In the sorely missed days when the crackle and pop of 208 metres on the medium wave, or Radio Luxemburg to use the more romantic nomenclature, was the only way for UK-bound youth to hear the latest contemporary music, sprightly Lux would do its utmost to provide the listener with a sprinkling of news. This gave the network a touch of gravitas and it gave the listeners a sense that they knew what was going on in the real world. There was a memorable occasion when this honest and laudable ambition led to one of radio's most delicious faux pas. The memory is dim, even with the help of a passing reference to the incident by Paul Gambuccini on Radio 4 recently. But the context was the Middle East at the time when to be a foreign correspondent in Lebanon was to be at the heart of the biggest foreign story, day after day. The matchless words were those of a reporter covering the conflict, who, reaching for the word Lebanese, missed by several consonents and announced that "lesbian forces have invaded Israel". I daresay some people hardly noticed: afer all, this was an era when the Middle East had more factions than enough. The Lebanese army was itself a loose affiliation of units, so the fact that it might have taken the day off from invading Israel so that a battalion of lesbian mercenaries could have a go would have struck some people as merely the ultimate expression of man's folly. The slip of the tongue is a terror that radio reporters face every time they confront a microphone. Even football results - the classic example being East Fife 4, Forfar 5 - offer the potential for the kind of calamity that makes for radio's continuing promise of excitement through unpredictability. But how much longer can we expect to hear news, of lesbians or Lebanese, on commercial music networks? In spite of the continuing audience growth of Radio 5 Live and Talk Radio, the impression grows that these and one or two other networks are becoming part of a news enclave. We need more competition for news to ensure proper disclosure; I fear we are getting less. News is shrinking into a small orbit controlled by a few people. Commercial music stations in the late 1990s take a view that is markedly different to that of Radio Luxemburg when I was growing up. More surprisingly, the attitude of the Radio Authority seems to be changing, too. Whereas no commercial applicant for a licence would have dreamed of leaving out a commitment to news bulletins a few years ago, now the signs are that news is more or less an option. The Radio Authority has even allowed some existing stations to drop or reduce their news bulletins. This ought to be worrying someone and one of the people it ought to be worrying is Tony Blair. The Prime Minister expressed concern about low turn out in the recent council elections. If young people in the 16-25 age group, who predominently listen to music stations, cease to be exposed to any of the issues in the news, who can expect them to visit polling stations when the time comes? Commercial broadcasters claim that, in surveys, their listeners report irritation when news bulletins interrupt music. But it would be interesting, and I suspect highly informative, to chart how these responses vary depending on when the survey is undertaken: there are few signs that anyone was "irritated" by coverage of Dunblane or the death of Princess Diana of Wales. Stations that are dropping news bulletins would do better to take a lesson from those that are adapting their bulletins to the audience. Many stations with an AM and FM outlets now produce a more traditional bulletin for older listeners on AM with a much more tabloid approach on FM. The latter is less abstract, more likely to be conveyed via an interview between a studio presenter and a reporter on the beat. Some frown on this approach to news, but if it works it should be welcomed. No news is the real bad news.