Why I ❤️ GB News
Wednesday, August 16, 2023 at 14:58 I was on the GB News Breakfast Show yesterday.
It followed the announcement on Monday that the Department of Health and Social Care is proposing to add inserts to tobacco products that will feature information designed to encourage smokers to quit.
Having appeared on The Live Desk, the lunchtime news programme, the previous day, I was invited this time to go head-to-head with Hazel Cheeseman, deputy CEO of ASH, on the wider question, ‘Should the Government introduce stricter rules for smokers?’.
I had one or two problems on Monday with my internet connection, which seems to be a bit slow at the moment, so I offered to go the GB News studio in London instead of doing the interview on Zoom.
The producer said they would take a chance on the connection being OK, which at least saved me from a very early drive into London, and thankfully it seemed to be alright, although I think I may need a new wireless router.
Anyway, the ten-minute ‘debate’ went reasonably smoothly, with no technical issues, and despite Hazel having the inevitable dig at Forest’s funding there was none of the slightly unpleasant edge that has come to characterise interviews involving me and her boss, Deborah Arnott.
On Monday, for example, I was on the Five Live phone-in with Deborah and as soon as I was invited to speak she started to interrupt, despite the fact that I had listened to her in respectful (!) silence.
She then seemed to suggest that I had once ‘recommended’ that people should smoke, a claim I took strong exception to.
That said, I don’t mind Deborah’s barbs because they make her, and ASH, appear rather petty, so as far as I’m concerned she’s welcome to go on making them.
Hazel, on the other hand, comes across as a reasonable and fairly sunny individual. Time, perhaps, to give her the top job and we can all move on.
Anyway, I wanted to praise the GB News Breakfast Show presenters, Isobel Webster and Stephen Dixon, who gave us equal time and the debate was conducted extremely fairly, I thought, in a relaxed and non-confrontational manner.
It was a far cry from the more gladiatorial approach of ITV’s Good Morning Britain where guests are (or were) pitted against one another and encouraged to engage in what, in my experience, often became a loud and boorish argument.
To be fair, I haven’t been on GMB for some time, and since Piers Morgan left the programme I rarely watch it, so perhaps it’s changed, but after one or two uncomfortable experiences in the ‘debate’ slot (does it still exist?) I would take some persuading to return.
(Ironically, the only time I enjoyed being on GMB was when Piers was the interviewer because I found him to be very fair. Susanna Reid too, the yin to his yang.)
Anyway, despite its critics, GB News seems a happy ship, with a growing audience, and as an occasional interviewee I can honestly say I have never (touch wood) had a bad experience.
Guests are treated with respect and allowed to have their say without repeated interruption. That doesn’t mean we go unchallenged, far from it, but there is a refreshing willingness to debate issues in a way that doesn’t always happen on the BBC, for example.
Like all TV and radio stations there are views broadcast on GB News I don’t agree with at all - some might even be described as conspiracy theories - but if you support free speech that comes with the territory. Ultimately the viewer, or listener, can make up their own minds.
Sceptics should also note some of the recruits to GB News, most recently Christopher Hope, formerly chief political correspondent and associate editor at the Telegraph.
Or Nigel Nelson, ‘the longest-serving political editor and political news reporter in the United Kingdom’, formerly with the Sunday People for which he still writes a column, I think.
Then there’s Olivia Utley, a young (ish) Telegraph journalist, who evidently weighed up her options and decided that GB News was a better bet and arguably more fun.
I particularly like the fact that alongside more experienced anchors such as Webster and Dixon (formerly Sky News), Pip Tomson (a recent recruit from Good Morning Britain), and Eamonn Holmes, GB News has given opportunities to a number of young reporters and presenters.
The energy they bring is palpable, and some of the younger regional news reporters are excellent.
There are still issues, of course. For example, I understand it’s not always easy for producers to attract guests, hence the regular appearances of a relatively small cast of contributors, especially in the evenings and at weekends.
Nevertheless, after yesterday’s discussion on the Breakfast Show, I said to my wife, “I love GB News”. And for all its faults, none of which are insurmountable, or even unique, I meant it.
See also: GB News: ‘So refreshing!’ (July 2021) and The unbearable darkness of GB News (June 2021).
