GOOD Morning Britain has been hit with Ofcom complaints after viewers slammed Piers Morgan’s brutal interview with Health Secretary Matt Hancock.
The government minister appeared on the breakfast show on Monday – following a 201-day boycott of the show and 55-year-old Piers‘ combative presenting.
And Hancock was left squirming in the chat when the host demanded that he resigned following the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.
The Sun can now reveal that the interview sparked 85 Ofcom complaints – with a further 41 also contacting the telly regulator over a previous episode, which saw Hancock approached by GMB’s roving reporter as he left BBC studios last week.
Hancock and Piers’ exchange got off to a frosty start as the former denied that there was ever an official boycott, but Piers pointed the finger at ex-communications boss at Downing Street Lee Cain, who left dramatically last week with Dominic Cummings, as the mastermind of banning ministers from the show.
After more than 200 days of not having a minister to interrogate, Piers read out the full “charge sheet” of failures during the coronavirus crisis – including the inability to ensure there were enough tests available.
Laying into Hancock, he seethed: “You are the Health Secretary, it’s on your watch. It turned out we had very little protective personal equipment for our health workers, so hundreds of them died.
“It then turned out that in care homes, far from having the ring of protection which you’d been boasting about, we actually sent thousands of elderly people out of hospitals and into care homes without testing them.”
Piers stormed: “Given that we now have over 50,000 deaths in this country, which is the worst death toll in Europe, why are you still Health Secretary? Why haven’t you handed in your resignation?
“There have been a constant series of Government failures and U-turns over this year, are you prepared to admit (to that)?”
Hancock defended the testing policy, saying mass testing would be mobilised to let family and friends visit residents in care homes by Christmas.
He went on to insist: “We have been working incredibly hard for instance building the sort of testing capacity that we’re talking about today, expanding the number of tests available, making progress on the vaccine.
“That’s what I’ve been working on, and obviously this is critical period in the crisis.”
The last time Hancock was on the show was in March of this year, where Piers sparked thousands of complaints with his harsh interview.
Piers tore into the cabinet minister after a heated debate over the coronavirus outbreak and accused Hancock of not taking the issue seriously.
Showing incredible foresight at the time, Piers demanded to know why people were not yet banned from going out.
Hancock tried to calm the furious host, saying “I know you’ve got frustrations”, only to be interrupted – and eventually snapped.
Piers has regularly lashed out at the government ever since, being incredibly vocal in their handling of the coronavirus pandemic – and slamming their decision to not speak to GMB viewers.
Last week, the breakfast show ambushed the Health Secretary live on airs, with the minister stunned to be approached by reporter Nick Dixon in the street.
Although he gave a brief comment about the vaccine, he refused to acknowledge the government’s GMB boycott – or discuss coming on the show.
