'GB News is vitally needed. Ofcom has become judge and jury with a clear agenda against channel' - Howard Cox

'GB News is vitally needed. Ofcom has become judge and jury with a clear agenda against channel' - Howard Cox

GB News is hitting back at Ofcom's ruling

GB NEWS
Howard  Cox

By Howard Cox


Published: 23/05/2024

- 15:00

Howard Cox is Reform UK's former London Mayoral Candidate

This week, Ofcom’s investigation concluded that People’s Forum: The Prime Minister on GB News broke broadcasting due to impartiality rules.

Given that this represents a serious and repeated breach of these rules, Ofcom is now considering a statutory sanction against GB News.


Someone, please explain why an insurgent GB News, the long-awaited and vitally needed new news channel, should not ask the Prime Minister of the UK to be questioned by a cross-section of the voting public on political issues of the day.

If this innovative event had been hosted by Sky, BBC, or ITV, we can be certain it would have been met with no scrutiny.

However, it appears that Ofcom has assumed the role of judge and jury in all matters of political communication, with a clear agenda against GB News.

I cannot dismiss my personal opinion that the monolithic BBC, along with their kindred liberal politicos, could be complicit in this biased narrative.

Rishi Sunak speaks at first People's Forum in February

Neither GB News nor Rishi Sunak knew the audience questions beforehand

GB NEWS

GB News now faces the threat of sanctions from this unelected, semi-public administrative body.

While independent from the civil service, this body receives financial support from the government and makes senior management appointments. The implications of this are significant and should not be overlooked.

Ofcom has wide-ranging powers across the television, radio, telecoms, and postal sectors.

It has a statutory duty to represent the interests of citizens and consumers by promoting competition and protecting the public from harmful or offensive material.

So please tell me why the massive impartiality I see regularly on other mainstream media outlets is not subject to the same scrutiny.

I was excluded from recent London Mayoral hustings held by the BBC, ITV, and LBC.

These broadcasters saw the insurgent Reform UK party I represented as undeserving of being challenged by Londoners.

Our proposed strategies of removing all of the Capital's ULEZ, tripling bobbies on the beat, and significantly increasing affordable homes were not allowed to be presented to London's electorate despite being well-received by those who managed to hear about my policies.

I wrote to Ofcom complaining of this political discrimination and await their reply.

I also mentioned to this patently left-wing political regulatory quango that the draconian purdah rules preventing interviewing candidates within six weeks of the election favoured the two major parties.

This was definitely not impartial because political journalists spoke biasedly only of Labour and the Conservatives, despite Reform having mid-teen popularity in the polls.

Small insurgent parties cannot get their messages out to the public. That cannot be democratic, politically transparent or fair!

LATEST OPINION:

Rishi Sunak answers questions from independently selected audience at GB News' People's Forum

Rishi Sunak answered questions from an independently selected audience in the GB News' People's Forum programme in February

GB NEWS

Returning to the GB News wrongly "guilty as charged" issue, I agree with them that the regulator's threat to punish a news organisation with sanctions for enabling people to challenge their own prime minister strikes at the heart of democracy at a time when it could not be more vital.

Ofcom is not fit for purpose and seems to have a politically motivated agenda to quash centre-right free speech at GB News.

Their inconsistent investigations are based on 547 complaints about this live, hour-long current affairs programme.

I would love to know the breakdown of the political profiles of those complainants.

I bet your bottom dollar the massive majority will be Labour, Lib Dem and Green voters.

You may like