Seen as among the best war reporters of his generation, Martin Bell is openly critical of journalism today. He made sure Chris Price was up to scratch.

Having covered 11 conflicts and reported from 80 countries over 30 years in broadcast journalism, pinning down Martin Bell has always been no easy feat.

Yet even at the age of 73, the Royal Television Society’s Reporter of the Year in 1977 and 1993 finds it hard to stay in one place too long.

Martin has a home in Ashford with his wife Fiona but spends much of his time doing talks on cruise ships and charity work all over the country. Most of his travels are in his capacity as an ambassador for UNICEF.

“They send me where they can’t send their celebrities,” said Martin, who left journalism to become MP for Tatton in 1997, defeating sleaze-embroiled Conservative incumbent Neil Hamilton. “For an old bloke I am quite busy.”

Having reported on conflicts in Vietnam, the Middle East, Nigeria, Angola and Northern Ireland, Martin was awarded an OBE in 1992. That same year he was seriously wounded by shrapnel while recording a report in Bosnia. For a man who made his name as one of the nation’s foremost foreign affairs correspondents, Martin is a staunch critic of the state of journalism today. “I hate rolling news. It so often broadcasts inaccuracies and editors will go with a false report. Then once it is out there it is too late to correct it.

“I’m also against the death of real news. The old agenda has expired and now it is all celebrity journalism. There are some very good journalists about but if you look at the amount of space devoted to X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing, it means there are areas that are completely unreported.

“We have got our priorities wrong. I understand companies have got to sell newspapers but there is a responsibility to the world to tell people what is going on and most of the time we are failing at that.”

Possessing a strong sense of right and wrong is what has inspired Martin to embark on his various missions, from foreign reporting to becoming an MP. Yet he insists his forays into politics are a thing of the past.

He said: “I am done with that now. I am too old but there are some things you remember having enjoyed in life and being an MP was one of them.

“It is hard to know if I’ve made a difference. Without the TV coverage there may have been no effective action in the Bosnian war. To some extent the TV pictures forced the politicians’ hands. For a brief period we got some success out of Parliament.

“Good things happen when people make them happen and bad things happen when people let them happen.”

When he appears at the Folkestone Book Festival, Martin will talk about his collection of poetry, For Whom The Bell Tolls. Loosely speaking his poetry career started at the age of 19, during his national service with the Suffolk Regiment. He wrote a poem about the chain of command but did not write another one for 51 years.

He said: “I was upset about the war in Iraq and the way it was being reported. So I wrote a poem from a soldier’s point of view. Then I found writing poetry comes very easily. I have written more than 100 in the last year and I wrote 12 on my last trip in a cruise ship alone.”

Martin Bell speaks at the Folkestone Book Festival on Tuesday, November 8, from 5.30pm. Tickets £8, concessions £7. Box office 01303 858500. Full details atwww.folkestonebookfest.com