Did Jimmy Young’s ‘softly softly’ approach beat Jeremy Paxman’s grillings?

The late broadcaster used his gifts as a singer to put interviewees such as Margaret Thatcher at ease – in stark contrast to his colleagues’ more combative approachesThe extremes of British political interviewing are represented by Sir Jimmy Young and Jeremy Paxman. Whereas Paxo famously asked ex-home secretary Michael Howard the same question 12 times, while working through his full repertoire of “Who farted?” faces, Young would have called Howard “Michael”,