Veteran BBC Radio 4 journalist and Today presenter James Naughtie has been inducted into the UK radio hall of fame.
Naughtie, who has been part of the regular presenting rota on the Radio 4 flagship morning news programme for almost 15 years, accepted the award at a Radio Academy lunch in London this afternoon.
He said: “The wonderful thing about the great ship Today is that every single morning it is a huge privilege to be on it.
“Believe it or not it’s fun. Serious journalism is fun.”
He later added: “All of us in radio know that it [the radio industry] is a great place and long may it thrive.”
Naughtie began his journalism career at the Aberdeen Press and Journal in 1975 before moving to The Scotsman’s Westminster bureau.
He spent three years at the Washington Post and a further two at The Guardian before moving over to broadcasting in the mid-Eighties.
After a period presenting The Week In Westminster and The World At One, he joined the Today programme in 1994.
He is currently one of five presenters on the Today rota, alongside John Humphrys, Sarah Montague, Edward Stourton and new recruit Evan Davis, the former BBC economics editor.
The UK radio hall of fame is overseen by the Radio Academy, a charity responsible for promoting excellence in radio.
It recognises the achievement of radio talent, dead or alive, who have made the greatest contribution to British cultural life.
Inductees in recent years have included John Timpson, the former Today presenter, who died in November 2005, and Radio 4 World At One journalist Nick Clarke, who joined the hall of fame last year following his premature death from cancer in 2006.
Other hall of fame inductees include talk radio presenter Anna Raeburn, BBC sports commentator Alan Green and former TalkSport presenter Mike Dickin, who died in December 2006.
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