David Mathew

Very sorry to hear about Dave, who seemed indestructible. I’m sure anyone else of our vintage would regard Dave as the ultimate filing editor, the keeper of the scrolls, who continued to have the highest standards on copy editing in the face of pressure to loosen up in the interests of economy, i.e. profit. It sometimes took time to get a story through Dave - but you knew it would be totally error-free by the time it hit the wires. In the end the company decided that some accuracy could suffer in the interests of speed. I can’t recall whether Dave was around to witness the introduction of “Karaoke Filing”, as described by Jim Flannery, when filing editors were banished, but he would have hated it.

He was a stalwart of the Reuters Golf Society, at his prime a prodigious hitter of the ball until age and ailments cramped his length.

As an Aussie, I will miss his no-nonsense Aussie approach to life. ■