[leewilliams]

GB News is rightly criticised here for its lack of balance - people with connections to the Conservative Party interviewing fellow Conservatives is never going to lead to a fair and balanced interview and it shouldn't happen. However, I must note that I would argue the same principle should apply on the other side of the political spectrum, too. I see that on this morning's GMB, Labour leader Keir Starmer is being interviewed by former Labour politician and Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls. I think, while everyone will undoubtedly have their own politics, impartiality is important in news coverage and any personal leanings or views should never be apparent, whether red, blue or anything in between.

The problem with that is you’d lose a fair few prominent, proper journalists - Lewis Goodall, for instance, was a Labour activist and Nick Robinson famously a Young Conservative chairman before they began their media careers. Particularly in the case of Robinson, I’ve never detected any bias in his holding to account of Tory ministers - in fact he usually gives them both barrels.

There is a difference between people whose political allegiances have been public in the past and sitting MPs interviewing their own government representatives.