Jonathan Charles Gaunt (born 3 March 1961) is an English radio talk show presenter, TV personality, newspaper columnist, social commentator and spokesman.
Gaunt describes himself as a "working-class, educated guy with, in broad strokes, a rightwing agenda". He appears every Wednesday as a newspaper reviewer on ''
Sky News Sunrise''. He also appears as a contributor to television programmes such as ''
Question Time
A question time in a parliament occurs when members of the parliament ask questions of government ministers (including the prime minister), which they are obliged to answer. It usually occurs daily while parliament is sitting, though it can be ca ...
'', ''
Countdown
A countdown is a sequence of backward counting to indicate the time remaining before an event is scheduled to occur. NASA commonly employs the terms "L-minus" and "T-minus" during the preparation for and anticipation of a rocket launch, and eve ...
'', ''
Daily Politics
''Daily Politics'' was a BBC Television programme which aired between 6 January, 2003 and 24 July, 2018, presented by Andrew Neil and Jo Coburn. ''Daily Politics'' took an in-depth review of the daily events in both Westminster and other areas ...
'' and
BBC News
BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
. On radio, Gaunt is a regular contributor on
BBC Radio 2's ''The
Jeremy Vine
Jeremy Guy Vine (born 17 May 1965) is an English television and radio personality, presenter, broadcaster and journalist. He is best known as the host of his BBC Radio 2 lunchtime programme which presents news, views, interviews with live guest ...
Show''.
Play and script writer
He studied Drama and Theatre Arts at the
University of Birmingham
The University of Birmingham (informally Birmingham University) is a Public university, public research university located in Edgbaston, Birmingham, United Kingdom. It received its royal charter in 1900 as a successor to Queen's College, Birmingha ...
. On graduation he founded a theatre
co-operative in Coventry called ''Tic Toc,'' and wrote over 15 political plays. The company eventually received funding from West Midlands Arts and the Arts Council of Britain. It was also funded by the company becoming a major promoter at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, promoting and hosting acts such as Julian Clary, Harry Enfield and Mike Myers.
His most successful play was ''Hooligans'' which won a Fringe First at the 1986
Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It also won the Perrier Pick of The Fringe. This play was subsequently adapted by
Yorkshire Television
ITV Yorkshire, previously known as Yorkshire Television and commonly referred to as just YTV, is the British television service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the Yorkshire franchise area on the ITV (TV network), ITV network. Until 19 ...
, and Gaunt began writing for television, becoming a member of the ''
Emmerdale
''Emmerdale'' (known as ''Emmerdale Farm'' until 1989) is a British soap opera that is broadcast on ITV1. The show is set in Emmerdale (known as Beckindale until 1994), a fictional village in the Yorkshire Dales. Created by Kevin Laffan, ...
'' script writing team for two years.
Radio presenter
Gaunt then ran the
Livingston Forum in
West Lothian, Scotland for a year, before returning to Coventry where a chance meeting with Moz Dee,
[ who later became the programme director at Talksport, led to his being persuaded to audition for the local radio station for which Dee worked, BBC Coventry & Warwickshire.][Burrell, Ia]
"Jon Gaunt: 'I'm the voice of ordinary folk'"
''The Independent'', 28 January 2008
Gaunt has worked for many radio stations, including BBC Three Counties Radio
BBC Three Counties Radio is the BBC's local radio station serving the counties of Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire.
It broadcasts on FM, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from studios at Grove Park in Dunstable.
According t ...
, BBC WM, BBC London 94.9
BBC Radio London is the BBC's local radio station serving Greater London and its surrounding areas. The station broadcasts across the area and beyond, on the 94.9 FM frequency, DAB, Virgin Media channel 937, Sky channel 0152 (in the Lond ...
, BBC Coventry & Warwickshire and Talksport. Gaunt's BBC Three Counties show was awarded three Sony Radio Academy Gold Award in 2001.
