Ten months ago, GB News unveiled a broadcasting coup. Their latest talent signing was a big one: the former prime minister Boris Johnson was to join the team to put his own idiosyncratic spin on the channel’s political coverage and to pay particular attention to analysis of the forthcoming British general election.
Eight months after this news broke, there was indeed a general election in Britain, but Johnson had yet to appear at the GB News studios, in London’s Paddington Basin. And now, as the end of summer draws near, a spokesperson for the channel is unable to confirm whether Johnson will ever take up his role.
Editorial director Michael Booker originally said he was “delighted” to announce that “GB News has got Boris ‘done’!”. In a more serious tone he added: “We are tremendously proud to have him join the GB News family, particularly as we head into a seismic year of politics both here and across the Atlantic.” Johnson was to become a presenter, programme maker and commentator on the “challenger” right-leaning news channel, launched in June 2021.
Last October, Johnson seemed just as enthusiastic about accepting his first major role in television. He said: “GB News is an insurgent channel with a loyal and growing following. I am excited to say I will be joining shortly – and offering my frank opinions on world affairs.”
He was also to have presented “a new series showcasing the power of Britain around the world, as well as hosting the occasional special in front of live audiences around the UK”.
But his GB News role is now in danger of joining the line-up of Johnson’s recent assignments and commissions, announced with great fanfare, that are endlessly delayed, possibly destined never to emerge.
It is now nine years since Johnson was paid an advance figure of £88,000 by UK publishers Hodder & Stoughton and the US firm Riverhead for a study of William Shakespeare, entitled Shakespeare: The Riddle of Genius. The intention was to publish in 2016, in time for the 400-year anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. Johnson, however, put the project to one side when the chance to lead his country arose in 2019, a decision he said would “honestly grieve me”.
Those yearning for a fresh Johnson tome can console themselves with the fact that a memoir of his time in No 10 is set to be published in October.
The book, from publisher HarperCollins and secured for an advance of £510,000, is expected to follow the convention of such literary parting shots by cannily reaching bookshops while the author’s political legacy is still being hotly debated.
While GB News viewers are left waiting, another media opportunity may arise soon. At the end of last week, Johnson was reported to have been informally approached by his former chancellor Nadhim Zahawi about taking on a senior international editing role at the Daily Telegraph. Zahawi is thought to be assembling a potential bid for the Telegraph newspapers and their sister magazine, the Spectator, and Johnson’s involvement is being used to entice investors, according to Sky News.
At the moment Johnson writes a column for the Daily Mail, but his links with the Telegraph go right back to his early career as a provocative Brussels correspondent covering shock stories about EU regulations, now acknowledged to have been exaggerated. He has also edited the Spectator.
GB News is owned by the investment group Legatum, headquartered in Dubai, and the British hedge fund manager Sir Paul Marshall, a man who was also recently interested in owning the Telegraph package of publications. He is now considered to be one of the frontrunners in the bidding for at least the Spectator.
It was revealed last week that Nigel Farage, one of GB News’s most prominent presenters, is paid £98,000 a month for his role at the station.
The broadcast regulator, Ofcom, has found GB News in breach of its rules more than a dozen times since its launch. In March, it found former presenter Dan Wootton had broken guidelines in relation to fairness and privacy, and it is also looking into breaches of impartiality in an interview with former prime minister Rishi Sunak.
Last autumn, Booker was clear about which former PM he really wanted on his screens. He said he could not “wait to start working with … the most influential prime minister of our generation” on the “hit shows” he would be making. Booker will have to be patient for a bit longer.
