Read this and pick up a paper

A lot of people do.

Well, for whatever reason, you hold in your hand our 500th edition. (Or you will if you pick one up Ed.)

Who gives a toss, you’d be forgiven for asking. Well, you should.

This newspaper was first published in 1998, started by one of the estate’s tenants, Mirror Group Newspapers.

Canary Wharf had gone from being a glint in a Reichman’s eye in 1988 and was halfway to becoming this monster of an island city, where nearly 100,000 work.

That’s a city the size of Exeter, working here every day.

Back in the day, when I was deputy editor of the paper, I was interviewed by ITV London news. They were burbling on about how Docklands was turning into a massive success story.

I was young, stupid and unable to speak in anything other than soundbites. And I said something I’ve been embarrassed about ever since (I was only 22, forgive me).

I said: “There are 60,000 people here, and where there’s people, there’s news.�

I cringe still. And yet my stupid hungover self might just have hit on something.

The buildings of the estate are wonderful. The Tube station is peerless. The companies here make a load of money. But none of that is the business of a paper.

A paper, when it is good, is about the people of the area it serves.

And this paper has shown that even in this most utlra-modern of places, there’s still a place for a paper. Because people care about their surroundings.

We’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of. I did a lot of things wrong as editor.

But we also did and do good. We campaigned for and collected money for the families of the men killed in the crane collapse in 2000: crane erection supervisor Michael Whittard, crane operator Peter Clark and erector Martin Burgess.

We campaigned for better pay for cleaners.

And we even campaigned for Marks & Spencer to stock undies (which they still do).

And as the estate has developed, we have too. We have a Wikipedia page now, and a downmarket rival (I’ve always wanted to write that).

Editors and reporters and photographers and columnists come and go. (Although it would be remiss not to mention one early snapper – David Butler – who died just after leaving us.)

But our purpose remains. The point of us remains. The reason for you picking us up today remains.

Week in, week out, we tell you a bit about the place you inhabit. And you get the chance to bitch to us about
what you don’t like about the estate… and its paper.