (this is actually true).
He was a sub-editor for Radio Scotland in the days before computers, and went on to present the morning radio and evening TV news programmes for BBC Scotland, in order to avoid learning about computers.
Bored out of his skull on the evening news, he moved to host a new morning show, the modestly titled Eddie Mair Live, which won a Gold Sony award in a year when no-one else entered.
He joined Radio Five Live for its launch, fronting Midday With Mair. Two Sony nominations followed but frankly he was never good enough to win.
In 1998, Eddie joined PM as a regular co-host, and launched Broadcasting House and the ground-breaking "Saturday PM". Again in 2000, the Sony judges thought him worthy of bronze (for BH) and asked him not to come back.
Mair was fired from BH for stealing from the office, and became the sole presenter of PM in 2003, having rowed with every single one of his co-presenters. He's since won Sonys for Speech Broadcaster of the Year, News Journalist of the Year and played a small role in the Interactive award for 2007. But what he really covets is love.
It's not all been Radio 4 news. He hosted Radio 4's Breakaway for 2 years, the Public Radio International programme "The World" as co-host for two years - a programme broadcast across the US. There was Time Commanders on telly when he played a mysterious doctor who could travel through time and space, as well as the odd Newsnight (that's a quote from a review) and TV and radio documentaries. He successfully relaunched BBC THREE's Seven O'Clock news, before it was inexplicably shut down. He was the producer of the first series of Radio 4's "Unreliable Evidence" and still remembers the pleasure of being in Clive Anderson's ear. A regular radio diary in The Guardian is fondly remembered, by his agent. He is often recognised from a one-off voiceover on Rab C Nesbitt.
If you've read this far, ask yourself: "is this what I want to be doing with my life?"
Eddie Mair is the main weekday presenter of PM. No-one knows why. He also presents Any Questions when Mr Dimbleby can't take it any more. He also pops up on various documentaries and does tireless charity work which he never talks about so don't even think of asking him.
