OFCOM may investigate Sky News presenter Kay Burley for “empty chairing” the Conservative Party chairman.
The host listed the questions she had planned to ask James Cleverly, directing them to a vacant seat in the studio she said was “supposed to be filled” by the politician.
Burley claimed the Conservative Party chairman missed a planned appearance on her breakfast show, although the Tory MP responded that he was not in fact due to appear.
Ofcom received at least 23 official complaints relating to the presenter’s claims and the empty chair gesture. A spokeswoman said: “We are assessing these against our broadcasting rules before deciding whether or not to investigate.”
Sitting next to a vacant seat during her Kay Burley @Breakfast show yesterday morning, the host said: “Where is he? He’s probably 15ft away from where I’m standing just at the moment.
“I’ve been in to see him during the break, he said he wasn’t due to come and talk to us today although they had said that they would talk to us.”
Burley then listed several topics she had hoped to discuss with Cleverly, including Jacob Rees-Mogg’s controversial comments about the Grenfell Tower tragedy and Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s comparison of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to Joseph Stalin.
“I know that Number 10 Downing Street watch our show,” Burley said.
“I know that the spin doctors at Number 10 Downing Street had absolutely reassured me via text that when politicians were doing the rounds in the morning, they would be doing this programme – and yet, we have an empty chair.”
The presenter also said she wanted to ask the Tory party chairman about the Welsh Secretary Alun Cairns – who has since resigned over claims he knew about a former aide’s role in the “sabotage” of a rape trial – and No 10’s refusal to publish a report examining Russian infiltration in British politics, among several other controversies.
Cleverly responded to the claims during a TalkRadio interview with Julia Hartley-Brewer.
“We hadn’t booked in to go on her show, and I was sitting in this studio preparing to talk to you, as I’m now doing, and she said, ‘I want you to come on my show now’,” he said.
“I like to think I’m a pretty decent multi-tasker, but I cannot physically be in two places at the same time.”
Burley later tweeted: “He ducked us on the media round but then said yes to my team when we tracked him down.”
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