Kay Burley

Early life

Burley was brought up in Beech Hill, Wigan, Lancashire, and was brought up as a Roman Catholic, although she has said she has limited religious knowledge.

Her first reporting job came at the age of seventeen, on the Wigan Evening Post and Chronicle.

Broadcasting career

Burley worked in BBC local radio and TV, including Tyne Tees Television, before joining TV-am in 1985 as a reporter and occasional newsreader. From 1987, she presented TV-am's first hour, filling in for Caroline Righton and covering for Anne Diamond during her maternity leave.

Burley was recruited by Andrew Neil, and joined Sky Television, launching the Sky One Entertainment Channel in November 1988 with her own documentary The Satellite Revolution. She moved to the fledgling Sky News in 1988.

Among her assignments, she fronted Sky News coverage from Sri Lanka following the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and subsequent tsunami. In 2005, she was prominent in Sky News's coverage of both the General Election and the royal wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles, and in 2013 was prominent in the coverage of the birth of Prince George of Cambridge.

Burley is an occasional contributor to the tabloid Sunday Mirror, and in the summer of 2006 appeared occasionally on Channel 5's news bulletins. She has appeared as a stand-in for Iain Dale on his Sunday Politics show on London talk radio station LBC 97.3 and joined LBC Radio on 23 March 2014 along with The Sun’s Managing Editor Stig Abell to present a show from 8–11am on Sundays.

Writing

Burley's first novel, First Ladies, was published on 12 May 2011. The book is an erotic romance set in the media industry, including television news. One reviewer called it a "turgid mess" which is not even bad enough to be good: "Unfortunately, this book, with its dire comic timing, complete absence of irony, pointless digressions, dull plotting and complete lack of any engaging characters, is so mind-numblingly, fist-chewingly awful, that it’s just bad."

Burley's latest novel, Betrayal, was released in May 2012.

2008–9

In a 2008 interview with the wife of serial killer Steve Wright (the "Suffolk Strangler"), Burley has been widely criticised for asking his wife "Do you think if you'd had a better sex life he wouldn't have done this?"

Images from 2008 show Burley appearing to strangle reporter Kirsty Wigglesworth outside the Naomi Campbell hearing, which a Sky News spokesperson explained by saying "Kay Burley was provoked by a hard hit to the face with a camera."

2010–11

In February 2010, Burley apologised to guest Peter Andre who "fought back tears" after she aired comments by Dwight Yorke who criticised Andre after he volunteered to adopt Katie Price's first child (and Yorke's son) Harvey. Burley wrote in her online blog that Andre consequently "sobbed on my shoulder". Ofcom received 881 complaints from viewers, the majority opposed to the "intrusive" methods used by Burley; they found that Burley's interview was "persistent and probing" but not "bullying" or "intimidating". Later on that month, Burley was forced to apologise on-air for offending Catholics when she joked that US Vice President Joe Biden, who had ashes on his forehead to mark Ash Wednesday, had a "large bruise" that he had picked up from "walking into a door" or from slipping on ice during his recent trip to Canada for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

During the 2010 general election, Burley's interview with electoral campaigner David Babbs from 38 Degrees was criticised for "of bias and aggressive behaviour". Burley said, in part:

Ofcom rejected any complaints over Sky News coverage of the event, despite receiving 2,800 complaints. Burley subsequently was heckled by protestors as she was reporting from College Green, who continuously chanted "sack Kay Burley", prompting Burley to say "Lots of demonstrators shouting 'fair votes now' – not sure what they mean by that" and "They don't like The Sun, they don't like us, they don't like Rupert.

In September 2010, commenting on the News International phone hacking scandal, part of an exchange between Labour MP Chris Bryant and Burley went viral, whereby Burley asks Bryant to cite information claiming that phone hacking was "endemic" in other newspapers. Bryant did, accusing Burley of being "a bit dim" and saying:

Burley also falsely claimed that if he had changed his PIN, Bryant would not have been hacked. Bryant responded in an article for The Independent, saying that "My PIN had nothing to do with my phone being hacked. Someone phoned Orange, my mobile network provider, and tried to pretend to be me in order to gain access to my voicemails." Bryant has since asked on air for Burley to apologise over the interview.

2012–2015

On 5 October 2012, Burley was accused of insensitivity after she broke the news of the probable death of missing five-year-old April Jones live on air to volunteers who had been assisting in the search for her. The interviewees were unaware that the case had become a murder inquiry.

2015–present

During the 2015 general election, Channel 4 and Ofcom received more than 400 complaints against bias in their treatment against Ed Miliband (Labour leader) in favour of David Cameron (Conservative leader and Prime Minister), including a "town hall" part of the programme which Burley moderated. Burley repeatedly questioned Ed Miliband about his relationship with his brother David, at one point telling him: "Your poor mother."

In June 2015 Burley was criticised through social media for her interview of Nick Varney, the CEO of Merlin Entertainments. This followed an accident on The Smiler ride at Alton Towers, which led to injuries for 11 of the 16 passengers. Responses to her behaviour dubbed it "disrespectful to everyone involved" and an "outright attack". In response Burley tweeted "For those concerned I was hard on Alton Towers boss, he'll get over it. Not sure those on his ride will be so quick to recover". Her interview with Varney began a negative reaction over social media, prompting 1,816 complaints to Ofcom and also led to over 55,000 signatures on a petition to have Burley sacked. Ofcom declined to launch a formal investigation into the interview.

In March 2015, Burley repeatedly asked Cerie Bullivant of CAGE how he felt about the beheading of Western hostages by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. When Bullivant left the interview as he believed Burley's question to be "inherently Islamophobic and racist", Burley retorted that it was "nonsense", and told Bullivant to "get over yourself". This prompted 57 complaints to Ofcom, but no action against Burley was taken.

Dancing on Ice

Burley was a contestant for the second series of the ITV reality television show Dancing on Ice, beginning on 20 January 2007. She was skating for MacMillan Cancer Care, in memory of her mother, who had died of breast cancer. She donated her appearance fee to the charity. Burley went out of the show in the fifth week following a skate-off.

Personal life

Burley is twice divorced. She has one son from a one-year marriage to Steve Kutner, a football agent.