Late last night BBC’s Newsnight hosted an unbalanced GB News bashing panel where both Adam Boulton and Caroline Nokes called for the channel to be taken off-air because Laurence Fox was rude. Ofcom, when it ruled against GB News over impartiality, reminded broadcasters:

“The Code is clear that when programmes are dealing with matters of major political controversy and current public policy, the heightened special impartiality requirements apply. Specifically, Rules 5.11 and 5.12 require that an appropriately wide range of significant views must be included and given due weight in such programmes, or in clearly linked and timely programmes.”

Calling for the shutdown of a broadcaster because a presenter has behaved badly is an extreme stance. Despite the BBC’s roster of presenters including the likes of Russell Brand, Jimmy Saville and John Peel – all of whom behaved far worse than Laurence Fox – their misbehaviour has not resulted in calls for the station to be shut down. Newsnight’s panel did not constitute the required “appropriately wide range of significant views” as required by Ofcom. If co-conspirators want to make a complaint to Ofcom about Newsnight’s lack of impartiality they can do it here.

Over on Sky News earlier last night Guido’s editor was part of a more balanced discussion with Gina Miller where he derided the idiocy of Laurence Fox whilst defending the upstart station’s output and journalism:

Rival channels have a self-interested motive to protect what Adam Boulton phrased as the “delicate and important broadcast ecology” from the upstart channel which is regularly beating them in terms of ratings. Ava Evans herself opposes any move to close the channel. The calls for Ofcom to sanction the station come from politicians opposed to the political skew of the channel and the self-interest of rival broadcasters. 

UPDATE: A co-conspirator points out Ofcom will only investigate a BBC-related complaint once the BBC complaints procedure has been exhausted. Complaints can be directed here…

Amongst the exciting new lineup for Tom Newton Dunn’s new TalkTV show is none other than Moët Marxist Grace Blakeley, who is joining as a panellist on The News Desk alongside the likes of Adam Boulton, Douglas Murray, James Slack and Anas Sarwar. Guido looks forward to hearing her wax lyrical about the dangers of capitalism at the pleasure of a 91-year old media mogul worth nearly $21 billion.

It’s quite the departure for Blakeley, who will now be cashing cheques from the Murdoch Empire for the first time despite warning about the dangers of the “corporate media” and the threat it poses to “our BBC”. Here’s what she said in February last year about Rupert himself after an Extinction Rebellion protest:

“So whether we’re thinking about, for example, in the UK Extinction Rebellion, which has had some good organising tactics and some howlers as well, but they did a good one recently, which was shutting down the Murdoch-owned press, which put all this stuff out about how climate change wasn’t real, wasn’t as big as everyone said. It was a really good example of an interesting direct action that highlights this antagonism, highlights a bad guy and encourages people to feel powerful.”

Thankfully Extinction Rebellion can’t blockade a TV broadcast…

While Guido is surprised to see Blakeley board the Murdoch train, the same can’t be said of Adam Boulton. Rupert reportedly had his eye on his ex-employee for months, as Guido first revealed back in November. Now he’s back in the fold. Should be fun viewing.

Guido enjoyed Adam Boulton’s final Sky News programme this afternoon; an hour-long documentary on the relationship between No. 10 and the media. Surprisingly David Cameron agreed to participate, to discuss his own media strategy. In 2010 Cameron tried hiring Andrew Parsons on the public dime to be his official photographer, however media pressure eventually led to their roles being scrapped. Boris has since tried this again, more successfully, now enrolling three No. 10 photographers onto the taxpayer-funded payroll. Commenting on this Cameron joked “Boris has always been able to get away with things mere mortals can’t”…

After 30 years, today was Adam Boulton’s last show on Sky News. His team put together a fitting tribute, although they did miss out one particular highlight…

The rumour mill over at the mini-Shard is whirring regarding which top stars might be poached to front Murdoch’s upcoming TalkTV venture, launching in early 2022. After already nabbing Piers Morgan in September, Guido hears Adam Boulton could be on the cusp of making a return to the Murdoch fold. Announcing his departure from Sky News a week ago, Boulton told The Times, “I mean, to give up daily broadcasting is a wrench. Maybe there’ll be other broadcasting things.” His departure would also time well with the TalkTV launch; he’s expected to leave Sky at the end of 2021. 

In more light-hearted hiring news, Guido hears Ed Balls has also been spotted having conversations at the News UK headquarters, and is also strongly rumoured to be joining the venture.  Especially awkward for GMB – they lost Piers to TalkTV and have only just taken Balls on as a new presenter…

Adam Boulton has announced via an interview with in The Times that he is leaving Sky News and will step down as editor-at-large and Sky News presenter this New Year’s Eve:

“… it’s a kind of mutual decision. Basically, just looking ahead, having been at two start-ups, first with TV-am and then Sky, I think it looks like the direction which Sky News wants to go over the next few years is not one that’s a particularly good fit for me…

But also, let’s be honest about this, there’s always a changing of the guard in television. Television is very sensitive to the idea of diversity… I was joking with one of my old bosses about this and he said, ‘You’re white, public school, Oxbridge male, what’s not to like?’ But I don’t complain about that. I was political editor for 25 years. Then Faisal Islam did it. Beth Rigby’s there now.”

John Ryley, Head of Sky News, says in a a statement:

“Adam Boulton has been a hugely significant figure both in the growth of Sky News and British broadcasting as a whole. Adam was the first Political Editor to treat politics as a dynamic, changing story, combining live commentary with video. He also played a key role in bringing about the first televised leaders’ debates in 2010. I will miss his wise counsel.”

Younger viewers might not appreciate just how much traditional television reporting format emulated the deadlines of newspapers until Boulton introduced a continuously updated style of political news reporting. Before Boulton and Sky News the BBC would basically have a little changed political report for most of the day.

Boulton has been on the political frontline for 33 years, first as political editor for TV-am (1984-89), then as political editor of Sky News for 25 years (1989-2014), before becoming Sky’s News editor-at-large and finally full-time presenter of All Out Politics every weekday. In The Times he is described as “kind but combustible” and over the years we at Guido have seen both sides. He was an early adopter and reader of the site, we’ve also had plenty of bitchy Twitter spats, particularly during the period of Brexit battles. We’ve had some laughs too. In person he was always kind and generous with good advice to the editor. Good luck in the future Adam…