Emily Maitlis, Haribos, and GB News playing darts - What you missed from the general election TV coverage

With rolling news coverage of the general election throughout the night, there's plenty you might have missed.

Scott Bryan
·6-min read
Virtual cats, Haribos, and an exasperated Emily Maitlis were just some of the highlights from the general election TV coverage. (Sky/Channel 4)
Virtual cats, Haribos, and an exasperated Emily Maitlis were just some of the highlights from the general election TV coverage. (Sky/Channel 4)

Sir Keir Starmer will be the UK’s new Labour prime minister after a Conservative rout saw former premier Liz Truss and a dozen serving Cabinet members lose their seats in last night's general election. It all played out on the rolling news coverage overnight, with each channel bringing out their heavyweight presenters to man the swingometers.

Didn't stay up all night to watch? I watched all of the channels at the same time with absolutely no sleep last night for you. I know you didn’t necessarily ask me to do this, and in a same way I sort of wish you stopped me, but here’s my review of the TV coverage.

Clive Myrie and Laura Kuenssberg anchored the BBC News election coverage overnight. (BBC screenshot)
Clive Myrie and Laura Kuenssberg anchored the BBC News election coverage overnight. (BBC screenshot)

The BBC’s coverage was remarkably polished (of course it was) and featured the polling guru Sir John Curtice (literal god), but the most enjoyable, and surprising, part of their coverage was seeing how well Clive Myrie and Laura Kuenssberg gelled together as co-hosts.

It provided a bit of a fresh air into an election programme that can often end up feeling rather stuffy, although you wondered how much airtime some parties received over others, with much talk of Reform.

Read more: Election 2024: Starmer to become prime minister after landslide Labour win

They also provided some memorable, and rather awkward, moments. One included them highlighting after the exit poll that Conservative Steve Baker MP had less than 1% chance of remaining as an MP… to Steve Baker who happened to be in the same studio as them at that time.

The only thing that didn't work properly was the swingometer, because the swing couldn’t go over 20% (when the results actually did).

They also aired the weirdest exchange of the entire night between host Clive Myrie and deputy Labour Leader Angela Rayner: “You say you are not counting your chickens. What kind of chickens might they be? What kind of chickens would you like to see?”

You might have thought that this exchange took place at four o’clock in the morning. No, this was at 10.15pm.

Steve Baker lost his Conservative seat in the general election. (ITV screenshot)
Steve Baker lost his Conservative seat in the general election. (ITV screenshot)

ITV consisted of a sea of laptops, a sea of people looking into laptops, popping their head above them once in a while to provide some analysis.

And as there was endless analysis provided by Labour’s Ed Balls and the Conservative’s George Osborne, it was impossible to not be looking at SNP’s Nicola Sturgeon positioned eternally in shot, wondering how tired she was.

Gosh, they love the colours blue and dark green and want you to know about it, I thought. It also completely lacked atmosphere, feeling as if you were stuck in an office pulling an all-nighter with colleagues who were equally as frustrated as being in there with you.

The highlight of the whole night was actually when their main coverage was over, when Steve Baker MP laid into George Osborne, thinking that he had asked him a snarky question, when in fact it was Ed Balls.

Emily Maitlis and Krishnan Guru-Murthy hosted the Channel 4 election coverage. (Channel 4 screenshot)
Emily Maitlis and Krishnan Guru-Murthy hosted the Channel 4 election coverage. (Channel 4 screenshot)

Channel 4’s coverage featured political heavyweights Rory Stewart, Alistair Campbell alongside Emily Maitlis and Krishnan Guru-Murthy. But after accusations from some people online that the line-up was too left wing, their coverage added Conservatives Nadine Dorries, Ann Widdecombe and Kwasi Kwarteng as panellists who, bizarrely, all appeared at the same time.

The friction in the studio was evident. It was like stumbling late into a family argument deep into Christmas Dinner. Yet it was strangely compelling, such as when Dorries claimed that Boris Johnson knew what hardship was like, before it was pointed out that Boris had gone to Eton. Another moment featuring Maitlis turning her head away from Dorries went viral.

Overall, it was coverage that was extremely watchable. The best of the lot was Hannah Fry, who crunched the results as they came in. She made it look effortless, which made it all the more surprising considering that she was a late replacement for Clare Balding who had to pull out as she was hosting Wimbledon.

Although, knowing how good Balding is, I was surprised that Balding didn’t proceed with hosting both anyway.

Kay Burley hosted Sky News's election coverage alongside virtual Sunak and Starmers. (Sky News screenshot)
Kay Burley hosted Sky News's election coverage alongside virtual Sunak and Starmers. (Sky News screenshot)

Sky News threw everything at their coverage. And I mean it. They had a virtual studio, with a virtual Larry the Cat licking its paws in front of a virtual Downing Street (no, really).

At times it all got a bit much. They had 3D life-sized Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak appearing like catwalk models on screen with no idea what to do with them.

At one point Sky News also flew one of their own helicopters over a taxi featuring one of their own reporters travelling back to the studio from where the exit poll data had been collated.

And when the exit poll dropped, their presenters didn’t react with words… they just made an assortment of weird noises (you really have to hear it).

Meanwhile Political Editor Beth Rigby, who went viral for pronouncing haribos as “har-ree-bows,” deliberately said it the right way whilst discussing the sweets during the channel’s coverage. Shame, as I really wanted it to catch on.

GB News temporarily got the exit poll wrong on screen, and said that the Conservatives were predicted to have 410 seats and Labour had 131 (it was actually the other way round.)

Perhaps it was wishful thinking. When the exit poll was released, their own viewing party reported many of their audience members booing the news of the Labour landslide and jeering the predicted votes for Reform. They then played a game of darts to predict how long it would take for Rishi to resign.

No idea either.

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