On 13 June 13 2021, ex-BBC presenter Andrew Neil led the launch of the Conservative-leaning TV channel GB News. As its then flagship presenter, Neil announced the birth of a news network hosted by “passionate presenters with character, flair, attitudes, opinion and, yes, a sense of humour.”
While Neil left GB News only three months after its launch over disagreements with “other senior managers and the board”, the channel has grown considerably.
According to broadcast data body BARB, GB News reached 3.2 million people in January up from 2.9 million a year earlier. This January, for comparison, NewsUK’s rival channel TalkTV reached 1.7 million people, Sky News reached 7.1 million and BBC News reached 8.9 million.
Online, GB News has become the 20th biggest news website in the UK according to Press Gazette’s monthly ranking with growth of 3% month-on-month in December.
GB News has also bolstered its staff, with additions including former Telegraph political editor Christopher Hope, and received a nomination for Scoop of the Year at the British Journalism Awards in December.
At the same time, however, several GB News shows have come under Ofcom scrutiny. As of the start of March, 13 Ofcom investigations into the broadcaster continue, mostly relating to due impartiality. One relates to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak filling in for fellow Conservative MP, Jacob Rees-Mogg, at the helm of a People’s Forum programme.
In the space of three months last year Ofcom found that GB News had broken the Broadcasting Code on three occasions.
Internally, GB News has also faced turmoil. Presenters Laurence Fox and Calvin Robinson were fired – and Dan Wootton was suspended and left after the eventual Ofcom ruling – after Fox made comments about a female journalist’s appearance while appearing on Wootton’s show and Robinson later gave him support.
GB News’s often opinionated presenters are key to its output – here’s an outline of its regular on-air journalists and hosts.
Who are the regular GB News presenters?
The GB News schedule starts at 6am and ends at midnight daily. The channel uses personality-led formats, making the views of its hosts a major part of its output.
These are the regular presenters on the channel as of March 2024 (in alphabetical order).
Andrew Doyle
Andrew Doyle is a playwright and journalist from Northern Ireland. He joined GB News in 2021 and currently hosts Free Speech Nation every Sunday from 7pm to 9pm and Headliners every day at 11pm.
Doyle holds a doctorate in early Renaissance poetry from the University of Oxford. He started his career as a stand-up comedian, still running a comedy night in London called Comedy Unleashed, with the tagline “the home of free-thinking comedy”. In 2019 and 2020, Doyle wrote two books under his fictional character’s name Titania McGrath, both aimed at parodying “woke culture”.
His broadcasting career also includes appearances on Sky News and BBC Radio 4’s show The Moral Maze.
Andrew Pierce
Andrew Pierce has worked as a journalist for the Daily Mail, which he calls his “spiritual home”, since 2009. Alongside his work at the newspaper, which includes a new weekly Youtube show alongside Sarah Vine, Pierce co-presents Britain’s Newsroom for GB News on weekday mornings with Bev Turner.
He started his journalism career working for local newspaper the Gloucestershire Echo and has been working as a reporter for over 40 years.
He has experience working as an assistant editor for publications including The Daily Telegraph and The Times, where he spent 17 years. Pierce also hosted a political radio show and a breakfast show on LBC for several years before joining GB News.
Anne Diamond
Anne Diamond joined GB News in 2022 to host Breakfast with Stephen and Anne, the weekend breakfast show with Stephen Dixon.
Diamond began her television career with BBC West in Bristol, before moving to ATV Today as a reporter and newsreader in 1979, later rejoining the BBC to become a reporter on the nightly programme Nationwide.
During the 1990s, she presented the breakfast show on LBC, alongside Sir Nicholas Lloyd and Tommy Boyd, until she left in 1999.
Until 2016, Diamond took part in several TV shows, then joined ITV’s Loose Women with Denise Welch, but left in 2018 when she appeared in Channel 5’s Costa Del Celebrity.
Before joining GB News, Diamond was also a regular newspaper reviewer for Sky News.
