Pay Attention by Laura Kuenssberg review – a BBC reporter’s howl of frustration

After more than two decades of studied neutrality, the journalist delivers some home truths about modern politics Laura Kuenssberg always swore she would never write a book. Amid all the vitriol hurled her way, the BBC’s political editor turned presenter has largely kept her coun

After more than two decades of studied neutrality, the journalist delivers some home truths about modern politics Laura Kuenssberg always swore she would never write a book. Amid all the vitriol hurled her way, the BBC’s political editor turned presenter has largely kept her counsel. She rarely complained even when she needed security to do her job unobstructed at Labour party conference under Jeremy Corbyn, or had to run the gauntlet of aggressive Brexit protesters outside parliament, or when a creepy unnamed minister tried to inveigle her into his hotel room for what an appalled Kuenssberg concluded was intended to be a threesome.

Knowing everything she does is minutely parsed for bias, she keeps her cards close to her chest. Until, apparently, something snapped. Pay Attention is a muted but heartfelt howl of frustration with politicians “who have looked like an absolute shower for a long time” but also, sotto voce , with voters, who she evidently wishes would occasionally take things more seriously.

Having covered Westminster since the late noughties, Kuenssberg brings all that weight of experience to bear in spelling out just how far the abnormal is now becoming normalised in British politics. Continue reading...