Sky pulls Fox News from UK programming roster
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Editor
| 30 August 2017

Officially a result of desperately poor ratings, unofficially a tactic to impress UK regulator Ofcom as it aims to seal the merger with 21st Century Fox, but for whatever reason Fox News has been pulled from Sky’s UK grid.

Fox News went dark from UK screens as of 4pm on 29 August after the company said it was no longer a viable option in the UK as the costs of distributing the US network meant it was not in 21st Century Fox's commercial interests to continue its offer. “21st Century Fox has decided to cease providing a feed of Fox News Channel in the UK,” a company spokesperson told numerous new sources. “Fox News is focused on the US market and designed for a US audience and, accordingly, it averages only a few thousand viewers across the day in the UK. We have concluded that it is not in our commercial interest to continue providing Fox News in the UK.”

However, the official reasons for the move were almost immediately challenged by media analysts and politicians alike, suggesting the move was a tactic by the Rupert Murdoch-owned company associated with its controversial plan to purchase full control of pay-TV giant Sky. Pulling Fox News was seen as a necessary move to ease the bid.

On 26 August, UK Secretary of State at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, Karen Bradley confirmed that she had asked for further investigation from UK regulator Ofcom in relation to the proposed merger, over and above the advice that she had received at the end of June 2017, due to concerns regarding plurality of media ownership. The highly partisan and provocative nature of Fox News is seen by many as inimical to UL broadcasting. In 2016, its late former chief executive Roger Ailes had to resign from its post after being engulfed in a sexual harassment scandal, calling into question the fitness to manage by Rupert and James Murdoch who were his ultimate managers.

The BBC challenged Fox’s official line that there were only 2,000 average daily viewers for the service, quoting figures from the Broadcaster's Audience Research Board (Barb) suggesting that on average the UK daily viewing figures for Fox News in 2017 were actually in the region of 60,000.