Bev Turner
Bev Turner joined GB News in November 2022 and presents Britain’s Newsroom every weekday morning with Andrew Pierce.
Her previous roles have included presenting pregnancy/motherhood series Bump Club for BBC Radio 5 Live, ITV’s coverage of Formula One, the cooking show Taste for Sky1 and BBC Two’s Homes Live.
She hosted her own show on LBC from 2015 to 2019. Her time at the station ended when her contract expired and was not renewed and she took the opportunity to highlight a lack of diversity among LBC presenters, saying there “remains ONE female presenter and 19 men, (only one of which is not white)”.
In recent years the journalist has made headlines for comments she has made about Covid-19 vaccines, lockdown and climate change.
She expressed support for Russell Brand in September 2023 before leading coverage of allegations against him, prompting a backlash.
Cameron Walker
Cameron Walker is the royal correspondent at GB News and presenter of special programmes dedicated to the royals.
After studying broadcast journalism at Nottingham Trent University, Walker did a traineeship at ITV News as a TV reporter and producer. He then worked as a researcher for Good Morning Britain.
Only five months after starting his role at GB News, Walker reported on the Queen’s death. In October 2022, the then 25-year-old wrote for Press Gazette about going in at the “deep end” on such a historic occasion.
Camilla Tominey
Camilla Tominey, also associate editor at The Telegraph, is a writer and broadcaster best recognised for her coverage of politics and the royal family.
She attended the University of Leeds to study law before beginning her job as a trainee at the Hemel Hempstead Gazette. After three years, the journalist was hired as a royal correspondent for the Sunday Express.
Tominey began working for NBC News in 2010 as a royal expert and has commentated for BBC, ITV, Channel 5, Sky News and and Australia’s Channel 9.
She broke the story of Prince Harry’s relationship with actress Meghan Markle in 2016 and was one of the only journalists to predict the 2017 general election before it was announced.
She then joined The Telegraph to cover politics and royals in 2018.
Tominey began hosting a Sunday afternoon programme on LBC in 2021, but left the station in 2022 to work as a political presenter for GB News, where she now hosts The Camilla Tominey Show every Sunday from 9.30 to 11am.
Christopher Hope
Christopher Hope, nicknamed Chopper, left The Telegraph after 20 years to become head of politics and political editor at GB News in August 2023.
In January 2024, the channel announced he would be co-presenting a new show based around PMQs alongside former Labour MP Gloria De Piero.
Hope began his career in local newspapers and then became a business journalist in 1999 when he started writing for The Scotsman. His experience in political journalism began in 2006 when he joined the Lobby team at The Daily Telegraph. In 2008, Hope became Whitehall editor and went on to several roles including chief political correspondent and associate politics editor.
Hope has anchored Radio 4’s The Week in Westminster and was a part of the investigative team that exposed the parliamentary expenses scandal in 2009.
At The Telegraph he also recently hosted a weekly show called Chopper’s Politics, in which he conducted interviews with many Cabinet ministers as well as every Prime Minister and party leader since 2017.
Darren Grimes
Darren Grimes is one of the hosts of The Saturday Five show from 6pm to 8pm on Saturdays on GB News.
A former Liberal Democrat member at university, Grimes changed his stance and founded the pro-Brexit youth activism campaign group Be Leave in 2016. He then worked as deputy editor at the Brexit Central website.
In 2019, Grimes supported the launch of Turning Point UK, the British sister organisation of a pro-Trump American activism group. The organisation has been endorsed by many Conservatives, including fellow GB News presenters Nigel Farage and Jacob Rees-Mogg.
In 2020 Grimes launched his own right-wing political website, Reasoned, whose tagline called for people who “hide their political views for fear of being called homophobic, a TERF, racist”.
In 2022, Grimes joined GB News to present weekend show Real Britain but left several months later. In April 2023, he returned to the channel to co-host The Saturday Five alongside Emily Carver.
Eamonn Holmes
Eamonn Holmes hosts Breakfast with Eamonn and Isabel on GB News alongside Isabel Webster.
