I'm a coward.
Five years ago, I was offered the chance to work for a new TV channel called GB News.
I came up with a string of reasons not to.
I’d been in newspapers for over 20 years and had a secure job, I needed to be careful about paying the mortgage, blah, blah, blah, yada yada, you know, the kind of thing.
But who was I kidding?
The truth was I was scared.
I was scared of change.
Scared of doing something different.
Scared of failing.
A lily-livered chicken.
I was initially concerned about whether the channel would fail
|GB NEWS
Luckily there was a plucky bunch already signed up for GB News ready for launch on June 13th, 2021.
They were the brave trailblazers who created the conditions for it to become the news channel that thrives today as Britain’s number one.
Just remember where Britain was back then.
We’d just emerged from a brutal pandemic that did untold damage to people, families and the institutions we used to trust and admire.
The culture wars had been raging for years with the ultra-liberal voices on the left trying their best - and in many cases succeeding - to shame the rest of us into silence for the crime of thinking for ourselves.
It didn’t feel like 2021, more like 1984.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
Snobs wanted to shut us down
|GB NEWS
GB News quickly became a target of those who were at that time winning the culture wars.
It was a bleak time for free speech.
At that point if you wanted a picture of the future, imagine an artisan organic-cotton tote bag smashing into a Freeview box, while a person in a vegan-leather jacket and ethically sourced flip-flops aggressively drafts an email to Ofcom—forever.
Big Brother and all his followers weren’t watching us, after all they wouldn’t lower themselves to that level.
Those snobs just wanted us shut down.
Plenty still do.
Our crime is to let people think for themselves and speak their minds.
Our critics don’t understand that news, and how people think about it and consume it, is changing forever.
It’s changing all the time and the sooner a bunch of former Guardian journalists and their TV news relic friends understand it the better.
The moon howlers are being left behind.
GB News is a force for good.
And we are a force that’s here for good.
Just over six months after GB News came on air, I finally plucked up the courage to finally take up the offer to become the channel’s Editorial Director.
I joined the same day as Eamonn Holmes – a TV legend whose arrival made quite a few people sit and notice GB News for the first time.
Still Britain’s most loved and recognisable TV presenter, Eamonn instantly became a brilliant addition... We can’t wait to see him back soon.
It’s been a lot of hard work for everyone.
It’s been particularly tough to see the criticism – politically motivated in the main - that the brilliant staff past and present have had.But it’s fantastic to see just where those staff have got GB News now.
They have made GB News Britain’s number one TV news channel and I’m proud to be their colleague.
I’m also proud to be part of the wider GB News community – led by the people that really matter – you, our viewers and listeners.
The world has always been, and always will be, a hard place.
All families, communities, countries have their ups and downs.
Britain is going through a difficult period.
The past few weeks have illustrated that, with trouble on the streets of Southampton and Belfast showing the anger at our unfair society bubbling just underneath the surface.
But things will get better if we stick together.
With The People’s Channel you have a friend and an ally.Since GB News has existed, we have tried to be part of the solution to the nation’s problems.
We have been and will continue to be a place where people of all perspectives come together and find a positive path forward.
When the channel came to life at 8pm that night back in June 2021, Britain came back to life.
Five years ago, we first gave a voice to the silenced majority.
Five years ago, we began fighting your corner.
And you know what?
We’re only just getting started.