Bernard Ponsonby

Bernard Ponsonby is a Scottish broadcast journalist for regional news and current affairs programming for STV. He joined the station in 1990 and was appointed political editor in 2000, following the retirement of longstanding political editor Fiona Ross. Since 2019, Ponsonby has been Special Correspondent for STV News. Early life Ponsonby was born in Castlemilk, Glasgow. He was educated at Trinity High School, Rutherglen, and Strathclyde University. He has been a supporter of Celtic F.C. since boyhood. Bernard was brought up in The Garngad .An area within Glasgow ,known by locals as The Garden of God .It is an area with a large percentage of Roman Catholics of Irish decent.There is a large base of support for Glasgow Celtic F.C. from within the residents of The Garngad. Political career Ponsonby joined the Social Democratic Party (SDP) as a young man, and upon leaving university was briefly employed as a researcher for the former MP Dr Dickson Mabon. After the SDP merged with the Liberal Party in 1988, he stood for the Liberal Democrats – then styled as the "Democrats" – in that year's Govan by-election, losing his deposit with a 4.1% share of the vote. Following that he became the party's press officer in Scotland. Television career Ponsonby joined Scottish Television (STV) in 1990. For seven years, he presented the channel's flagship political programme Platform. He currently reports and provides political commentary for all three editions of the station's flagship regional news programme, STV News at Six, in the North, East and West of Scotland. He has also contributed to the weekly political programme Politics Now, for which he became presenter in January 2009, until the programme's end in 2011. He now commentates on the replacement programme Scotland Tonight.