Holmes held several roles at Ulster Television, winning a Hometown Radio Award in the process. In 1986, he joined the BBC, then Sky News and ITV, presenting over 20 different shows. For his services to broadcasting, he was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2018.
Only months before joining GB News, Holmes had been criticised by ITV viewers who accused him of legitimising conspiracy theories related to Covid-19 and 5G, when he said on his show that dismissing those claims was “very easy” as it “suits the state narrative”. However, after receiving 755 complaints, Ofcom concluded that “overall there was adequate protection for the audience”.
After joining GB News in 2021, Holmes took a four-month absence in 2022 due to health issues.
Ellie Costello
Ellie Costello has been a presenter and reporter at GB News since 2021. She now co-hosts Breakfast with Stephen and Ellie on Thursdays alongside Stephen Dixon and Saturday Morning Live with Ellie and Pete with Peter Andre.
Costello obtained a degree in English literature at Southampton University and a Masters in broadcast journalism at London’s City University.
She has experience in news reporting, having worked as a radio and TV reporter including for the BBC World Service, Victoria Derbyshire show and BBC News.
Emily Carver
Having grown up in north London, Emily Carver graduated from the University of Bristol, where she read French and German, and then pursued a Masters at the London School of Economics.
Carver went from being a parliamentary researcher and policy adviser at the House of Commons between 2017 and 2019 to being a journalist, with bylines in publications like The Telegraph and The Independent, as well as being a regular columnist for Conservative Home since 2021.
The journalist also developed an interest in broadcast, which led her to GB News. Between 2021 and 2022, she appeared as a panellist on BBC Question Time, Politics Live and LBC Cross Question.
Today, she co-hosts The Saturday Five weekly at 7pm and Good Afternoon Britain on weekday lunchtimes.
Gloria De Piero
Gloria De Piero currently co-hosts a weekly PMQs show alongside Christopher Hope but previously hosted Gloria Meets on Sundays at 6pm.
De Piero grew up in Bradford and was the first in her family to go to university. She said: “I became active in politics as a teenager because I wanted to change things for people from backgrounds like mine.”
After a stint working for the BBC and as political editor for GMTV, she was elected as Labour MP for Ashfield in Nottinghamshire in 2010. In 2019, she decided not to stand for election again and instead returned to broadcasting at Times Radio and Talkradio.
Isabel Webster
Isabel Webster initially joined GB News in 2021 to co-host its weekly news review show on Sundays and she now presents the breakfast programme alongside Eamonn Holmes.
It is not the first time Webster has co-hosted a morning show with Holmes. For several years until 2016, the two presented the Sky News Sunrise show together.
Webster grew up in Surrey, studying politics and theology at the University of Bristol before earning a postgraduate diploma in Broadcast Journalism from City, University of London.
With a career spanning radio and TV, she worked for various local services of the BBC, then joined Sky News in 2011 where she anchored several shows before moving to GB News.
Jacob Rees-Mogg
Born and raised in Somerset, Jacob Rees-Mogg studied history at Trinity College in Oxford.
During his years in finance, until 2007, Rees-Mogg got close to the political field and was elected as the MP for North East Somerset in 2010. Growing in popularity over the decade, Rees-Mogg was briefly in the running for Theresa May’s possible successor as leader of the Conservative Party but he endorsed Boris Johnson in 2019.
Johnson appointed Rees-Mogg as Minister of State for Brexit Opportunities and Government Efficiency and he was later chosen as business secretary for Liz Truss.
Today, he is still an MP alongside being a GB News presenter hosting his own show, Jacob Rees-Mogg’s State of the Nation, on Mondays to Thursdays at 8pm.
GB News editorial director Mick Booker has described Rees-Mogg as “an authentic and authoritative voice of the Tory backbenches with his trademark common sense, refreshing directness, and an impish sense of fun”.
At the time of writing in March 2024, one of the open Ofcom investigations against GB News centred on Rees-Mogg reading out breaking news about the verdict in a civil trial against former US president Donald Trump in possible contravention of rules around programmes being presented by politicians.
