Sissons: 'Kaplinsky hired for her looks'

Peter Sissons has suggested that Five News anchor Natasha Kaplinsky has made a career out of being good-looking.

The broadcaster, who recently announced his retirement from the profession, said that newsreaders should be "more than just pretty faces".

Sissons said: "Natasha has done very well out of her looks. I suppose any bright woman with good looks who can make herself £1 million a year must be doing something right from her point of view.

"I haven't followed her career very closely. I'm one of the very many people who have never watched Five News from beginning to end."

He added: "The world is stuffed with wannabes and wannabe TV presenters at the moment. It should be a requirement that you don't get to read the news unless you've been through the fire of frontline reporting.

"We've got to make sure the new generation of news presenters have what the old generation had, which is knowing how the world worked."