OUT of camera-shot a pig sinks its teeth into the leg of BBC business presenter Steph McGovern but all the viewers see is a smile and professional detachment.
“I try to make business interesting to viewers so in this case that meant climbing into a pig pen,” the 31-year-old tells students. “I just felt a shooting pain in my leg and one of the pigs had bitten right through my welly. I thought what do I do? I can’t kick a pig on national tele. But that is the life I live; anything can happen on live TV.”
With a distinctive Teesside accent, loved by many reviled by others, Steph couldn’t come from any other town but Middlesbrough. Despite being a bit of a globetrotter and being based in Manchester for her job, she retains close links with the region as a governor at Macmillan Academy where she went to school. She also regularly returns to her own home here and keeps in touch with her teacher father, nurse mother and friends.
“I was good at science, business and maths at school and thought I would stand out in engineering as a girl,” recalls Steph, who has worked for the BBC for the past 12 years. “I joined Black and Decker for a year in industry and hoped this would pay my way through university. I was given some big projects that they didn’t expect me to succeed with, including designing a new more powerful leaf-blower. But we managed it and saved Black and Decker a £1m a year in the process so became famous in the engineering world.
“I won some industry wards and was interviewed by the media. Then every time the press needed someone to comment on an engineering issue it was a case of ‘get that northern girl who won those awards’. One of these interviews was at the BBC in London and as soon as I walked in I knew I had to work there.”
Steph secured as much work experience as she could on Radio 4 and Tomorrow’s World. She managed to get a job with economics editor Robert Peston, with whom she spent a lot of time in Number 10 Downing Street.
One day radio presenter Chris Evans needed a stand-in business reporter to cover for sickness, the same day as U2 were due to be on his Radio 2 show.
“The paparazzi were outside and I walked in wearing sunglasses with my peroxide blonde hair – they thought I was Lady Gaga,” she says. “Then Bono walked in and gave me a massive hug just as Chris came out of the lift to collect him. I was there to do a piece on mobile phone insurance but Chris said, on air, he thought I was Bono’s bit on the side.”
Steph was later asked by a producer if she had done any live TV. “I said yes even though I hadn’t,” she says. “They told me to tone down my image, though I could keep my Boro accent, and I ended up with a ginger bob and a fluffy orange cardigan looking like a right frump.
“I didn’t realise there was going to be such a backlash. One viewer wrote in questioning how I could be intelligent with my accent while another sent me £20 for speech correction therapy. Some people think I am a Middlesbrough tart, others that I am common.
“But I have got some funny fans. One pretends to be my eye-brows, another my high viz vest and now they answer my critics so I don’t have to. They also talk to each other, which is a bit strange but very funny.
“If there is one thing my experiences have taught me it’s that you have to be true to yourself. People will like you more. It’s the same with the writing. Don’t lose your personality; that has been crucial to my career.”