John Cleese
John Cleese joined GB News in October 2023 to host ten-episode discussion show The Dinosaur Hour. The series saw Cleese host discussions with guests described as “those out-of-touch and unfashionable folk who have been left behind in these dizzying and confusing times,” including Stephen Fry, Caitlyn Jenner and Trevor McDonald.
Cleese is well-known for his career in comedy TV and film, which included co-founding Monty Python and creating hit series Fawlty Towers.
Lee Anderson
Lee Anderson became a Conservative MP for Ashfield in Nottinghamshire since 2019 but was stripped of the Tory whip in February 2024 after making comments about Sadiq Khan that the London mayor described as “Islamophobic, anti-Muslim and racist”.
Anderson subsequently joined Reform UK as its first-ever MP.
Coming from a family of coal miners, Anderson worked in the mines for ten years after leaving school. He then worked at his local Citizens Advice Bureau and in hostels to support the homeless.
This sparked his interest in politics, and he became a Labour councillor in 2015. He was also a case worker for Gloria De Piero, who was a Labour MP for Ashfield at the time and is now his colleague on the GB News presenters team.
Anderson later moved to the Conservative Party, becoming a councillor of Mansfield District Council. In 2019, he was elected as an MP.
Later a deputy chair for the Conservative party known for his controversial opinions on the death penalty, poverty and political correctness, Anderson quit that position in January 2024 after disagreements with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda bill, which he said should be more “watertight”.
He hosts Lee Anderson’s Real World on GB News on Fridays at 7pm.
Leo Kearse
Leo Kearse is one of the presenters of the daily paper review show Headliners. He also hosts The Saturday Night Showdown weekly at 8pm.
While he has a background in business consultancy and IT, Kearse is primarily known for his career as a comedian. A lot of his viral videos are based around – in his own words – “slamming woke lefties”, and he defines himself as a “right-wing comedian”.
Kearse stood as a Reclaim Party candidate in the 2021 Scottish Parliament election, winning a 0.3% share of the ballot. At the time of the election, his discourse mostly revolved around fighting for free speech.
Liam Halligan
Liam Halligan is the economics and business editor at GB News – but at the time of writing has reportedly handed in his notice, according to Guido Fawkes.
After co-hosting a show with presenter Gloria De Piero in 2021, he went on to present his own show On The Money until September 2022. After that show was cancelled Halligan said he tried to do “as many ‘segments’ in other shows” as he could.
With a degree in economics, Halligan co-founded an academic journal focusing on the Russian economy and has been involved in several economic committees at a national level.
He has also worked as a journalist for the Financial Times, The Economist, Channel 4 News and GQ and was a presenter on the current affairs show CNN Talk. Halligan has written a weekly column for The Sunday Telegraph for more than 20 years, and co-presents The Telegraph’s Planet Normal podcast with Allison Pearson.
Mark Dolan
Mark Dolan joined GB News in 2021. He now hosts two shows on the channel, Mark Dolan Tonight at weekends and Friday Night Live with Mark Dolan. He has also presented paper review show Headliners.
Dolan grew up in North London then went on to attend the University of Edinburgh, where he achieved a Masters in politics.
With a career in stand-up comedy, Mark Dolan has hosted various radio shows at stations like Viva Radio and Talkradio throughout the years and hosted Channel 4’s Balls Of Steel from 2005 to 2008.
Martin Daubney
Every weekday from 3pm to 6pm, Martin Daubney presents his eponymous show on GB News.
Daubney started working as a journalist in 1995 when he joined the ranks of women’s weekly magazine Bella. After writing in men’s lifestyle columns for various tabloid newspapers, he became editor of lads’ mag Loaded for almost eight years. In 2007, while he was editor of Loaded, he organised a straight pride as he believed heterosexual men’s rights were endangered. Since then, he has been writing and commenting about masculinity for various shows and papers.
Before joining the channel, Daubney was also deputy leader of the Reclaim Party, founded by Laurence Fox – who was fired by GB News in October 2023 due to “totally unacceptable” comments about female journalist Ava Evans made on a live show.
