Editing Today (BBC Radio 4) (section)

==Notable features==
The programme has a regular slot for sports news and items, "Sports Desk", between 26 and 30 minutes past each hour, regularly presented by [[Garry Richardson]] (from 1981 to 2024), [[Jonathan Legard]] or [[Rob Bonnet]] and occasionally by [[Alison Mitchell]], [[Karthi Gnanasegaram]] or Chris Dennis.<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qj9z BBC Radio 4 – Today]. BBC (1 January 1970).</ref> From 1977 to 2024 it carried a daily [[horse racing]] [[Tip (gambling)|tip]].<ref>{{cite news|first=Caroline|last=Davies|title=BBC Radio 4 scraps daily horse-racing tips from Today programme|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/article/2024/jun/24/bbc-radio-4-scraps-daily-horse-racing-tips-from-today-programme|work=[[The Guardian]]|location=London|date=24 June 2024|accessdate=24 June 2024}}</ref>

If [[Parliament of the United Kingdom|Parliament]] is in session the previous day there will be a summary at about 06:50 (Yesterday in Parliament<ref>[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/bbc_parliament/3081534.stm "Westminster to your ears"]. BBC News (13 May 2004).</ref>) presented by two from [[Robert Orchard]], David Wilby,<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/presenters/david_wilby.shtml David Wilby] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090110193010/http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/presenters/david_wilby.shtml |date=10 January 2009 }}</ref> Rachel Hooper and Susan Hulme.<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/presenters/susan_hulme.shtml Susan Hulme] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090110234105/http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/presenters/susan_hulme.shtml |date=10 January 2009 }}</ref>

Journalist and historian [[Peter Hennessy]] has made an assertion in one of his books<ref>[[Hennessy, Peter]], ''The Secret State: Whitehall and the Cold War, 1945–1970''. Allen Lane, The Penguin Press. 256 pages. {{ISBN|0-7139-9626-9}}</ref> that a test that the commander of a British [[Submarine-launched ballistic missile|nuclear-missile]] [[submarine]] must use to determine whether the UK has been the target of a [[nuclear attack]] (in which case he has [[Letters of last resort|sealed orders which may authorise him to fire his nuclear missiles in retaliation]]), is to listen for the presence of ''Today'' on Radio 4's frequencies. If a certain number of days (said to be three) pass without the programme being broadcast, that is to be taken as evidence that the orders must be executed. The true conditions are of course secret, and Hennessy has never revealed his sources for this story, leading Paul Donovan, author of a book about ''Today'', to express some scepticism about it.<ref>Paul Donovan: ''All Our Todays: Forty Years of Radio 4's "Today" Programme''.London, Jonathan Cape, 1997. {{ISBN|0-224-04358-7}} (revised paperback edition is {{ISBN|0-09-928037-X}})</ref> However, the [[longwave]] signal of Radio 4 is capable of penetrating to surface depths where submarines can rise, although it does not have the range required to be heard at this depth far from the UK's coastal waters.