TELL OFCOM: Conspiracy theories don’t belong on our TVs

Watch: Neil Oliver’s latest monologue on GB News shares a long list of misleading and conspiratorial allegations — without any proof or opposing viewpoints. 

On 9 June 2024, Neil Oliver shared misleading and conspiratorial allegations in a long monologue on GB News. He referred to the “so-called climate crisis”, he alleged that bad weather in May when it was also the hottest May on record in the UK meant that you “get told one thing, but see with your own eyes and therefore actually know something else entirely”.

In doing so, Oliver is casting doubt on established, mainstream facts and expertise in relation to the climate and weather — and fails to provide any proof to substantiate his claims or give any airtime to opposing views. This therefore violates rule 5.7 of the broadcasting code. Submit your complaint to Ofcom using this form and by following the guidance below. 

Programme details:

Programme title: The Neil Oliver Show
Date of broadcast: 9 June 2024
Time of broadcast: 18.06
Channel / station: GB News

Your complaint:

Subject: GB News’ The Neil Oliver Show breached Ofcom rule 5.7 which forbids misrepresenting facts and requires giving views due weight.

Description:

Here’s a few bullet points to include:

• Neil Oliver shared misleading and conspiratorial allegations in a long monologue on his show on Sunday 9th June 2024. He referred to the “so-called climate crisis”, he alleged that bad weather in May when it was also the hottest May on record in the UK meant that you “get told one thing, but see with your own eyes and therefore actually know something else entirely”. In referring to green technologies such as wind farms and solar panels, he claimed “none of it seems green to me, all of it looks on the contrary only about greed”.
• Here Oliver is casting doubt on established, mainstream facts and expertise in relation to the climate and weather — and fails to provide any proof to substantiate his claims or give any airtime to opposing views.. This therefore violates rule 5.7 of the Ofcom broadcasting code.
• Oliver also made broader conspiratorial allegations about the authorities lying to, and manipulating, the general public. He claimed that “more and more of us have seen that whatever it is we’re told about COVID, about war, about the climate, it looks like the opposite to us”. The World Health Organisation supposedly “relentlessly pursues the globalist dream of overriding national sovereignty and putting all the most important decision-making regarding our lives into the hands of an unelected, unaccountable cabal”. He also references the “totalitarian” who “have it all”, including “the money in private, secretive, unaccountable hands, the judiciaries, the mainstream media, the police, the civil servants, not to mention all the guns and all the drones”.
• These references to a “globalist”, “unelected, unaccountable cabal” who are in control of finance, media, the security state and politics are a clear example of the publicising of unproven and dangerous conspiracy theories. Said conspiracy theories have led to real world harm in the UK, US and elsewhere.