Michael Portillo
Michael Portillo hosts Sunday with Michael Portillo on GB News weekly at 11am.
After graduating from the University of Cambridge, Portillo worked as a graduate trainee for a transportation business before starting his job with the Conservative Research Department in 1976.
“I have been lucky to have two distinct careers,” Portillo has said. The first was in politics, where he served as MP for Enfield Southgate between 1984 and 1997 with ministerial roles under Margaret Thatcher and John Major. He made a return to Parliament between 1999 and 2005 as MP for Kensington and Chelsea.
He has also had a broadcasting career since 1998 including Portillo’s Progress with Channel 4, Great Continental Railway Journeys in which he was able to cultivate his passion for steam trains, Portillo’s State Secrets on BBC Two, and a number of other documentaries for the BBC.
Michelle Dewberry
Michelle Dewberry has her own GB News show, Dewbs & Co, which runs Monday to Friday from 6pm to 7pm.
Dewberry left school at 16 but then took a YTS Apprenticeship with St John Ambulance, which she has said put her on the right path, initially to a career in computing.
She entered BBC’s The Apprentice in 2006 and won before becoming more engaged in politics in 2010. Between 2016 and 2020, Dewberry was a regular commentator on Sky News and presented its weekly debate show The Pledge.
She ran for election in Hull as an independent in 2017, and again for the Brexit Party in 2019.
Nana Akua
Nana Akua is one of the weekend hosts of GB News. She presents a self-titled Saturday and Sunday afternoon show focusing on debates and news stories.
Akua’s career in radio started at Kiss 100 although she had originally wanted to be a trader to follow in her father’s footsteps. After her time at Kiss, she went on to work at Capital Radio, where she set up Capital Interactive. She then pursued her dream of being a presenter and after negotiating a position as a trainee DJ at The Capital Radio Cafe, she moved on to having her own Drivetime Show on Fusion 107.3.
After working for Sky Vegas, she had various jobs at the BBC, presenting national, regional and local radio.
Akua has spoken several times against the Black Lives Matter movement, notably by accusing it of “capitalising on white guilt” and of being a “far-left Marxist” organisation.
Neil Oliver
Neil Oliver hosts the current affairs show Neil Oliver Live on GB News, which airs on Sundays from 6pm to 7pm.
After a career in archaeology, Oliver presented the BBC documentary Coast for several series.
Since joining GB News in 2021, Oliver has been at the heart of a number of complaints, especially around comments he made on air about climate change and Covid-19.
Nigel Farage
The former Brexit Party and UKIP leader’s career in broadcasting started by contributing to the US TV network Fox News after Donald Trump’s election in 2016.
From 2017 to 2020 Farage hosted The Nigel Farage Show on LBC Radio, where he interviewed then-US President Trump – who he has since had on GB News.
After leaving LBC, Nigel Farage joined GB News initially to host a programme called The Political Correction, until going on to present his own evening show Farage.
In December 2023 Farage finished third in the latest series of ITV show I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! He reportedly received a £1.5m fee for his time on the show, making him its highest-paid star.
Olivia Utley
Olivia Utley is a political correspondent at GB News.
Utley has said: “…by Westminster standards, I was a late political bloomer: throughout secondary school and university I couldn’t have cared less what was going on in Parliament.”
But after she graduated in English Literature from the University of York in 2015, she got her first job as a parliamentary assistant to an MP and started freelancing for blogging sites.
Her recurring bylines include The Sun and The Telegraph, where she worked as a commissioning editor from 2021 to 2022. She has also made regular appearances on BBC Question Time and Radio 4’s Any Questions as well as the broadcast newspaper review shows.
Patrick Christys
Originally from Cheshire, Patrick Christys entered the journalism world as a local news reporter in Cumbria at the Westmorland Gazette.
When he moved to London, he started as an overnight editor at The Daily Star and The Daily Express, before going on to report from Iraq and Syria.
