Philip Hayton

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Philip Hayton was born in Keighley in Yorkshire and was educated at Fyling Hall School, an Independent school near Robin Hood's Bay in North Yorkshire in Northern England.^[1]

Hayton had a distinguished 37 year career at the BBC, having been one of the first presenters of BBC Look North in Leeds before moving on to present the One O'Clock News nationally. Following this, he left national news to become main presenter of BBC North West Tonight, but soon returned to main news to present on BBC World and eventually, BBC News 24.

[edit] Leaving the BBC

In September 2005, Hayton drew media attention when he resigned from BBC News 24 six months into a year's contract, citing differences with co-presenter Kate Silverton.^[2] The Daily Telegraph, without substantiation and quoting an unnamed 'insider', reported that he turned to Silverton during a break and said "I don't like you" ^[3] The Daily Mirror quoted another BBC 'insider' as saying that Silverton is "...pushy beyond belief. Behind her big superficial smile she can be a really aggressive, manipulative monster who always gets what she wants." ^[4] Hayton merely cited "incompatibility" with Silverton as his reason and when his managers refused to move Silverton to another time slot he left. Silverton was later in the peculiar position of having to go through the morning's paper review live on air the morning the story broke, avoiding any discussion of the story and chiding her new co-anchor when he looked to refer to it ^[5] Hayton said that he left the BBC "without bitterness or rancour". Silverton continues to present on News 24 in the same weekly time slot alongside Simon McCoy. From 2007 onwards Hayton has been the regular host of Head2Head a BrightTALK internet broadcast for Skandia in which he holds court between two financial figures. ^[6]