Below: With Hazel Cheeseman of ASH on the GB News Breakfast Show
Reader Comments (4)
Interesting post, Simon. Following on somewhat from my comment yesterday (on the “inserts” story), I wonder if, as I alluded to in that comment, it has finally dawned on ASH that if they actually ever do achieve their utopian dream of no smokers, ever, anywhere then – err – there’d be no need for an anti-smoking campaign group, either, would there? So, it would be goodbye to all that goes with being the Government’s favourite “experts” on all things anti-smoking – the funding, the facilities, the cosy chats, the power and the influence. My goodness – they wouldn’t know what to do with themselves! So maybe they’ve decided that the ascetic, aggressive and demanding attitude of the likes of Ms Arnott are no longer useful to them, and that their best bet to save their own skins is to gradually move back to their original roots, i.e. one of education and encouragement rather than coercion and self-righteous bullying. Who knows?
But, to move on to more positive things - yes! GB News! What a breath of fresh air they have been after so many years of constant same-old, same-old attitudes of pretty much all of the other major stations. Starting as they did right in the midst of the pandemic when our politicians (and many of their hangers-on) were all rushing round busily in a massive power-grab, and various usually-backroom nobodies were getting a real kick from the sudden publicity and status that the pandemic offered them, GBNews’s timing couldn’t have been better. If ever we needed a national station which dared to offer an opposing view to the doom-laden predictions of instant and sudden death to half the population (it seemed) if we didn’t don face masks, stand six feet away from each other, offer our arms willingly for “the jab,” and spend half our lives with our hands in the sink, it was then and, amazingly, it happened! It’s just a pity for us smokers that GBNews weren’t around a few years ago when anti-smoking hysteria was at its height. It could all have been so different ☹!!
Talking of the pandemic (which we weren’t but we are now), am I the only one who felt as if the whole scaremongering that the media and politicians worked so hard on over those two years had a remarkable similarity to the whole anti-smoking movement, just condensed into a couple of short years rather than a couple of decades or so? I’ve never known anyone else – not even fellow smokers – mention it, but to me the way the whole Covid scenario was presented, and the auspices under which such drastic "control" measures were implemented, had a really eerie similarity to tactics used in the run-up to the smoking ban, right down to the colours of those ads featuring weeping nurses and sad-looking doctors - sepia-browny-green with yellow banner-lines, just like - err - plain packaging. Coincidence? Or a bit of subliminal messaging? Hmm. And that’s just one example. Then again, it might just be my cynical side showing itself …
Indeed it was Misty
We were presented as a dangerous infection because of the secondhand smoke and then the entire country was treated as possible bearers of a dangerous infection because of the virus.
"The issue is Government guidance which is based on legislation linked to the indoor smoking ban, when a definition was needed for what constituted outdoor and indoor.
The Covid guidance for reopening outside reads: “To be considered ‘outdoors’, shelters, marquees and other structures can have a roof but need to have at least 50 per cent of the area of their walls open at all times whilst in use.”
Calls for 'pavement pragmatism' as pubs and restaurants told outdoor space counts as 'indoors'
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/04/11/calls-pavement-pragmatism-scores-pubs-restaurants-told-outdoor/
People were not at all pleased to be compared with smokers, but I was much amused.
Hi Rose!
Good to hear from you! Since the demise of Frank’s blog I’ve missed your encyclopaedic titbits of information. I can always count on you to root out some snippet of news that I’ve missed, and I’d certainly missed that one! Many years ago, when the F2C forum was still up and running there were many on there who referred to the smoking ban as the “smoking ban experiment” – and judging by the template tactics used in respect of the pandemic (and the notable absence of those bits of the “experiment” which hadn’t worked in the past), it looks as if they were spot on!
Scary stuff.
Thank you very much, Misty
"the smoking ban experiment" appears to have been right, as explained in 2021.
‘If you can’t smoke in it, it won’t be COVID safe’
Pubs and bars urged to contact their council’s EH department, who can help with guidance on outdoor structures.
15 April 2021 "
CIEH President and legal trainer Julie Barratt is critical of the way the guidance has been issued by central government. What should have been a simple message of ‘follow the smoking ban rules’ has instead been complicated.
Even the COVID regulations refer to other regulations (the smoking ban regulations), which doesn’t make it easy for people to follow."
https://www.cieh.org/ehn/public-health-and-protection/2021/april/if-you-can-t-smoke-in-it-it-won-t-be-covid-safe/
I presume the government did not want people to spot the similarity too easily.
And yes, I am thankful for GB news, I expected Auntie Beeb to roar as she always did at the outrage of the Smoking Ban, but never heard a peep.