During the four year long debate about whether GB News are breaking the rules requiring impartial broadcast news there has been a noticeably missing voice, a clear view from the Labour Party . That situation ended at 10.45 am on Wednesday 10th September 2025 when the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Lisa Nandy, was appearing before the CMS Select Committee. No transcript has yet been released so I have prepared one plus what I think are some key points. (If you want to see the video of the hearing it is here and the relevant section is at 10:45:00). 

Lisa Nandy was answering a question about the BBC, talking about its funding and its independence, when she began what looked like a deliberate pivot:

“And If I may on that issue of independence the other thing that the BBC finds very challenging and you know the committee will know that there have been several challenging issues and areas where the BBC has fallen short in recent months is that they are rightly held to the highest of standards but there has been a fracturing of the news media and there are different standards being observed in other places.

“So to take a very clear example of something that this government and I feel very strongly about, there is a real importance for the public when they look at the news to be able to understand whether what they are seeing is political polemic or news. At the moment that situation is currently completely unsatisfactory and there has been a blurring of political polemic that is presented as news on other channels. I am really keen that as part of supporting not just the BBC but all of our public service broadcasters that we make sure that we get those rules right . Ofcom is currently consulting on tightening the rules around politicians presenting news programmes and news in any format and that is something that we as a government strongly support. We will look closely at what Ofcom present to us but it is any area in which we intend to act”.

Labour MP Paul Waugh then asked: 

“By implication are you talking about GB News there, I mean obviously like me you’d be a strong supporter of freedom of speech and of the freedom of media and the press but at the same time if you switch on GB News at  night it is basically a newspaper on TV format which is not meant to be the Ofcom rules is it?”

The  Culture Secretary replied:

“I’ve had particular concerns raised with me by parliamentarians about the appearance of Nigel Farage presenting news programmes on GB News. I think that is a fair criticism from members of parliament of all political parties because the public have a right to know if what they are seeing is news and is impartial or is not and one of the challenges that then creates for public service broadcasters is that people lose trust in the news altogether. Now that is then a challenge for the whole country because the way in which people consume their news has polarised and fragmented and people are reading different accounts. Those shared spaces and that shared understanding is the basis of democracy is fracturing. I think that is very, very dangerous, a very dangerous position for a country to be in and it is something that we intend to robustly defend is the impartiality of our news. It is not for the government ever to stray into determining who can be featured on broadcast media and what is discussed, That is entirely a question for broadcasters whether its GB News, the BBC or others not least because they exist to hold the mirror up to government and subject us to scrutiny and that is essential in any democracy. But it is right and proper that as a government we ensure we have a proper framework so that viewers are empowered to understand if what they are seeing is news or is what they are seeing is political polemic presented as news”. 

Some key points:

1. It may not have had the usual trappings of a major policy change, no pre-briefing, no press statement, but this was a Cabinet minister saying for the first time what, according to her, MPs of all parties have been telling her. Presumably that’s MPs of every party except Reform. 
2. Why now? My hunch is that Labour have always thought this but decided they didn’t need to get involved publicly in what they saw as GB News helping Reform take voters away from the Conservatives. Maybe they’ve decided they are now losing out too and “intend to act”.
3. How would they act? Ms Nandy said “We will look closely at what Ofcom present to us” on “tightening the rules”. There are two problems with that.
4. Problem One: Ofcom doesn’t ‘present’ to Government on issues like this, that’s not how an independent regulator is meant to work. When Ofcom announce the outcome of their consultation on the rules (see previous posts) the Government will have to decide whether the problem has been solved or whether some other intervention is necessary, such as a tightening of the legislation.
5. Problem Two: as argued in previous posts Ofcom’s current plan will not ‘tighten’ the rules because it does not address the core problem, the regulator’s current view that Nigel Farage does not present ‘news’ but ‘current affairs’. That’s why GB News says: “The Culture Secretary is clearly either mistaken or misinformed about the nature of GB News programming.GB News has never and does not use politicians to present news programmes. Politicians can present current affairs programmes.”
6. Any clues on how the problem could be solved ? Interesting that the SoS mentioned ‘news in any format’. This underlines the point that the Broadcasting Code requires due impartiality in ‘news in whatever form’ not just news bulletins. A revised piece of guidance to the code could build on this and be more precise about what is ‘news in whatever form’ overturning Ofcom’s current view that News Presenter of the Year Nigel Farage doesn’t present news.
7. Does Lisa Nandy’s involvement help or hinder the argument for the proper enforcement of the rules? The conventional wisdom is that she overplayed her hand on the BBC’s Glastonbury mistakes but learned that lesson. The qualifications set out in the second half of the full transcript of her remarks on impartiality seem to support this.
8. Next step? Ofcom executives now have to make up their mind after the consultation knowing that whatever they decide the Government have a view and that all the other political parties (and that includes Reform) feel they have a stake in the outcome too.