# Andrew Neil

Andrew Neil (born 21 May 1949) is a Scottish journalist and broadcaster. Neil was appointed editor of The Sunday Times by Rupert Murdoch in 1983, and held this position until 1994. He was formerly editor-in-chief of Press Holdings Media Group (from 1996, later chief executive, chairman from 2008) of which The Spectator was formerly a part. Briefly chairman of GB News in 2021, Neil had a difficult relationship with Paul Marshall, an investor in the the television station, and resigned as Spectator chairman in September 2024 when Marshall acquired the magazine.

## Quotes

* [England needs] another hundred [Mohamed] Al Fayeds. So he comes from the wrong side of the tracks; so does Mrs. Thatcher. Who cares who owns Harrods? It's a department store, not the Department of Defense. He's a great entrepreneur.
** As cited by Maureen Orth in "Holy War at Harrods", Vanity Fair (December 1995)
* GB News will not be yet another echo chamber for the metropolitan mindset that already dominates so much of the media. It is our explicit aim to empower those who feel their stories, their opinions, their concerns have been ignored or diminished.
* We will puncture the pomposity of our elites in politics, business, media and academia and expose their growing promotion of cancel culture for the threat to free speech and democracy that it is.
** Andrew Neil: A welcome letter to GB News viewers (13 June 2021)
* In the run-up to the launch, through the launch, and in the aftermath of the launch – and I think most of you who know anything about it will know you couldn't file the launch under startling success – more and more differences emerged between myself and the other senior managers and the board of GB News. And, rather than these differences narrowing, they got wider and wider and I felt it was best that, if that's the route they wanted to take, then that's up to them, it's their money.
** Speaking on BBC Question Time after resigning from GB News having hosted only eight shows on the new channel BBC News (16 September 2021)
* I’ve had my third jab. All Pfizer. And I strongly recommend everybody to do the same. I’ve also seen how well vaccine passports work. I don’t believe in mandatory vaccination but if you don’t get jabbed you need to realise there are consequences on where you can go.
** Twitter, 8:11 AM · 6 December 2021
* France has had vaccine passports for sometime now. It has 600,000+ Covid cases. UK has 1m+. Which part of vaccine passports don’t you get. They also encourage younger folks to be vaxxed, where UK is lagging. And, as you say, vax works.
** Twitter, 9:19 AM · 6 December 2021
* I have clicked to follow you. Please DM your address/contact details so my lawyers can serve legal papers against you for this clear libel and defamation. I’ve instructed the papers to be drawn up now. All those tweeting support for and spreading her tweet will also be served
** Twitter, 5:29 AM · 7 December 2021
* There are still 5 million unvaccinated British adults, who through fear, ignorance, irresponsibility or sheer stupidity refuse to be jabbed. In doing so they endanger not just themselves but the rest of us.
** It's time to punish Britain's five million vaccine refuseniks: They put us all at risk of more restrictions, says ANDREW NEIL. So why shouldn't we curb some of their freedoms?, as quoted in the Daily Mail
* Britain should follow the French example — and also take note of what other European countries are doing — and penalise the vaccine refuseniks.
** It's time to punish Britain's five million vaccine refuseniks: They put us all at risk of more restrictions, says ANDREW NEIL. So why shouldn't we curb some of their freedoms?, as quoted in the Daily Mail
* Russians taking Ukrainian citizens to so called “filtration camps” then relocating them to distant parts of Russia to work for free. In other words slave labour. Straight out of Nazi Germany playbook.
** Twitter, 6:37 PM · 21 March 2022
* Israel fails to stand up for Ukraine. Reluctant to impose sanctions on Russia. Still allowing flights from Russia but ended visa-free travel for Ukrainians. Stayed silent after Russian airstrike near Babi Yar memorial, where German Nazis killed tens of thousands of Jews in WW2.
** Twitter, 5:52 PM · 22 March 2022

## External links

* Andrew Neil on IMDb
* Authority control: WorldCat search