News anchor Richard Morecroft remembered as a 'great Australian'

Late veteran news anchor Richard Morecroft is being remembered as a consummate professional and "a great Australian".

The 70-year-old died "at a time of his choosing", a statement on Instagram said, after he received a cancer diagnosis earlier this year.

"We are devastated to lose such a warm, generous and caring human and hope that all those who knew him, if only through their TV screens, will remember him fondly," the statement said.

Morecroft graced television screens for decades as an ABC 7PM NSW anchor for almost 20 years, BTN presenter and host of Letters and Numbers on SBS.

Geraldine Doogue worked with Morecroft as co-host on The National in 1985, when her late husband Ian Carroll changed the half-hour 7PM television bulletin to an hour-long news and current affairs program.

Doogue told 702 ABC Sydney that she was shocked by his death and said his professionalism was a big part of his legacy.

"He was just terribly good to me and to my late husband ... during that really tumultuous year," she said.

"I mean, he was very much for it. Richard, once he was in, he was in. He was a very loyal, he contributed massively."

Doogue said he had a strong sense of what "an ABC authority ought to be" and modelled it "effortlessly".

"He had quite a wit about him, but he fundamentally felt his role, I think, was to be that face of the ABC while he was doing this," she said.

"He looked out for people who weren't born and bred to that particular spot, which is very admirable, I think."

He also hosted wildlife and educational programs and wrote about nature and the environment.

Morecroft eventually moved to the NSW south coast, which Doogue said he called "his cathedral", with his partner of 36 years, Alison Mackay.

"He had this whole side in him that was artistic, very much involved with the natural world," she said.

"He just thrived in that environment and gave enormously to [and was] very generous to all sorts of charities."

'A twinkle in his eye'

Former ABC presenter Keith Conlon, who met Morecroft when they worked together at a student radio station in Adelaide in the 1970s, said his fellow broadcaster was always a "lovely, warm person".

"We kind of invented community radio on the run, and Richard was one of those people who came through the door — he was an arts student [at University of Adelaide]," he said.

"He wasn't one of those 'out there' types … Very articulate, very intelligent.

"You just knew you were dealing with a person of substance."

Conlon said originally, Morecroft expressed interest in potentially becoming a teacher or an actor, but that it made sense he turned to news reading.

"If you're a newsreader, you are in a way acting. You only run the gamut from A to B but you've got to try to lift that news off the page and give things a different nuance," he said.

Conlon said he was "delightful" with "a twinkle in his eye".

"He had a beautiful voice — just that lovely tone, but much more than that, he had a considered way of talking," he said.

"He loved the language, he loved the sense of what we were talking about, and he was dedicated to doing those things right. He was a perfectionist.

"But if you'd called him a star he would have cringed."

'A figure of absolute trust'

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in a statement that Morecroft was a "great Australian".

"Combining a consummate professionalism with an unyielding humanity, Richard was a figure of absolute trust, a warm and familiar presence who guided us through the good times and bad," he said.

"He loved the arts and was deeply passionate about our natural environment.

"Nothing completed the picture so delightfully as the time we learned that he used to keep a baby flying fox safe and sound beneath the desk while he was presenting the news."

702 ABC Sydney Mornings host Hamish Macdonald said he grew up watching Morecroft on the news.

"I think he's part of why I wanted to go into journalism. Really, he was just such a reliable, friendly, trusted voice," he said.

Nightlife host Philip Clark also recalled Morecroft as a "terrific fellow".

"Total professional as a newsreader and broadcaster as well," he said.