Nigel Dacre: And the good news is...

Critics say that ITV News has lost its way. Here, Nigel Dacre, the outgoing editor, defends his populist approach

Looking back over the seven years that I've been editor of ITV News, I can't remember a quiet or settled time. It's been a roller-coaster of a period, which has included two wars, two general elections and a string of big news events, including the Dunblane massacre, the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and the September 11 attacks.

Off screen, hardly a month has passed without a story about ITN hitting the headlines – newscasters coming or going, schedule changes, claims that we are lowering our standards, or the latest on the contract negotiations with ITN's various and competing customers. Throughout all of that, our strategy in the ITV newsroom has been to keep our heads cool and concentrate on our primary job – to produce the best and most distinctive news programmes we can.

In particular, we pride ourselves on being able to react quickly but thoroughly to breaking stories; in the past few years we have been tested time and time again. There's nothing quite like being in a television newsroom when a major news event breaks. Many of the awards we've won over the past seven years have been for such stories.

In general, it has been a period of relentless evolution in the TV-news industry, with widespread changes in production techniques and editorial styles. For our part, we've tried to improve the service on ITV by broadening the news agenda and by introducing new production techniques and a bright new set and graphics style.

We've set out to build the programmes around a "family" of experienced and high-profile correspondents, such as Bill Neely, Andrea Catherwood, Robert Moore, Caroline Kerr, James Mates and Shiulie Ghosh. It has been particularly pleasing that so many of our top correspondents are women, some with young children.

And, of course, we have had to ensure that we maintain what has always been a strong newscasting team. That has meant retaining the loyalty and commitment of ITN's long-established newsreaders – such as Trevor McDonald and John Suchet. But it has also meant bringing in fresh talent from outside the company, such as Mary Nightingale, while developing a new generation of newscasters, notably Katie Derham and Mark Austin.

Along the way, there have inevitably been problems and pressures. Certainly, one of the greatest challenges facing my job in the past few years has been to keep the newsroom positive and focused during the News at Ten debate.

Above all, though, my main aim has been to maintain a balanced approach to the news agenda. I've felt passionately that popular news programmes on the mainstream channels should cover a broad range of stories, including the day's important political, economic and international stories, as well as the big human-interest, consumer and health news. In my view, news programmes on the main channels let viewers down if they become too narrowly focused, in any direction.

Like many backroom, behind-the-scenes journalists, I've always tried to report the news and avoid being in it myself. So I've been uncomfortable with the press coverage that has followed the announcement of my departure from ITN last week. But I would like to make one other point. I believe that British viewers are extremely well served by the range and quality of their television-news outlets – strong news programmes on every mainstream channel, as well as three 24-hour channels. No one in this country can complain that they don't know what's going on in the world.

Indeed, it's my view that the editorial competition between ITN, the BBC and Sky News has markedly improved the quality of the news services across the board in recent years.

As we edge toward another international conflict, the presence of strong and authoritative TV-news programmes becomes even more important.