John Humphrys slams Thought For The Day as ‘deeply boring’ and says it has too many Christians

John Humphrys has said the Thought for the Day slot on BBC Radio 4 is ‘deeply boring’ and features too many Christians.

The most senior presenter of the Today programme, in which Thought for the Day features, suggested that the BBC should do away with the almost three-minute slot altogether.

In an interview with the Radio Times, Mr Humphrys was asked what he thought of Thought for the Day.

He replied: ‘Deeply, deeply boring, often. Sometimes not.

‘Sometimes it’s good and the guy or woman is delivering an interesting thought in a provocative way. Usually not.

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‘It seems to me inappropriate that Today should broadcast nearly three minutes of uninterrupted religion, given that rather more than half our population have no religion at all.

‘Certainly very few of them are practising Christians. We have Hindus of course, and we have the occasional Muslim, the occasional Jew, but by and large it’s Christian. Why?’

Thought for the Day is broadcast at 7.45am on BBC Radio 4 and lasts for two minutes and 45 seconds.

Mr Humphrys was part of a joint interview with his fellow Today presenters for the Radio Times to mark the programme’s 60th anniversary.

During the interview, he asked his colleagues: ‘When you’re presenting it, how many times have you said to yourself, “Dear God, we’ve got to cut a really fascinating programme short because we’re now going to hear somebody tell us that Jesus was really nice, and the world could be a better place if we all…” you know… oh God.’

Fellow presenter Justin Webb replied: ‘They’re all roughly the same. “If everyone was nicer to everyone else, it would be fine”.

‘But from my cursory glance around the world, I think a lot of religious people don’t want to be nice to each other.’

Today presenter Mishal Husain said: ‘I think it’s a bit of punctuation in the programme. For me it’s the time I need to be out of the house, when I’m late.’

But fellow presenter Nick Robinson said the slot did have merit.

‘Do you know what, when Jonathan Sacks, the former chief rabbi, does it, I listen,’ he said. ‘There are a few people who are just profound. Profound.’

(Main picture: Rex)