GB News went on air at 8 p.m. on 13 June 2021 with a promise to let Britain’s forgotten voices speak. Chairman Alan McCormick and CEO Angelos Frangopoulos steered the channel from studios on the South Bank, broadcasting free-to-air on Freeview 236 and streaming worldwide via YouTube and gbnews.com. Founders Andrew Cole and Mark Schneider positioned the outlet as a counterweight to the metropolitan consensus, licensing the spectrum but keeping editorial control through parent company All Perspectives Ltd.
The schedule mixed straight hourly news with personality-led debate: breakfast with Colin Brazier and Nana Akua, primetime polemics from Nigel Farage and Dan Wootton, weekend fishing and finance slots. Ratings dipped after an opening-week peak of 336,000, then rebounded whenever culture-war flashpoints surfaced. Ofcom logged more than 1,200 viewer complaints in the first year, upholding three rulings on due impartiality; the channel paid one £50,000 fine after Mark Steyn cast doubt on mRNA vaccine safety.
Money arrived from advertising, viewer donations and a merchandise store selling “Don’t Kill Whales” mugs. By summer 2022 the station claimed break-even, though accounts filed at Companies House showed £30.7 million accumulated losses. Studio production values stayed resolutely low-tech: guests sat at laminated desks, reporters filed on shaky 4G links, the weather map crashed live on air. That scruffiness became part of the brand, proof that the channel was spending licence-fee money on neither vanity drones nor CGI icebergs.
Production Details
2021
Main Cast
