A member of the Today programme repertory company

By James Naughtie

Presenter

I can remember very clearly the first appearance of Hans Friedrich von Ploetz on the Today programme, soon after he had arrived in London. Up he popped just before the eight o'clock news, talking as ambassadors don't usually talk. There was a bit on Europe, a bit about German as a language – the mix that was to become familiar.

Later that morning my phone at rang home with a message from the ambassador. Trouble, I thought. Had he landed in hot water in Berlin? Not a bit of it. He was thrilled. Faxes and phone calls had been pouring into the embassy from TV and radio programmes trying to engage his services. He was off. Hans said to me that morning : "This is extraordinary. Everyone seems to have heard my broadcast!" Modestly, I said that he had learned the first great lesson British public life....

But seriously, the truth was that he was such a natural broadcaster, such a persuasive diplomat of the air that he became, from that day on, a cherished member of what we like to call the 'Today Programme Repertory Company'.

They're distinguished by knowing that there is no point on coming to the microphone unless you have something to say; and no point in doing it without realising that you are there, in part, to deliver a performance.  You may be passing on a message from your government, but that's not all.

He understood it from the first, and I think he set a standard for other ambassadors in London. I remember with special pleasure the time he persuaded Daniel Bernard, the late ambassador of France, to come to the studio with him to make a joint appeal for more language teaching in British schools. The French embassy had been a traditional problem area for us: ambassadors tended to be a little stand-offish. It took the Germans to break that mould.

I have no doubt that there are private achievements, known to few, which were managed in dark corners of the Foreign Office or in Downing Street during his time in London, but I'd suggest that his appearances as an eloquent and witty spokesman for his country on radio here were as valuable as anything. Hans even participated in one of the end-of-year polls to find our most-revered historical figure. He always had the air of an enthusiast. For diplomats, who have to preserve a cautious and meticulous regime in all they do, that is not always easy. It is one thing to put on a bit of dash and flair and a white-tie dinner at Buckingham Palace. Any old envoy can do that, with a bit of training. But to sparkle on the Today programme? To become, on air, "our old friend the German ambassador...." That takes class. And who knows, it may even matter more.