Alastair Campbell has revealed that he was approached about hosting a show on GB News prior to its launch in 2021.
The former Labour spin doctor - a vehement critic of Brexit - told a session at the Times and Sunday Times Literature Festival that in the weeks building up to the channel's launch he was being courted about co-hosting a programme with former UKIP leader Nigel Farage.
"Farage was desperate," he said, in quotes reported by The Times. "I mean honestly he was phoning me the whole time, 'This would be great, you'd love it!'"
Campbell continued: "I think they were trying at the start to give a sense that it wasn't going to be a biased right-wing station. So the idea was for me and Farage to do a weekly show. It was going to be me and him talking, about two or three themes, maybe have guests.
"We did talk about it and I didn't rule it out immediately. I've done loads of stuff with Farage before, there's quite a famous clip of us on Good Morning Britain where we nearly came to blows, but in the end I thought 'no'.
"He wanted to do it because he thought it would give him legitimacy and they thought they could do it because it would allow them to say we're not just a shit-stirring right-wing station. In the end that's why I said no, because I thought 'I'm being used'."
Farage instead went on to host his own weeknightly programme, which regularly ranks as the station's top show in the ratings.
Neil Wilkes
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