WEBB
Justin

• 1. Career

Justin Oliver Webb is a British journalist who has worked for the BBC since 1984.

He is a former BBC North America Editor and the main co-presenter of BBC One's Breakfast News programme. Since August 2009, he has co-presented the Today programme on BBC Radio 4, and also regularly writes for the Radio Times. Since 2022 he has been a co-presenter of the "Americast" podcast.

Career

Webb joined the BBC as a graduate trainee in 1984 working in Northern Ireland for BBC Radio Ulster based in Belfast. He then worked as a reporter for BBC Radio 4's Today programme, before becoming a foreign affairs correspondent based in London and covering news around the world. He reported on the Gulf War and the war in Bosnia, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the first democratic elections in South Africa.

He then became a BBC News presenter based in London, and the main presenter on BBC One's Breakfast News programme from 1992 to 1997. He also presented the BBC's One and Six O'Clock News bulletins and presented BBC Radio 4's The World Tonight from 1997–1998. From 1998 he spent three years working as the BBC's Europe correspondent based in Brussels. During that time he reported on the workings of the European Commission and Parliament, the politics surrounding Britain's decision on whether to join the single currency and the enlargement on the European Union.

In 2001, Webb moved to the United States, as the BBC's chief Washington correspondent. Much of his time was spent on local Washington Radio, including, WAMU, a public radio station, on The Diane Rehm Show. In 2006, at a seminar on impartiality, Webb said the BBC was anti-American and treated the US with "scorn and derision", according it "no moral weight". He has also presented a Radio 4 series on anti-Americanism. In December 2007, he became North American Editor for BBC News, a role newly created in time for the American presidential election of 2008. He replaced Matt Frei who moved to present the new World News America bulletin.

In August 2009, Webb returned to the UK to replace Edward Stourton on BBC Radio 4's early morning news programme Today. In October 2017, Webb disclosed that his presenting colleague Nick Robinson was being paid £100,000 more than him, for doing "essentially the same job". Webb's pay amounted to £200,000, whilst Robinson's reached £300,000, despite Webb joining the programme six years before. Webb promoted that the era of the "big beast" news anchor would likely be drawing to a close, with the "very well-paid" John Humphrys and Huw Edwards "in the firing line".

Webb received criticism for appearing to endorse the view that: "antisemitism is a bit like the way some of our people might regard anti-white racism, that actually it's a different order of racism. It's not as important – it's still bad – but it's not as important as some other forms of racism..." on the BBC on 12 March 2019; a BBC spokesperson clarified that he was "not expressing any personal view" and that Webb "is the first to admit he should have phrased his question better."

In September 2021, Webb asked Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey, if there should "not be spaces where biological males cannot go?" in reference to trans women. Webb was later cited in a CNN article which suggested that "Anti-trans rhetoric" was rife in the British media.

In February 2022, the BBC said that Webb was not sufficiently accurate when he described the philosophy professor Kathleen Stock – who resigned following protests over her views on gender identity and transgender rights – as being "falsely" accused of transphobia. However, the BBC said that it was accurate to describe her as a subject of abuse by students.