GB News is born: renamed the “British Fox”, but it will not be BoJo’s megaphone

In times of media crisis, a pleasant novelty comes from the United Kingdom with the birth of GB News , the information channel founded by Andrew Neil, dean of BBC journalists, and creator of the new TV, already renamed "the British Fox" . Neil's goal, however, is to attract the many viewers disappointed by the BBC and the many voters who voted for Brexit in 2016 and who do not have a point of reference in the London-centered landscape of the British media, and dominated by the progressive mainstream culture.

Those who think that Neil will make a TV megaphone of the Conservatives or Boris Johnson are wrong. In the 2019 election, the current prime minister avoided the BBC reporter's grilling on the Andrew Neil Show by not showing up for his interview after Neil had put him in great trouble in July 2019 when he was elected leader of the Tories. In a career that has seen him among the spearheads of the Times , the Sunday Times , the BBC itself and the NewsCorp group (even though he himself said he hasn't heard or seen Murdoch for over 10 years), Neil has always stood out for the quality of his work and the outspokenness of his views.

But what will GB News be like? The channel will be visible via satellite on Freeview , Sky and Virgin Media and will have the economic and financial support of Discovery , the Dubai-based private investment firm Legatum and the English businessman Sir Paul Marshall, brexiteer already behind the launch of the UnHerd website. The initial cost of starting the broadcasts is £ 60 million.

Neil's intention is not to make an all-news TV as so many already exist in the United Kingdom and beyond, but to divide the schedule into in-depth programs of the same news entrusted to presenters known also for their unconventional ideas. To do all this, GB News is negotiating with right-wing commentator Nick Ferrari of Leading British Conversation , formerly among the Tory candidates for the London syndicate, and Piers Morgan, the historic face of British and American press and TV. The effort to recruit 140 staff members, including 120 journalists, and to equip the broadcaster with streaming , podcast and video-on-demand services was also important . The start of the broadcasts is scheduled for the first half of 2021, despite all the difficulties of the case also caused by the pandemic. We will see – and hear – some good ones.

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This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL http://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/quotidiano/nasce-gb-news-ribattezzata-la-fox-britannica-ma-non-sara-il-megafono-di-bojo/ on Wed, 20 Jan 2021 04:50:00 +0000.