The ‘anti-woke’ news channel had Andrew Neil and Alan Sugar, but no Piers Morgan – and the opening night felt like the furthest thing from appointment TV imaginable. I give it a year
“Now is the time to do news differently,” said Andrew Neil as GB News went live on Sunday night. “We are committed to covering the people’s agenda, not the media’s agenda.” Not in the first hour you weren’t. Instead, Neil spent it introducing his new colleagues while – be still irony – indicting the woke numpties from traditional news channels stuck in the narcissistic Westminster bubble. There may have been news breaking during the hour (indeed it was scrolling on a ticker at the bottom of the screen) but it went unreported.
No matter. First up was Neil Oliver, former BBC archaeology presenter turned GB News current affairs presenter, whom Neil introduced as the King of Scotland. An ill-omened title, given that the last title holder was Idi Amin. “I seem to have come to the fore with opinions,” he told Andrew Neil. “People talk to me all the time. They come up to me when they’re walking the dogs. They no longer feel their voices or voices like theirs are out in the mainstream.” The thing to do, Neil baby, is not to slow down.
