Tim Hewat

Who was Tim Hewat?

Timothy Edward Patterson Hewat was an Australian television producer and journalist. He has been described as the "maverick genius of Granada television's current affairs in its formative years" and "one of the true greats of the medium."

Born in New Zealand, he was raised in Australia and educated at Geelong Grammar School, where a contemporary was Rupert Murdoch. After a start as a cub reporter on the Melbourne Age, he migrated to London in 1948. He was a reporter, then a sub-editor on the Daily Express, followed by a move to Canada to work on the Toronto Globe & Mail.

Returning to Britain in the late 1950s, he joined Granada TV's Searchlight programme in Manchester as a current affairs producer. Hewat is most celebrated for having created in 1963 Granada's revolutionary and long-running World in Action.

Hewat later went back briefly to the Daily Express as a senior editorial executive. His second marriage was to Granada casting director Ann Suudi. They had two children. He returned to Australia in the late 1960s and wrote many self-help books. He died aged 76 from injuries sustained in a road accident.