Jon Gaunt – now on Fubar Radio
Sunday, May 25, 2014 at 9:37 I received a message the other evening via Facebook.
I don't normally read Facebook messages. I get very few and they normally say things like, "I like you contact me to my email" or "Hello my dear one, how you doing over there?".
This one was different. It was from broadcaster and journalist Jon Gaunt:
Hi Simon long time no speak I've got a new radio show www.fubarradio.com do you fancy coming on tomorrow to talk?
You will remember that Jon was sacked by Talksport in 2008 for calling a London councillor a "Nazi" and an "ignorant pig" during a live debate. The BBC reported that 'the incident came as he interviewed Redbridge councillor Michael Stark about the authority's plans to ban smokers from fostering children'.
Via this blog and emails to Forest subscribers we did our best to support him – see A friend in need, Letter to Talksport, John Gaunt sacked by Talksport and John Gaunt: update. Unfortunately we couldn't help him save his job.
The following year Jon launched SunTalk, an internet radio show broadcast from the bowels of News International. I did several interviews for SunTalk, usually on the phone. I once attempted to speak to him above the roar of traffic at Oxford Circus. I couldn't hear a word he was saying so kept on talking until the line went dead.
On another occasion I visited him in his studio in Wapping and wrote about it here:
On this evidence presenter Jon Gaunt is rather more mellow than his TalkSport persona. And there is no comparison with his aggressive stage act which I found quite uncomfortable when I saw it in St Albans earlier this year.
He sounds like he's having the time of his life, surrounded by colleagues who are getting a huge buzz from running their own mini radio station. And as a columnist on the paper, he's secure in the knowledge that he's unlikely to get fired for speaking out of turn.
I hope that News International sees this as a long-term initative because there's no doubt that it will take time - years, perhaps - to build a reasonable audience. A lot of people are still suspicious of internet radio and the technical problems I experience when trying to listen to other internet radio stations are a serious turn-off.
Sadly SunTalk was pulled after only a year and little was heard of Jon until his name popped up in association with the Police Federation and MP Andrew Mitchell.
Now, after three years in the "radio wilderness", he's joined Fubar, another internet radio station, where he has a talk show every Saturday from 10.00am.
Yesterday's guests included Richard Littlejohn, Katy Hopkins, Peter Hitchens, Peter Oborne and, er, me, so I was in good company.
I'm fairly sure, though, I was the only person interviewed whilst standing beneath a tree sheltering from the rain in St James' Park, London.
The magic of radio, eh?
For further information about Fubar click here.
Reader Comments (1)
If someone had told me 30 years ago that in the future gay people could adopt children just so long as they aren't gay smokers I would not believe them. I haven't got anything against gay people adopting children I just don't understand why a gay non-smoking couple is so much more worthy parents than a straight couple that just happen to be smokers. It's an absolute disgrace and nasty piece of discrimination.