News Associates graduate and political journalist Lord Ross Kempsell will be speaking to trainees at our tenth JournoFest conference.
JournoFest brings together News Associates and The School of Journalism trainees for a day-long festival of high-profile speakers and special guests from the media industry – and our tenth event in March will be our biggest yet!
Kempsell joined our London part-time course in 2016 after graduating from Christ’s College, Cambridge.
His first job in journalism was a news agency reporter in Kent. He joined TalkRadio as political editor where his general election campaign interview with Boris Johnson went viral. He later became special correspondent at Times Radio where he filed for The Times newspaper.
He left journalism to become political director of the Conservative Party and special advisor to Johnson when he became Prime Minister. Kempsell was nominated for a life peerage in Johnson’s Resignation Honours.
He is now the publisher of the Guido Fawkes political news website and the only former News Associates trainee to sit in the House of Lords.
Lord Kempsell
The conversation with Kempsell will be chaired by News Associates deputy managing editor Graham Dudman, with plenty of time for questions from our audience of 200 trainees and guests in person, and even more via Zoom.
Kempsell will be making a return to JournoFest after speaking at the second event in 2018.
JournoFest 2025 will take place at The Twickenham Stoop – and be livestreamed – on Saturday March 15 and is exclusively for News Associates and The School of Journalism trainees.
You can follow all the action on Instagram @NewsAssociates.
The Twickenham Stoop has been home to the Harlequins since 1963 when they acquired the ground, initially as a training pitch. It was named in memory of Adrian Stoop who played for Harlequins 182 times over 38 years and was president of the club for 29 years.
@newsassociates_ Our trainees share what they learnt at #JournoFest 🎉 #TeamNA #StartedHere #JournalismTips #JournalismTopTips #NewsAssociates #JournalismCourse #NCTJ #TopTips ♬ Evergreen – music <3
Previous JournoFest keynote speakers include Sky News special correspondent Alex Crawford, Radio 5 Live Breakfast presenter Rachel Burden, columnist Susie Boniface and veteran BBC News anchor Maxine Mawhinney.
See our highlights from previous JournoFest events here.