Reuters, the international news agency, reached an out-of-court settlement with its veteran sports editor, Paul Radford, yesterday, bringing to bring an end to the journalist ‘s age discrimination claim against the company and three of its executives.
Radford, 66, dropped his action in return for an undisclosed payment for loss of employment and a contribution to his legal costs.
Ossian Shine, the agency’s Asia sports editor, was immediately appointed acting global sports editor while Radford retired from the company after 32 years’ service.
Radford took out his action against Reuters, plus its chief operating officer Stuart Karle, deputy editor-in-chief Paul Ingrassia and logistics chief Larry Rubenstein, after Ingrassia removed him from his responsibilities for running Reuters coverage of the London Olympics six months before the start of the Games.
Radford had covered 15 Olympics for Reuters and led the entire Reuters team at five Games, including the Beijing Games in 2008 for which he collected the Reuters News Story of the Year award for the team.
Shine, who is Singapore-based, led the text team at the London Olympics in Radford’s place. Ingrassia banned Radford from the Reuters office at the Olympic Park.
The employment tribunal hearing had been scheduled to last six days and included witnesses from the International Olympic Committee and the London Games organisers testifying for Radford.
It was adjourned during the first day for an out-of-court settlement to be reached and was called off before the start of day two when both sides announced an agreement had been signed.
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