Gaunt hosted a mid-morning current affairs show on Talksport. On 18 November 2008 it was announced that Talksport had terminated Gaunt's contract following an interview with Redbridge Council's Michael Stark on 7 November, in which Gaunt branded Councillor
A councillor is an elected representative for a local government council in some countries.
Canada
Due to the control that the provinces have over their municipal governments, terms that councillors serve vary from province to province. Unl ...
Stark a "Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
", and "an ignorant pig" live on air in a discussion about whether smokers should be allowed to foster children in care. Gaunt felt that the policy was draconian and would leave children in care, where he believed that they would be in much more danger. He had criticised Redbridge Council in similar terms in his ''Sun'' newspaper column that morning. Ofcom later found Talksport in "breach of broadcasting rules" as a result of the incident and Jon Gaunt's appeal failed. "The broadcast was undoubtedly highly offensive to Mr Stark and was well capable of offending the broadcast audience."
In January 2009 Gaunt stated his intent to fight the human rights
Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...
case for the sake of "all broadcasters", before turning his attention to suing Talksport for terminating his contract. In January 2010 he won the right to appeal against Ofcom on the grounds that it had breached his right to freedom of expression
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recog ...
. The case returned to the High Court of Justice
The High Court of Justice in London, known properly as His Majesty's High Court of Justice in England, together with the Court of Appeal and the Crown Court, are the Senior Courts of England and Wales. Its name is abbreviated as EWHC (Englan ...
on 15–16 June 2010, but on 13 July it was announced that Gaunt had lost his case, the judge upholding Ofcom's decision and concluding that "the offensive and abusive nature of the broadcast was gratuitous, having no factual content or justification". Human rights group Liberty
Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom.
In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society fr ...
intervened in the case because of its "wider importance to free speech",[ but Gaunt's decision to appeal the judge's ruling was dismissed in the Court of Appeal in June 2011.
From April 2009 to July 2010, Gaunt presented an online radio talk show for the ''Sun''s website, called ''Sun Talk''. The show was also broadcast on regular FM radio in Spain, on the Costa Blanca via Bay Radio (Spain) and Costa Del Sol via Spectrum FM. The three-hour talkshow was broadcast every weekday from 10 am to 1 pm GMT.
In March 2010, ''Sun Talk'' won a British Press Award for Digital Innovation, and Gaunt was nominated for a ]Sony Radio Award
The Radio Academy Awards, started in 1983, were the most prestigious awards in the British radio industry. For most of their existence, they were run by ZAFER Associates, but in latter years were brought under the control of The Radio Academy ...
for Speech Radio Personality of the year. In May that year, ''SunTalk'' announced that it would be expanding its output for the 2010 World Cup
, image = 2010 FIFA World Cup.svg
, size = 200px
, caption = ''Ke Nako. (Tswana and Sotho for "It's time") Celebrate Africa's Humanity'It's time. Celebrate Africa's Humanity'' (English)''Dis tyd. Vier Afrika se mensd ...
.
In July 2010 ''SunTalk'' was closed down by News International, as part of a cost review strategy to focus on core operations.
In August 2010 Gaunt became the official spokesman for the EU referendum campaign.
In March 2013 Gaunt joined the UK Independence Party
The UK Independence Party (UKIP; ) is a Eurosceptic, right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom. The party reached its greatest level of success in the mid-2010s, when it gained two members of Parliament and was the largest par ...
. The announcement was made at the party's spring conference in the Devon city of Exeter.
In 2014 Gaunt joined FUBAR Internet radio.
In 2015 he launched a radio station called Talk2meradio but the station closed down in 2018.
He still does podcasts on his website.
In 2018 he joined Radio Sputnik Worldwide and currently presents a show called ''Shooting from the Lip''.
References
External links
Journalisted – Articles by Jon Gaunt
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gaunt, Jon
1961 births
Living people
People from Coventry
Alumni of the University of Birmingham
English columnists
English radio personalities
UK Independence Party people
English male non-fiction writers