There was no pompous opening monologue for TalkTV. Launch news anchor Tom Newton Dunn just said briskly: “Straight talking and straight reporting starts here, I’ll be bringing you the news every night – so let’s get on with it.”

Then it was into a fairly conventional hour-long news programme, albeit a tad more tabloid in approach than existing broadcasters.

He was up against Nigel Farage on GB News, Dermot Murnaghan on Sky, Outside Source and Ros Atkins on the BBC News Channel and the ITV Evening News and Channel 4 News bulletins.