28 Facts About Martha Kearney

Martha Catherine Kearney was born on 8 October 1957 and is a British-Irish journalist and broadcaster.

Martha Kearney was the main presenter of BBC Radio 4's lunchtime news programme The World at One for 11 years.

Martha Kearney is to stay with Radio 4, hosting a new series called This Natural Life and continuing to present episodes of Open Country.

Martha Kearney was born in Dublin, and brought up in an academic environment; her father, the historian Hugh Martha Kearney, taught first at Sussex and later at Edinburgh universities.

Martha Kearney was educated at St Joseph's Catholic School, Burgess Hill, Sussex, during her primary-school years.

Martha Kearney began her career as a phone operator on phone-in programmes at the London commercial radio station LBC and Independent Radio News in London.

Martha Kearney was a reporter on the AM programme before becoming a political correspondent when she covered the 1987 general election.

In 1998, Martha Kearney became a regular presenter of BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour.

Martha Kearney presented Newsnight and its weekly consumer survey of entertainment and culture, Newsnight Review, with increasing frequency.

Martha Kearney was a candidate to succeed Andrew Marr as the BBC's political editor in 2005, but lost out to Nick Robinson.

Kearney featured in a spoof segment of the BBC comedy series Time Trumpet, titled "Honey, I Shrunk Martha Kearney", in which Jeremy Paxman, in a fantasy version of Newsnight, interviewed her when she was a third of her normal size.

Martha Kearney featured later in the episode in a spoof report from Notting Hill.

Martha Kearney presented her final Woman's Hour on 19 March 2007 and her final Newsnight on 23 March 2007.

Martha Kearney became the main presenter of Radio 4's lunchtime news programme The World at One on 16 April 2007.

Martha Kearney presented Newsnight Review which became The Review Show from 2006 until 2014.

Martha Kearney was nominated for a BAFTA award for her coverage of the Northern Ireland peace process in 1998.

Martha Kearney was, with Jenni Murray, 2004 TRIC radio presenter of the year, and won a Sony bronze award for a programme on child poverty.

Martha Kearney was awarded Political Commentator of the Year by The House magazine in 2006.

In 2013, Martha Kearney won her episode of the Great Comic Relief Bake Off competing against Claudia Winkleman, Ed Byrne and Helen Glover.

Martha Kearney joined Today on Radio 4 in April 2018 as a main presenter, swapping posts with Sarah Montague.

Martha Kearney has presented Talking Books for the BBC from Hay Festival interviewing Kazuo Ishiguro and Marlon James amongst others.

In February 2024, Martha Kearney announced she would leave the Today programme, after the 2024, General Election.

In 2004, Martha Kearney was a judge for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction.

Martha Kearney chaired the judges for the 2012 Hippocrates Prize for Poetry and Medicine.

In 2013 Martha Kearney was a judge for the Man Booker Prize.

Martha Kearney's husband was an executive producer of the Academy Awards nominated short documentary Watani: My Homeland.

Martha Kearney is a keen bee-keeper and has made the BBC programmes Who Killed The Honey Bee for BBC Four, The Wonder of Bees for BBC Four and a two-part nature documentary Hive Alive alongside Chris Packham for BBC Two.

In 2023, it was announced that Martha Kearney joined Camphill Milton Keynes Communities as their patron.