NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Stratford Press

Jim Tucker: Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to journalism

Stratford Press
30 Dec, 2021 05:00 PM6 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Jim Tucker has been recognised for services to journalism in the New Years Honours list 2022. Photo / supplied

Jim Tucker has been recognised for services to journalism in the New Years Honours list 2022. Photo / supplied

When it comes to journalism in New Zealand, Jim Tucker could be said to have written the book on it. In fact, he has written several books including two journalism textbooks over the years.

Tucker has been made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM) for services to journalism in this year's New Year Honours list, published this morning.

That service to journalism references a career in the field that began in 1965, and has resulted in six national awards. From his starting days as a cadet reporter at the Taranaki Herald in New Plymouth, Tucker has worked as a reporter, editor, subeditor and photographer as well as a journalism lecturer at three different institutions.

The honour was unexpected, says Tucker, so unexpected he did what any journalist does, and did his own fact-checking before he was convinced it wasn't an elaborate joke.

"The first contact was an email, and I had just written a controversial column about anti-vaxxers which had led to me getting some very strong threats as well as someone setting up a faux Jim Tucker online persona. So to then get an email from what purported to be the government, saying oh you're going to get gonged, well the thought was there it might be some elaborate joke somehow. So I called them up and asked if it was for real."

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Having confirmed it was indeed, "for real" Tucker told his wife, son and brother, photo-journalist Rob Tucker, and started taking in the fact the government was honouring a journalist.

"I think that is the really important bit, that it's for services to journalism, I hope that is something all journalists can take pride in in a way. It normally doesn't happen to journalists, we are not trusted, we are not understood, and certainly when it comes to government, local and national, we are there to hold them to account, to question and to challenge, so to get an honour like this, from the government, that is a big thing."

With a career spanning over five decades, Tucker has covered many big stories but when asked if there are any particular highlights, he doesn't have to think for even a second before answering.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"That's very easy to answer, there was one big one in the early 70s. I became aware of how bad our rivers were, a couple of surfers called into the office of the Taranaki Herald, where I worked, to tell us about how they could see the pollution in the ocean, the could smell it as well, and noticed if they cut themselves when surfing, it took ages to heal. That got my curiosity going, because it matched what I had been seeing at several country council meetings. Officers would raise concerns about pollution from dairy factories or farms, but they would be brushed off by the councillors. I realised some of the councillors were farmers themselves or had connections to farming, and so I started looking into it."

As a reporter in a busy newsroom, Tucker couldn't get the time to do any serious investigative work during work hours, so he began taking his camera out on weekends, evenings and days off, looking for the cause of the region's polluted waterways.

That work led to a series of articles exposing the pollution leading to a widespread clean-up of the rivers and causes of their pollution.

The series of articles earned Tucker what he calls "a gong" from the New Zealand Conservation Society as well as an award in that year's New Zealand journalism awards, as well as cementing his reputation as a talented and determined journalist.

After working for the Taranaki Herald for over a decade, Tucker moved to Auckland where he worked in newsrooms there as well as a couple of years working as a news editor for a magazine. From there, he went on to head up journalism schools at the Auckland University of Technology, Western Institute of Technology and Whitireia. He has also been the executive director of the New Zealand Journalists Training Organisation and served as a media commentator and media awards judge over the years. A life member of the Journalism Education Association of New Zealand he was invited to join the organising panel of the Global Intermedia Dialogue and was awarded the Race relations Commissioner Award for New Zealand Diversity Action.

And over the years he has still found the time to write several books, on journalism and other subjects.

One of his first books was Kiwi Journalist, written while he was teaching journalism in Auckland.

"I realised we didn't have a textbook, so, after we decided one was needed, I wrote it."

That was followed seven years later by Intro, published by the NZ Journalists Training Organisation after it approached him saying a book was needed with a broader scope, to cover radio and television as well as print. Tucker wrote some of the chapters and edited the rest of the resultant book, which has gone through three editions and was the main textbook for journalism school until 2007.

Tucker has also written several books about various Taranaki people as well as one commemorating the 25th anniversary of Hospice Taranaki. A collection of selected columns of his was also published this year as a fundraiser for Hospice Taranaki.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

His next writing project is due to be published in February 2022 and is, he says, the first part of his memoirs.

"At this rate it's going to be a trilogy," he says of Flair and Loathing on the Front Page.

"My mother kept clippings of every important story I wrote, I have a hell of a lot of material to go through as I write my memoirs."

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Stratford Press

Stratford Press

A stroll through the history of the Stratford Press

16 Dec 06:13 AM
Stratford Press

Opinion: A year of change and challenges for our community

16 Dec 02:11 AM
Opinion

Carl Bates: Christmas under the mountain - a year on

16 Dec 02:03 AM

There’s more to Hawai‘i than beaches and buffets – here’s how to see it differently

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Stratford Press

A stroll through the history of the Stratford Press

A stroll through the history of the Stratford Press

16 Dec 06:13 AM

Stratford Press prints last issue as NZME closes 14 community papers nationwide.

Opinion: A year of change and challenges for our community

Opinion: A year of change and challenges for our community

16 Dec 02:11 AM
Carl Bates: Christmas under the mountain - a year on

Carl Bates: Christmas under the mountain - a year on

16 Dec 02:03 AM
Stratford council to oppose Treaty bill, citing lack of consultation

Stratford council to oppose Treaty bill, citing lack of consultation

16 Dec 12:07 AM
From early mornings to easy living
sponsored

From early mornings to easy living

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • Stratford Press e-edition
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP