"good communicator", but whilst he was "more honest on that than many other politicians who support Brexit", his approach was reminiscent of Nazism; "The word 'betrayal' was used in Germany from 1919 onwards and throughout the 1920s with terrible results". Esler has criticised the way the BBC and other TV and radio news has handled balance. He states that the present mode of balance involves "if you have a Tory on you get a Labour Party person", but says that "that's not what politics is like anymore". He criticises giving equal balance to "someone who really knows what they are talking about" and "someone who is essentially the village idiot". In August 2021 it was announced that Esler would be a competitor on BBC's Celebrity MasterChef. He left the competition during a quarter-final "after serving up an ‘incomplete’ dessert compared to ‘soup’." Personal life Esler has been married to rock violinist Anna Phoebe, his second wife, since 2012. They have two children. He was first married in July 1979, to teacher Patricia Warner, and they had two children together. The couple's separation was reported in 2008 and a divorce granted in 2010. Esler's hobbies include camping, hiking and skiing. He is a fan of progressive rock, citing King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Colosseum and Pink Floyd as favourite bands, and presented Prog magazine's Progressive Music Awards for three consecutive years between September 2012 and 2014. Awards and honours Esler's report on the military build-up in the Aleutian Islands as part of the Reagan administration's New Maritime Strategy earned him a Royal Television Society award. In 2007 he won a Sony Gold Award for his radio documentary report Letters from Guantanamo on Sami al-Hajj, one of the detainees in Guantanamo Bay. Following the broadcast, al-Hajj was released from American custody. Esler has received two honorary degrees from the University of Kent: an honorary MA was awarded in 1995, followed by an honorary Doctorate in Civil Law in 2005. He was installed as the sixth Chancellor of the university in July 2014. Bibliography Esler has written the following books: Non-fiction How Britain Ends - English Nationalism and the Re-birth of Four Nations. Head of Zeus. 2021. Fiction References External links Gavin Esler BBC Newsnight Gavin Esler's Personal Website 1953 births Alumni of the University of Kent Alumni of the University of Leeds BBC newsreaders and journalists BBC World News Chancellors of the University