HE covered his first murder when he was 16 and is a seasoned journalist. But, as Mike Buckingham discovers, former Argus man Bob Skinner has a soft centre.

IF you cut Bob Skinner's arm off you'd find the word 'newspapers' written through it like a stick of rock.

Instead of blood there would be printer's ink. Bob Skinner believes that a newspaperman's duty to witness and accurately record events is a high calling and he will defend the journalists' trade to the last.

"But he or she has to have a cynical wariness about what they are told. And they have to love doing their job."

Bob, now 78, is a seasoned reporter who started out on the Argus' sister paper Penarth Times and progressed to the South Wales Argus when competition between newspapers in the Rhymney Valley was fierce and journalists, though deadly rivals, shared a bibulous cameraderie.

"It's got to be fun. Life, after all, is a quirkish business," he says. His introduction to newspapers was via his uncle George Dymond, a hard-bitten pro who had seen service in the trenches in the Great War and could colour a story to any market.

Bob Skinner was born in London of Welsh parents and during holidays in Wales would be his uncle's enthusiastic understudy.

"I helped him as he covered everything from miners' strikes to murders. Over 50 years he must have done work for every newspaper and news agency in Britain as well as his regular beat on the long-defunct Docks Guardian in Cardiff.

"It was because of him that at the age of 16 I got my first job on the Penarth Times."

Then called up into the Army he was, like so many young journalists, commissioned into the Intelligence Corps.

"Which I have to say was rather fun. There weren't many people in the Intelligence Corps and those there were had been despatched to the four corners of the Earth.

"I remember being made duty officer my very first day in the corps.

"My army career ended with me recovering from an injury received during battle training at what was then St Lawrence Army Hospital at Chepstow."

A brief foray into public relations, as PR for the Welsh Conservatives, was followed by a getting a job at the Argus, then in Market Street, Newport, as a reporter at the new Caerphilly office. Many years afterwards Bob retains fond memories of a newspaper which was his spiritual and actual home.

"The new office had a flat above and behind it where myself, my wife Rosemary, who is also a journalist, and baby Beverley, lived in exchange for a very reasonable rent.

"It was an all-night, all-day job with policemen and other contacts dropping by for a cup of tea at odd hours. I once loaned the police the Argus car to use as a temporary squad car.

"They trusted me to the extent of opening the police incident book and leaving me to jot down information."

In his new humorous book Don't Hold The Front Page! Bob tells of a classic boob that might have spared the blushes of a lady, but not his own.

"It was the official opening of the maternity unit at the Miners' Hospital and the star attractions were Aneurin Bevan and a 'Mrs' Price and her new twins and my story went on about how delighted Mrs Price was with her new twins.

"The problem was it wasn't Mrs Price at all. It was Miss Price who now had three illegitimate children. With many babies born out of wedlock nobody would these days care a jot but in those days illegitimacy was almost a crime.

"I think matron could at least have dropped me a hint." In the years since saying farewell to his beloved Argus Bob has done many things, mostly in the field of public relations.

He has observed how Japanese cities inform and consult their citizens and has helped shaped the public face of Cardiff-Wales airport. He has broadcast on radio and TV and been press adviser for the Pope's 1982 visit to Wales. In between the peaks of professional successful have been cock-ups and pratfalls.

"This is the story of a man who can't say 'no'," Bob smiles. "Everything I've got into is because someone has asked me to do something and I've said 'why not?'."

It is for this reason a portion of sales go to Faceup, the South Wales charity for those disfigured by face and neck cancer.

"Nobody among my family or friends has suffered from this awful disease. I was asked to get involved and I didn't feel I could say no."

And yet, the way in which he says it shows that he cares deeply.

It is the job of the truly compassionate to gently direct our gaze back to those whose afflications might repel us.

Confronting awkward or unpleasant facts is the duty of the truly compassionate person. It is also, incidentally, the duty of the journalist.

Don't Hold the Front Page! by Bob Skinner is published by Graffeg at £5.95 and includes cartoons by 'Gren'.