GB News could be issued with a statutory sanction after a programme featuring Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was found to breach Ofcom impariality rules.
Ofcom is “starting the process for consideration of a statutory sanction against GB News” following the release of the programme in February.
People’s Forum: The Prime Minister was found to have broken impariality rules on Monday (20 May).
The show, which saw saw Mr Sunak answer questions from the audience during a live hour-long programme, was presenting in the context of the upcoming general election.
Ofcom said: “Given this represents a serious and repeated breach of these rules, we are now starting the process for consideration of a statutory sanction against GB News.”
The broacasting regulator that the show, which was “presented in the context of the forthcoming UK general election”, prompted a whopping 547 complaints.
It said there was “no issue with this programme’s editorial format in principle”, however, the broadcaster failed to “ensure an appropriately wide range of significant views was given” to ensure political impartiality.
The media watchdog also said: “We recognised that this programme would focus mainly on the Conservative Party’s policies and track record on a number of specific issues, meaning that Conservative viewpoints would be prevalent.
“We are clear that this, in and of itself, did not mean the programme could not comply with due impartiality rules under the code.
“It was incumbent on GB News, however, given the major matters under discussion, to ensure that an appropriately wide range of significant views was given due weight in the programme or in other clearly linked and timely programmes.”
Watch Apple TV+ free for 7 days
New subscribers only. £8.99/mo. after free trial. Plan auto-renews until cancelled
Watch Apple TV+ free for 7 days
New subscribers only. £8.99/mo. after free trial. Plan auto-renews until cancelled
Ofcom said: “The Prime Minister was able to set out future policies that his Government planned to implement, if re-elected in the forthcoming UK General Election. Neither the audience nor the Presenter challenged or otherwise referred to significant alternative views on these.”
“Given the very high compliance risks this programme presented, we found GB News’s approach to compliance to be wholly insufficient, and consider it could have, and should have, taken additional steps to mitigate these risks.”
“We found that an appropriately wide range of significant viewpoints were not presented and given due weight in the People’s Forum: The Prime Minister, nor was due impartiality preserved through clearly linked and timely programmes.”
GB news has now hit out at the action being taken by Ofcom and described it as an “attempt to silence” the broadcaster.
A GB News spokesman said: “Ofcom’s finding against GB News today is an alarming development in its attempt to silence us by standing in the way of a forum that allows the public to question politicians directly.
“The regulator’s threat to punish a news organisation with sanctions for enabling people to challenge their own prime minister strikes at the heart of democracy at a time when it could not be more vital.
“GB News is the People’s Channel. That is why we created a new broadcasting format, The People’s Forum, which placed the public - not journalists - firmly in charge of questioning Rishi Sunak.
“Our live programme gave an independently selected group of undecided voters the freedom to challenge the Prime Minister without interference.
“They did this robustly, intelligently, and freely. Their 15 questions, which neither we nor the Prime Minister saw beforehand, kept him under constant pressure and covered a clearly diverse range of topics. These were their words on the issues that mattered to them.”
