ITV‘s controversial husband-wife political interview has attracted greater than 8,000 complaints to Ofcom, placing it second on the 2024 listing.
Social media took off when Good Morning Britain host Ed Balls gave his spouse Yvette Cooper, the Labour House Secretary, a grilling on ITV earlier this week. Provided that GB Information has fallen foul of Ofcom’s guidelines over the thorny difficulty of politicians interviewing politicians from the identical celebration, the incident generated headlines. ITV has already mentioned it stands by the choice and believes the interview was “truthful and neutral.”
An Ofcom spokesperson mentioned: “We’re assessing the complaints in opposition to our broadcasting guidelines however are but to resolve whether or not or to not examine.”
Balls, who was a Labour MP and Chancellor however misplaced his seat in 2015 and has since appeared on Strictly Come Dancing, was interviewing Cooper in regards to the UK riots and the governing Labour Celebration’s response. It drew accusations of a battle of curiosity, on condition that the pair have been married for 26 years.
The scenario is completely different to GB Information in that Balls is not a politician. GB Information primarily got here below fireplace for exhibits comparable to Saturday Morning with Esther and Phil, when the husband-and-wife presenting duo had been each nonetheless MPs. It’s one among a quantity that has been rapped by Ofcom.
The incident is the second most complained about incident of 2024. That present title goes to an interview on the now-defunct TalkTV linear between firebrand presenter Julia Hartley-Brewer and Dr Mustafa Barghouti, the final secretary of the Palestinian Nationwide Initiative, which attracted round 17,000.
Following Monday’s episode, an ITV spokesperson mentioned: “Following a weekend of rioting and nationwide unrest, GMB featured a variety of interviews and dialogue round this nationwide emergency on at this time’s programme. [These] included James Cleverly, Shadow House Secretary and Yvette Cooper, House Secretary. We’re glad that these interviews had been balanced, truthful and duly neutral.”
The episode has additionally attracted ire due to the way in which during which Balls and co-host Kate Garraway interviewed one other Labour MP, Zarah Sultana, who mentioned the federal government ought to describe the riots as Islamophobic in addition to racist, and challenged Balls on an article he had beforehand written about immigration.
