Sir Trevor McDonald

Sir Trevor McDonald began his television career in 1962 in his native Trinidad, where he worked for newspapers and in local radio, rising to the position of assistant programme manager. Since then his career has encompassed reporting from Northern Ireland, sports correspondent, diplomatic correspondent, presenting and biography writing.

He has interviewed high profile people such as Nelson Mandela, President Clinton, Colin Powell and Saddam Hussein. He received a knighthood in the Queens Birthday Honours List for 1999 and had previously been awarded the OBE in the News Year's Honours List for 1992.

Sir Trevor McDonald was the main presenter of ITN's flagship programme, News at Ten since 1990.

In March 1998 Sir Trevor was awarded the Gold Medal by the Royal Television Society for his outstanding contribution to television news. In Mid-1997, he was voted the 'most authoritative and trustworthy' newsreader by Radio Times readers in a survey on viewing habits in which 40,000 people took part. Also in 1997 he won the prestigious Newscaster of the Year award from TRIC (Television & Radio Industries Club) for the second time (he was a previous winner in 1993.

Sie Trevor McDonald was named Most Popular Newscaster by viewers at the 1996 National Television Awards which he has presented for the last two years and was also voted viewers' favourite news presenter in research carried out by the media information services company, Paradigm. 25% of the 1,600 viewers questioned chose Trevor above all the others, with his nearest rival scoring just 4%.

In April 1997 Sir Trevor McDonald was given an Honorary Degree of Doctor of the University from the Open University and in July 1997 he received an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters from Nottingham University and an Honorary Degree of Doctor of the University from the University of Surrey. In November 1997 he received an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters from Southampton Institute.

He has written biographies of West Indian players Viv Richards and Clive Lloyd and his own autobiography, Fortunate Circumstances, was published in October 1993. Trevor's love of poetry resulted in the publication of an anthology entitled Favourite Poems in October 1997.

Sir Trevor won the coveted Media Personality of the Year award at the Commission for Racial Equality's Race in the Media Awards 2006.

His integrity and commitment to objective and fair reporting throughout his 32 year broadcasting career had done much to enlighten British people's understanding and awareness of race relations.