presenter was left utterly red-faced on the morning news show after he suffered an awkward blunder in a heated debate.
During Wednesday’s visit (February 26) to the London studios, the 65-year-old returned to the helm on the 24-hour show alongside his co-star Ellie Costello.
They dynamic duo woke up the nation as they discussed some of the biggest stories hitting the headlines. This included President Trumps’ baffling AI-generated video of Gaza and the news that BP is set to cut its renewable energy investments.
But arguably the biggest story on everyone’s lips is the Prime Minister’s plans to slash overseas spending to boost defence over the next two years.
On Tuesday (February 25), the Labour leader said he would cut the foreign aid budget to fund the military boost – a move welcomed by the Trump administration but labelled a “betrayal” by development charities.
Eamonn Holmes and Ellie Costello returned to the helm on GB News (Image: GB News)
Sir Keir will face MPs in the House of Commons today before jetting across the pond to the US, where will be top of the agenda. And it’s fair to say the dad-of-four was less than impressed by the announcement.
Later on in the show, the pair welcomed Shadow Home Secretary James Cartlidge onto the programme to get his thoughts on the latest announcement by the Prime Minister.
But things got off to a rocky start when Eamonn accidentally “promoted” the MP live on the show when he accidentally introduced the politician with the wrong title.
He began: “We now go to the defence secretary James Cartlidge who joins us today. James, how do you feel today? I mean you’ve got this extra money to play with, you’ve got to accept small victories and this is a small victory. Will it stop there?”
James chuckled: “Well, it’s a small victory to have been appointed as the Home Secretary this morning, it was very kind of you, unfortunately I am still the shadow, but look I am really pleased.”
Shadow defence minister James Cartlidge corrected the broadcaster on the show (Image: GB News )
The Irish broadcaster then interrupted the politician as he quietly mumbled “sorry” as James continued his answer. It was at this point that the news programme suffered a technicial issue due to a delay in streaming from the MP stood outside Parliament to the London GB News offices.
After the team picked things up, Ellie Costello took over the interview as she quizzed the MP about why he welcomes Starmer’s foreign aid cuts. He told viewers: “At the weekend I wrote an article, Kenny [McAskill] wrote a letter to the Prime Minister and I wrote an op-ed in one of the Sunday papers saying that we should go further and farther on the defence bending and actually we said that the aid budget is one of the ways we should fund this”.
Ellie asked: “Tell us a bit more about your concerns about the numbers in this defence commitment not adding up because the Prime Minister’s claiming the increase to be about £13.4billion, but you think there could be a short fall here?”
He replied: “I was looking at the numbers as I was sitting next to Kenny as she was responding to the statement and my maths was well if the A budget goes from 0.5 to 0.3, I think we can all work out that’s 40 percent, that suggests about £6billion but the Prime Minister said £13.4billion”.
Moving on to the topic of foreign aid being supplied to , Ellie interrupted him as he explained the reason why the UK supported in 2021.
It was at this point that he errupted: “Let me finish, let me finish, because you said that I’m ashamed and that’s a pretty loaded word to use. If we hadn’t done that and had fallen early, we’d have been in a situation like 1939, and that’s very serious. So you can judge us on what we actually delivered.”
It didn’t take long before fans flooded to X – formerly known as Twitter – to share their thoughts online, as one user penned: “Ah, here we go again – another lot promising to hold the government to account like it’s some sort of game. Good luck with that, mate, I’ve seen more spine in a soggy biscuit.”
Another agreed: “Oh, here we go again! Sounds like they’re more interested in a numbers game than what really matters. Let’s hope they’ve got their calculators out ebcause this could end up beign a right pickle if they don’t get it sorted. Holding them to account is all well and good, but actions speak louder than words, love!”
A third echoed: “We should start defending our own boarders. It is pathetic to hear Starmer talking big and yet betraying his own countries safety on a daily basis” as a third echoed”.
GB News airs everyday from 6am to 9.30am live on the GB News website.