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Media reform campaigners are targeting communications giant Sky Media for ‘propping up’ the right-wing GB News channel, following a spate of Ofcom investigations and allegations that the channel’s coverage exacerbated this summer’s racist riots in England.
Sky Media is the advertising arm of media giant Sky, and has commissioned the adverts for GB News from the channel’s launch in 2021.
On its promo site, Sky Media says it reaches “over 93% of the UK population” by selling ad space on “behalf of a range of renowned broadcasters and channels including Channel 5, Discovery, National Geographic, MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central.” GB News is not included on that list, but it sells ads for the right-wing channel too, on both TV and online, as well as over 120 others.
Now campaigners at Stop Funding Hate have launched a campaign to urge Sky Media to drop GB News as a client.
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The campaign group argues: “Sky Media has spent the last three years propping up this toxic TV channel — both by advertising on the station directly and selling ads for GB News via its media sales arm, helping raise millions more in revenue…
“Sky claims to support diversity, yet they’re propping up GB News — a channel known for scapegoating migrants, Muslims, trans people and other minorities. Sky Media [is] helping fund their inflammatory content.
“We will send a clear message that Sky’s customers and the public expect better. Sky [must] live up to their stated values. With enough voices, we can push Sky to make the right choice and stop enabling hateful content.” GB News was contacted for comment.
Speaking to Byline Times, SFH director Richard Wilson said: “GB News has reportedly lost over £100 million since it launched…Many people don’t know that Sky provides their ads, and wouldn’t expect it.
“Sky positions itself as progressive. They’ve made commitments to net zero, anti-racism, and support Pride, yet they’re one of the main enablers of GB News, which is toxic on all those issues.” Analysis by climate site DeSmog found that one in three GB News hosts in 2022 spread ideas denying man-made climate change.
On the 11th September, pet food company Butternut Box announced that they were pulling advertising from GB News – as they weren’t aware their ads were being placed there.
Wilson added: “Sky keeps putting brands in an uncomfortable position.”
In the year to June 2023, GB News made £4.2m from advertising, up from £3m the year before. But costs far outstripped its advertising haul.
“The riots have definitely galvanised people and brought the issue into stark contrast. Many people were making the link between the violence on the streets, the appalling racist attacks, and the content GB News has been pushing out. GB News has been pumping out anti-migrant headlines relentlessly for a long time,” Wilson said.
On an advertising offer still live on the Sky Media site, the company boasts that GB News hosts “TV icons such as Eamonn Holmes”, as well as “Michael Portillo, Camilla Tominey and John Cleese.”
Monty Python star John Cleese’s show, The Dinosaur Hour, last aired in December 2023. He has since spoken out against conspiracy theorist GB News presenter Neil Oliver’s claims of a supposed link between coronavirus vaccinations and a rise in cancer cases. The presenter was let off by Ofcom who said Oliver was expressing a personal opinion.
There is currently a live Ofcom investigation into a segment by Reform UK leader Nigel Farage on the channel, after a spate of rulings against GB News. Farage, now an MP and party leader, still presents a weekly show on the channel. He made £81,607 for 32 hours’ work according to his latest Register of Interests, though he claimed it included a back-payment for work in previous months.
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The live investigation by Ofcom concerns whether Nigel Farage was a politician rather than a news presenter for the purposes of presenting a show on 17 January this year. Farage was not an MP at the time but was president of Reform UK.
An Ofcom spokesperson said at the time: “We are investigating whether this programme broke our rules requiring news and current affairs to be presented with due impartiality, and preventing politicians from acting as news presenters.”
In an unusual move, Conservative leadership frontrunner Robert Jenrick pleaded for advertisers not to abandon GB News last week.
A Sky Media spokesperson refused to comment on the record. It is apparently common practice in the industry for the majority of TV advertising to be bought and targeted to specific audiences, not channels. Ad campaigns are spread across the entire portfolio of channels, suggesting advertisers cannot choose to exclude GB News from their ad campaigns.
Sky Media’s advertising pack for the channel states: “Available in 96% of UK homes, GB News is the pioneering news outlet that promises to deliver impartial and representative reporting for the entire nation.
“With a powerful sense of community and inclusivity at its heart [emphasis theirs], GB News is a news channel for the people. Designed to meet the needs of those who feel underserved by the other news institutions, GB News delivers compelling debates on key topics with a rational, optimistic outlook.”
Defending the ad partnership, Sky sources argue GB News as an Ofcom regulated channel, which Sky Media treats the same way as any other regulated channel. And they claim that selling advertising space on any particular platform or channel is not an endorsement of their views.
Around 1,200 people have signed Stop Funding Hate’s petition so far, urging Sky Media to drop GB News as a partner.
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Josiah Mortimer also writes the On the Ground column, exclusive to the print edition of Byline Times.
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