A Sky After Dark program which aired a highly offensive diatribe against Islam by a far-right guest wearing a shirt festooned with raw bacon rashers has been axed after six weeks on air.
While the new Sunday night show, Freya Fires Up, has been cancelled, its presenter Freya Leach will remain as co-host of Sky’s the Late Debate, which airs four nights a week.
Leach is the director of youth policy at the Menzies Research Centre and a former Liberal candidate in NSW for the state seat of Balmain.
The guest was a Scottish national, Ryan Williams, who made his agenda clear before he went on air by declaring he had “enough balls to fight Islam” as he was being fitted for a microphone.
Williams posted a video of his friendly interaction with a technical studio assistant which revealed Sky knew about their guest’s intentions before the live interview.
A Sky spokesperson told Guardian Australia last week: “The employee in the video is a casual technical guest liaison who meets and mics up studio guests. He was not aware of the guest’s background and not involved in booking the guest or any editorial processes.”
Sky News would not comment on whether anyone had lost their job over the incident.
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Leach went on to welcome him as a “social media sensation” and he spent a minute calling Muslims terrorists and explained he “wore” bacon to protect himself from alleged threats of beheading.
Most of what he said on live television is too offensive to repeat, but Williams has said online his intention is “to inflict maximum damage on Islam”.
“We have undertaken a thorough internal review, implemented its recommendations, and taken appropriate action with everyone involved in this incident,” a Sky News spokesperson said.
“We took immediate action during the live broadcast to cut off the guest, our host promptly apologised, and we ensured the content was not published or republished to any of our digital platforms”.
Tommy Robinson, a far-right identity, posted a segment of the interview on X and referred to Williams as a “hero”.
In 2018 Sky News sparked outcry after it invited Blair Cottrell, a far-right extremist who has expressed his admiration for Hitler, for a studio interview to discuss immigration.
