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TELL OFCOM: GB News host and Reform MP Lee Anderson engaged in highly personal ad hominem attacks

Watch: GB News host and elected MP Lee Anderson again attacks the Energy Secretary as a “lunatic” and “dangerous” and dismisses climate aid as “nonsense”.

Read our complaint against GB News

On 10 September 2024, GB News host and elected MP Lee Anderson again attacked the Energy Secretary as a “lunatic” and “dangerous”. This time Anderson went further by claiming that Ed Miliband is “the biggest threat to pensioners in this country since COVID-19”. This segment happened during a ‘Breaking’ news segment, which imposes even more responsibility around impartiality.

This segment violated Ofcom rules 5.1, 5.5 and 7.1 which require impartiality and the avoidance of “unjust or unfair treatment of individuals”.

Submit your complaint to Ofcom using this form and by following the guidance below. 

Programme details:

Programme title: Martin Daubney
Date of broadcast: 10 September 2024
Time of broadcast (24 hour clock): 16:15
Channel / station: GB News

Your complaint:

Subject: GB News host and Reform UK MP Lee Anderson made a series of harmful allegations about Energy Secretary Ed Miliband and about green policies, while being interviewed from the Houses of Parliament in a breaking news segment.

Description:

Here’s a few bullet points to include:

  • On 10 September 2024, Lee Anderson (a host on GB News) was interviewed in his capacity as an MP inside the Houses of Parliament to discuss his vote against the removal of pensioner fuel allowance from many pensioners. In it, he described “foreign climate aid” as “nonsense” and later called for “that lunatic” Ed Miliband to be removed from office “because he’s spaffing billions of pounds away with his GB energy, 8.5 billion, 11.6 billion on foreign climate aid. He’s a lunatic. He’s the most dangerous man in Britain”. He then claimed that the Energy Secretary is the “biggest threat to pensioners in this country since COVID-19”. This segment was a complete violation of Ofcom rules around impartiality, including in relation to government policy, as set out in Ofcom rules 5.1 and 5.5. The segment was published with the chyron “Breaking”, implying that it is a news segment, which puts it within scope of rule 5.1, which covers “news”. Describing a politician as a “lunatic”, “the most dangerous man in Britain” and “the biggest threat to pensioners in this country since COVID-19” is unfair, harmful and offensive to those who lost their lives to the pandemic, violating Ofcom rule 7.1 on unjust or unfair treatment of individuals.
Deadline for complaints: October 8, 2024 11:59 pm

Submitting a complaint to Ofcom should take you less than 10 minutes and is completed via a form on their website.

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Submitting a complaint to Ofcom should take you less than 10 minutes and is completed via a form on their website.

  • Ofcom is the UK’s public regulator for communications services. Among other responsibilities, their job is to ensure that TV channels uphold the Broadcasting Code. This code requires broadcasters to protect the public from harmful and offensive material, avoid unjust or unfair treatment of individuals and organisations, and report the news with due accuracy and impartiality.
  • Ofcom has real power to yield. Sanctions they can issue include directions not to repeat content, fines — and crucially, the power to suspend or revoke a TV channel’s licence to broadcast.
  • Ofcom must carefully consider every single complaint to see if their rules have been broken. If the complaint is strong, Ofcom will launch a formal investigation process.
  • Ofcom will not reply to each specific complaint but instead publishes records of the complaints received, investigations underway and breaches on their website, every fortnight.
  • Complaints must be about a specific breach of the code and submitted within 20 days of the program going to air.