After a few years in investigative journalism, he switched to radio, eventually becoming the host of Love Sport Radio’s breakfast show and Talkradio’s drive-time show.
He joined GB News in 2021 and hosts his show Patrick Christys Tonight at 9pm to 11pm every weekday.
Peter Andre
Peter Andre is the co-host of the news and debate show Saturday Morning Live with Ellie and Pete, alongside Ellie Costello.
After a singing career that saw him rank high in the UK Charts between 1995 and 1999, Andre moved on to television. In 2004, he and ex-wife Katie Price launched a reality show on ITV2 documenting their relationship. Andre also appeared in series 13 of Strictly Come Dancing in 2015.
Before joining GB News in December 2023, Andre presented several shows, including ITV’s Loose Women and Odd One In.
Simon Evans
Simon Evans hosts the daily 11pm show Headliners alongside Andrew Doyle and Leo Kearse.
Evans is primarily known for his career as a comedian, which he started after leaving Southampton University with a law degree in 1986. He then participated in shows like BBC Radio 4 series Simon Evans Goes to Market, as well as events like Live at the Apollo in 2013.
In journalism and broadcasting Evans has contributed to Andrew Neil’s This Week, Radio 5 Live’s Afternoon Edition, Question Time, and regularly writes for Spiked magazine.
Stephen Dixon
Stephen Dixon joined GB News at the end of 2021 and now co-hosts Breakfast with Stephen and Anne on weekends from 6am.
Dixon obtained a BA in Broadcast Journalism from Nottingham Trent University before working as a reporter for various local radio stations and as a presenter and producer for ITN. He eventually moved to Sky News, where he stayed for more than 20 years.
Tom Harwood
Tom Harwood is the deputy political editor for GB News and hosts Good Afternoon Britain on weekdays from 12pm to 3pm.
Tom Harwood grew up in Cambridge and graduated from Durham University, where he was involved in the student wing of Vote Leave. He then moved to London in 2018 to start his journalism career.
Harwood worked for the political news website Guido Fawkes and has written columns for The Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail.
Which presenters have left GB News – and why?
The faces of GB News have changed various times since its June 2021 launch.
Andrew Neil’s early departure
Andrew Neil, the original flagship presenter and chairman of GB News at its launch, stepped down after disagreements about the direction in which the channel was heading. Neil took a break from presenting after just eight programmes and his official departure was announced in September 2021.
The initial objective of GB News, as Neil explained, was not to “slavishly follow the existing news agenda”, giving power and voice to reflect stories “that matter to you and those that have been neglected”.
As a guest on BBC’s Question Time after his departure, Neil said: “More and more differences emerged between myself and the other senior managers and the board of GB News.
“The differences were such that the direction they were going in was not the direction that I had outlined, it was not the direction I had envisaged for the channel.”
Mark Steyn’s Ofcom fines
Canadian author and presenter Mark Steyn started hosting his own show on GB News in November 2021, originally airing every Friday. However, when GB News allegedly told him he may be liable to pay his own Ofcom fines, the presenter decided to leave the channel in February 2023.
Ofcom found that two of Steyn’s programmes broke the Broadcasting Code in relation to comments made about the safety of Covid-19 vaccines.
Laurence Fox and Calvin Robinson’s sacking, Dan Wootton’s suspension
In September 2023, Laurence Fox made misogynistic comments about journalist Ava Evans on Dan Wootton’s show. Wootton was criticised for not sufficiently challenging Fox’s comments or apologising.
The following day, GB News suspended both Fox and Wootton.
Calvin Robinson, another regular presenter, was also suspended after voicing his support for them. A few days later, GB News announced that Fox and Robinson had both been sacked.
Wootton’s suspension continued for several months but he officially left the broadcaster after Ofcom ruled the show had been in breach of the Broadcasting Code.
Reacting to his firing, Robinson posted on Twitter/X: “How long can a station keep calling itself ‘the home of free speech’ when it continues to engage in cancel culture?”
Fox’s comments received the highest number of Ofcom complaints across all programmes in 2023, with 8,867 complaints.
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