ITV’s chief executive, Dame Carolyn McCall, has defended the controversial interview on Good Morning Britain in which former Labour minister Ed Balls interviewed his wife, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper. The interview took place on 5 August, on the same day that violent unrest broke out in parts of the UK. Following the episode, more than 16,000 complaints were made to media regulator Ofcom. However, Ofcom announced that it would not be pursuing the complaints as it believed the interview had been fair, balanced and impartial.
Speaking at the Royal Television Society London Conference, McCall described the morning of the interview as “a very, very tricky morning,” and revealed that the home secretary’s appearance on the show had been unexpected. Although she confirmed that Balls would remain a Good Morning Britain presenter, she added that the show’s producers would not repeat a similar interview.
Ofcom said that it had carefully assessed the complaints it received, but that it would not be pursuing them further. It confirmed that the couple’s relationship had been made clear to viewers twice during the interview, and that Garraway, who co-hosted the show, had largely led the questioning. Ofcom did, however, issue guidance to ITV that it should take particular care to ensure impartiality in future political interviews.
Some of the complaints about the episode related to a separate interview with Coventry South MP Zarah Sultana. Ofcom dismissed these, saying that Sultana had been given ample opportunity to express her views and respond to questioning, and that the interview was consistent with the expectations of regular viewers.
Sultana, who had previously sat as a Labour MP, has criticised the “sneering contempt of ‘journalists'” in response to the interview, but said that she would not be deterred from “calling out racism and Islamophobic hate.
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