Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
I’ll never work Sunday on a
He’s hosted Formula One and the football, now he’s got breakfast news and his own quiz show... but Dan Walker says his faith is more important than his job
Being on TV on a daily basis isn’t necessarily the ego boost you’d imagine. Certainly not when you’re a breakfast TV presenter, broadcasting to the nation at a time when most people (even your own family) are preoccupied with toastbuttering and school-bag hunting.
Dan Walker seems resigned to the fact that his three children – Susie, 11, Jessica, nine, and Joe, seven – aren’t exactly hanging on his every word of a morning. ‘I think my wife, Sarah, makes them watch BBC Breakfast for ten minutes, just to check I’m still there, but that’s it,’ he says.
Still, at least his mum watches? ‘Oh yes,’ he says. ‘But with the sound down. She’ll text me when I’m on, saying, “That’s a nice tie.”’
When he phoned to tell her he’d landed a new telly gig – fronting his own quiz show – she had the sort of reaction only mothers can have. ‘She said, “I remember you dressing up like Bob Holness when you were seven,”’ he laughs. ‘Thanks for that, Mum.’
Yes, it seems that the Walker family liked to host their own quizzes with the young Dan ( in a dapper suit, à la iconic Blockbusters host) playing compère. ‘So it’s a role I’m comfortable with,’ he says.
Dan’s new show – for which he does wear a smart suit – is called Chase The Case. It’s a fast-paced affair in which five contestants are each given a suitcase containing an undisclosed amount. They have to trade general knowledge for info on what is in the cases – then work out which case they think contains the most money.
‘It’s like poker without the cards. The contestants have to use their powers of deduction,’ Dan says.
So, having started out as a sports presenter before segueing into more general news presenting, does this move represent his hat-trick?
‘Well, it’s very different to interviewing the Prime Minister on BBC Breakfast but it’s great fun to do, and I’ve always wanted to front a quiz show. Ten years ago I would have said I wanted to host a football show, a news show and a quiz show… I’ll have to come up with a new ten-year plan.’
He does suddenly seem to be everywhere, which leads to the obvious question of whether he is the new Golden Boy of the BBC… ‘I wouldn’t put myself in that category,’ he cringes. ‘I’m 41, I’m more like an old boot.’
He’s certainly got presence on the telly. He’s 6ft 6in tall – most unusual in this business, which tends to be peopled by the small and dainty. ‘ In my first job in regional TV I stood up for the first week, then they bought a sofa. I was too tall for the set. I’ve been sitting down ever since,’ he says.
One person who may not be thrilled to hear about his gigantic new television role is his ITV breakfast rival Piers Morgan, who presents Good Morning Britain with Susanna Reid. Dan and Piers are famous for their Twitter spats, and never miss an opportunity to have a swipe at each other and their shows. Mind you, it sounds as if the rivalry suits them. ‘There is an element of pantomime to it,’ Dan admits. ‘Actually, we get on quite well. I went to his 50th birthday party. It’s a great show and he does a great job. They’ve taken theirs in a certain direction, obviously.’ Where? More downmarket? More confrontational? ‘Well, yeah, but when you employ Piers that’s what you get. He’s good at that sort of thing.’
Piers was quick to highlight how uncomfortable the BBC Breakfast sofa was going to be on the day the news agenda was dominated by the BBC pay gap. Newspapers were full of the fact that Dan, earning circa £250,000 a year, was on the ‘big earners’ list, while his co-presenter Louise Minchin was not, meaning her BBC pay did not top £150,000.
An extraordinary gap there, surely?
Dan says that the situation is not as reported. He’s adamant he and Louise are on exactly the same money – but, crucially, for that specific job.
‘It’s awkward when your pay is front page news, but Louise and I knew we were earning the same from the start. I was only higher up the BBC list because I was doing other jobs for them, including working on Football Focus. As much as I love that job, I don’t do it for free.’
Louise also works for other people, but doesn’t have another BBC job – hence the (seeming) discrepancy.
So, does he think he is worth that pay packet? ‘Well, yes. I feel privileged to do the job, but there are a lot of people who get paid vast amounts more
than I do. I work hard and have done for 20 years.’ As a teenager, Dan had planned to follow his parents into teaching. His mother taught biology and zoology, and his dad was a geography teacher and a pastor, but, as a football nut, there was always a dream of being the next Des Lynam. ‘I wrote to him when I was 11, dreaming of being a presenter, but then I went to university at Sheffield.’ After his history degree, Dan began a course in broadcast journalism. Around the same time, encouraged by his girlfriend (now his wife), he entered a commentary competition on a local radio station – and won. ‘Funnily enough, Des advised me to do one or the other. I ended up doing both.’ Dan also considered trialling for youth football teams, but there was an issue. Most play on Sundays and his Christian faith meant he couldn’t do that. The clash between career and faith was still there when he moved into sports broadcasting – but, quite remarkably, he has always stuck to his guns about refusing to work Sundays.
‘I try to keep it as a special day – a day when my kids know I’m around, when we go to church. It’s important to me and my family.’ And you have sacrificed career opportunities for it? ‘It’s never been a problem. Yes, there have been jobs that I haven’t been able to do, but there have been other opportunities.’ Some have sought to turn his faith into an issue – most notably when a guest on the breakfast sofa who was talking about dinosaurs suggested Dan couldn’t participate because, as a supposed creationist, he didn’t believe in dinosaurs. ‘Of course I believe in dinosaurs, I would be foolish not to,’ he pointed out later. Today, he says the advantages of his faith far outweigh the rare uncomfortable moments. ‘It’s an integral part of who I am,’ he says.
His wife Sarah shares his faith. They met when she worked in a bakery in Sheffield, where they have recently returned to live, and now she holds family life together, particularly when work takes him away for weeks on end, as it did during the World Cup. From Moscow, he went to Glasgow to film Chase The Case. There has been no family holiday this year as a result. ‘Sarah’s a superstar,’ Dan says. ‘And I owe the family a holiday.’
Chase The Case begins on Monday 17 September on BBC1.