GB News presenters Colin Brazier and Alex Phillips axed in ‘bloodbath’ schedule shake-up
Alex Phillips #AlexPhillips
GB News launch presenters Colin Brazier and Alex Phillips have left the right-leaning channel after their shows were axed in a schedule shake-up called a “bloodbath” by insiders.
With daytime viewing figures in the low thousands, the afternoon line-up is being replaced as the channel uses a new £60m investment to focus on beating Rupert Murdoch’s TalkTV in prime time.
The changes mean swift departures for Brazier, a veteran former Sky News anchor and former Brexit Party MEP Phillips, who presented their final shows this week.
The pair had fronted GB News shows since its launch 15 months ago.
A widowed father of six, Brazier tweeted: “Me and my Brazier Bunch get to start a new chapter today. It may involve a tractor. Standby for updates.”
GB News signalled its intent to take on Rupert Murdoch’s struggling TalkTV with a rebooted line-up.
Former Labour MP Gloria De Piero, who quit politics with a warning that Labour needed to understand why Red Wall voters backed Brexit, will team up with former Sky News presenter Mark Longhurst to co-present a new weekday show.
Credited with persuading Labour figures to appear on GB News, she will expand her series The Real Me, talking to politicians about their non-political lives, and Life and Times, in which political heavyweights reflect on their careers.
Insiders have called the shake-up a “bloodbath”, with presenters only hearing their fate this week, sources said the changes marked an “evolution” in GB News, which has recovered from a rocky start and is beating TalkTV in the evening ratings with shows fronted by Nigel Farage and Dan Wootton.
Poached from Murdoch’s Times Radio, Michael Portillo also joins the new schedule with his own show and regular appearances as a political pundit.
Conservative MPs and married couple Esther McVey and Philip Davies will co-present another programme on Fridays, in addition to their Saturday morning show.
Rival channels focus on politics on Sundays, but GB News is getting religion. Calvin Robinson, who was ordained by the Free Church of England in June, will present a new show, Calvin’s Common-Sense Crusade, on Sundays.
GB News announced several new shows and presenters after it secured £60m of investment as part of an ownership shake-up.
The journalist and political commentator Andrew Pierce will also launch a show later this year while continuing his senior position at the Daily Mail.
This Morning‘s royal expert Camilla Tominey, who also works as associate editor of The Telegraph, will take on a senior presenting role.
An insider said: “It’s an evolution more than a bloodbath. GB News is bringing in new, young female journalists from mainstream publications, like Olivia Utley (a Telegraph writer who joins as a political pundit in October.”
But GB News faced condemnation after interviewing an alleged former Holocaust denier, freelance journalist Peter Imanuelsen, on a programme presented by Neil Oliver. GB News removed clips of the interview from its Twitter channel and website.
Imanuelsen said he had never been a Holocaust denier and had been the victim of faked screenshots.