By Steve Stratford, Deputy Editor

ONE of my biggest gripes being in local journalism is having to deal with people who want to be in the newspaper, but don't want publicity.

They're a strange breed. Like attention-seeking Big Brother contestants who embarrass themselves before millions on national television, and then complain when the celeb magazines start prying into their lives, there are people out there who want to speak to a reporter, but not be in the paper.

Take the case of a woman from Llandudno who rang the newsdesk last week complaining that the generator at a nearby building site was keeping her awake all night. She had a good story which involved swimming pools, private detectives and broken promises, just the sort of community-based story we like on the Weekly News.

But the lady in question didn't want her name or photo in the paper. Or where she lived. Which made it pretty damn hard for us to write the story. I can see the intro now - "An anonymous woman from somewhere in Conwy county has lost sleep because of a noisy generator at a mystery building site somewhere in Conwy county."

Why do people ring the newspaper if they don't want to be in it? I'll tell you why - newspapers get things done. If you're banging your head against a brick wall with the council, call the Weekly News, we'll do a story, and whatever it was you wanted doing will be done. Often before publication day.

Some people treat the paper like a Citizens' Advice Bureau, and we don't honestly mind, just as long as we get a story out of it. We have pages to fill with news, it's our job to report and write and print news. People who want the paper to sort things out but don't want publicity are wasting our time, and it can be very frustrating - especially if a reporter has spent the best part of a day ringing round trying to get to the bottom of an issue.

And while I'm on my soapbox, why do people write letters to our Your Views pages, but ask for their name and address to be withheld? It's my opinion that people should stick by their opinions - if someone is writing to criticise a councillor, a chief constable or even a fellow reader, they should have the courage to be identified. It's a coward who points fingers and throws stones but shies away from taking responsibility for their words.

This is all just a pet hate of mine. Most people do want to be named and photographed for the paper. But there is a frustrating minority who think that being named or pictured in the local paper will mean eternal embarrassment, ridicule, perhaps even death. And that's just silly.

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