Andrew Neil's new channel is getting a lot of criticism online after last week's figures have been shared
New TV channel GB News is getting a lot of criticism online as its viewing figures have plummeted over the last week.
Andrew Neil’s channel had lower viewing figures last week than a Welsh language version of kid’s show, Paw Patrol – a point that many social media users are enjoying making jokes about.
Former BBC journalist Andrew Neil said he was starting GB News, which launched on Sunday 13 June, to shake up the British media, challenge the status quo and counteract a “metropolitan” bias in its television.
In his introductory monologue during the launch of the channel he said he wanted the channel to give a voice “to those who felt sidelined or even silenced in our great national debates”.
However, despite starting off well with viewing figures of 336,000 after the launch, the outlook for GB News was looking very different at the end of week two.
Here are the viewing figures for various shows from Thursday, 24 June, as collected by Media Monitoring Services.
- BBC News at Ten: 3.6 million
- BBC News 1pm: 2.4 million
- ITV News at Ten: 1.5 million
- BBC Breakfast: 1.4 million
- BBC Question Time: 1.3 million
- Good Morning Britain: 717,000
- BBC News 9am: 294,000
- BBC Newsnight: 286,000
- Kay Burley, Sky: 54,000
- Sky News Ian King: 42,000
- Great British Breakfast on GB News: 32,000
- Andrew Neil: 31,000
- GB News DePerio & Halligan 16,000
- GB News Brazier & Muroki: 11,000
Some of the channel’s shows have lost tens of thousands of viewers. On 18 June, for example, Brazier & Muroki attracted 36,000 views while Thursday’s figures show it go 11,000.
All the while, according to S4C, the Welsh language version of Paw Patrol got around 161,000 viewers more than once this year.
This has of course sparked lots of mocking on Twitter.
One person wrote: “BREAKING: GB News brands Paw Patrol ‘woke’, ‘leftist’ and ‘Marxist’ after the welsh language version of the kids’ show trounces them in the viewing ratings.”
Another person said: “Andrew Neil’s GB News now has less viewers than the Welsh language version of Paw Patrol. So, an animated 10 year old boy and 6 puppies saw off Andrew’s racist war-on-woke without even speaking English… or being real.”
“More people live in my village than all those that choose to watch #GBNews,” added someone else.
Lucy Skoulding is a journalist and human rights student. Follow her on Twitter.
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