Iain Dale on Sky News:

“They’re obsessed by people going on Sky News which has the most minuscule audience you can imagine. I’ve never understood that, why do they do that when they’re talking to essentially a Westminster village wankathon, where only people in the media and politics actually watch it.

Ordinary people do not watch Sky News; they might have it on in a hotel room if they’re in a hotel, but how many normal people have Sky News on at home during the day or the evening? I would venture to suggest very few.”

After a week of the media continually failing to highlight guest experts’ party affiliations, this morning started off the same, with Sky News failing to inform viewers that Faiza Shaheen was the Labour Party’s Chingford candidate a few months ago. For the first time during the outbreak, an exasperated CCHQ vented their frustration on Twitter, asking Sky why there was no mention of her political CV.

No mention from @SkyNews that Faiza Shaheen is a Labour activist & a Labour General Election candidate in a key target seat in 2019? pic.twitter.com/aHGl4qVolN

— CCHQ Press #StayHomeSaveLives (@CCHQPress) April 20, 2020

Adam Boulton waded in with his usual tweeted rebuttal, shortly before Sky News ‘corrected‘ their editorial decision

She was on with Iain Dale previously a Conservative Candidate and Tory staffer. We didn't make a point of that either. We are talking about Now. https://t.co/e54CBtomiR

— Adam Boulton (@adamboultonSKY) April 20, 2020

It wasn’t long before the two guests themselves waded in, with Faiza arguing Iain Dale’s previous Tory-affiliations weren’t mentioned, and Dale parrying with the fact he stepped away from political activism 10 years ago and has voted for other parties since.

As ever, we’ll leave it up to Guido readers to decide who won this one…

Whatever happened to the watershed?

Michael Marmot, the lefty author of a report that attempts to link austerity with a slowdown in the speed at which life expectancy is increasing in the UK, was not happy with the first interview that actually challenged him on his conclusions. Marmot: you either love him or you hate him…

When LBC’s Iain Dale explained, as Guido did yesterday, that the same life expectancy change has occurred right across Europe, under radically different styles of government, Marmot was not happy, telling Dale “we can have a discussion about the causes, but I’m sorry I’ve had a long day going through all of this, and I’m not going to have an argument with you about the numbers in front of us.”

Guido hears Marmot told LBC producers it was the worst interview he had done that day. Presumably because it was the only one that countered him with facts…

Iain Dale had enough this morning on GMB after the two lefty panelists flanking him didn’t allow the LBC Presenter to get a word in edgeways. The left wing panelists, Tribune Magazine‘s Grace Blakeley and the BBC Asian Network‘s Nihal Arthanayake tried to blame the Tate Modern attack on austerity. After being repeatedly shouted down, Dale walked off. It was frustrating for those watching at home and must have been more so for Iain…