Who will succeed Dimbleby as Question Time host? A look at the candidates

For the first time in a quarter of a century, Question Time is hunting for a new host – or chairman, to give it its proper title – with David Dimbleby announcing he will step down from the role later this year. Given that the job is arguably the most high-profile hosting gig in British political TV, the hunt to find Dimbleby’s replacement is already the subject of rampant speculation, with the great and good of news broadcasting being tipped for the role.

What is certain is that whoever takes on the job will follow formidable footsteps: Dimbleby is widely considered to have revived the fortunes of Question Time, which was considered a lame duck when he was appointed in 1994, and the broadcaster has attained a cross-generational cult status in his 25 years at the helm. Here are the runners and riders to replace him.

Samira Ahmed

Ahmed has already issued a forthright come-and-get-me plea to the Question Time higher-ups via Twitter, one that does a robust job of pointing out her credentials. “I have 2 awards for journalism, 28 years in the broadcast news biz, including 11 at C4 News, currently presenting @newswatchbbc & @BBCFrontRow & an honorary fellow of St Edmund Hall, Oxford. I’m v well qualified to present @bbcquestiontime & I’d like to be seriously considered,” she wrote. Ahmed has since tweeted that she has been assured she is under consideration, although you suspect that a lack of a blue-chip presenting gig at the BBC might count against her.

Emma Barnett

Arguably the least recognisable figure among the frontrunners, Barnett makes up for her lack of name recognition with a growing reputation as a tough moderator. A former women’s editor at the Daily Telegraph, she has spent recent years gaining a broadcast education in the bruising world of talk radio, first on LBC and most recently on the mid-morning show on BBC Radio 5 Live. She received rave reviews for her tough interviewing of guests on both sides of the political divide while covering as host of The Andrew Marr Show earlier this year.

Victoria Derbyshire

The former 5 Live host’s transition from radio to television in 2015 was not the easiest. Her daytime show, described by the BBC News chief, James Harding, as the “centrepiece of domestic daytime TV news” before it aired, drew in a paltry 73,000 viewers in its first 10 shows. But since then she has established herself as a daytime alternative to the Jeremy Kyle ratings grabbers. From her background in lifestyle journalism, Derbyshire shifted gears with fearless interviewing (like her set-to with Ken Clarke), which could mean the Question Time bosses see her as authoritative and dogged enough for the BBC’s flagship political debate programme.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy

Could the Channel 4 anchor make the switch back to the beeb? It might not be that much of a leap. Guru-Murthy started his professional life as a host of a debate show on the BBC, but he has a bit of previous when it comes to upsetting Auntie. He was criticised for his grilling of the then BBC One controller Charlotte Moore at the Edinburgh festival in 2014 and his reputation as an aggressive and sometimes ruthless interviewer may not be quite what the Question Time bosses want as they look to transition from an ever-dependable like Dimbleby.

Mishal Husain

Now firmly established as a lead presenter on the Today programme, Husain was promoted to Dimbleby’s main presenting team for the 2017 general election coverage and handed the plum role of conducting the first joint interview with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle late last year. She would undoubtedly be a progressive choice for a hosting gig that has been exclusively white and male; she is currently the 10/1 joint-third-favourite for the job with Ladbrokes. She has proved adept at keeping politicians in check, too: witness her still impressive shushing of Boris Johnson (“Please stop talking!”) in 2017.

Emily Maitlis

Maitlis hit the headlines last summer after interviewing the prime minister in the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower disaster and suggesting that she had misread the public anger over the incident. Maitlis had previously spent time at the site sorting donations from members of the public before being told, at short notice, that the prime minister was heading to the BBC for an interview. She has since said her anger was because it “was no longer an intellectual exercise”. A Newsnight host since 2005, Maitlis spent weeks on the road in the US covering the last presidential election and the subsequent fallout after Donald Trump won. At one point, she managed to convince short-lived White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci to appear on the programme by grabbing him as he walked up to the building. A frontrunner for the Question Time job, she has broad name recognition and is not afraid to take controls of a fierce debate.

Jeremy Paxman

The famously aggressive interviewer quit Newsnight in 2014, but he remains one of the most recognisable current affairs presenters in the UK. Since then, he has dabbled with political programmes on Channel 4 to mixed reviews and continued to present University Challenge on the BBC. However, he also become increasingly critical of the corporation, saying such organisations “are vulnerable to consultants and other snake-oil vendors when the top management hasn’t much clue what day of the week it is”. Paxman lost out to Dimbleby in 1993, the last time the job was up for grabs, and he has made no secret of his desire to do the job. If the corporation decides to go for an established male presenter, it is possible they would consider Andrew Neil, who currently hosts the surreal politics show This Week, which airs after Question Time on Thursday nights.

Kirsty Wark

The Newsnight veteran is the clear frontrunner with the bookies to replace Dimbleby. Authoritative, combative when necessary and comfortable interviewing Quentin Tarantino or a world leader, Wark has been one of the BBC’s premier interviewers for more than two decades. A prominent voice in the wage equality debate, she recently spoke about the marginalisation of older women in the media. “Why shouldn’t there be representation of women well into their 70s and beyond?” she asked in 2015. “David Dimbleby is a fine broadcaster, but he’s heading in that direction. So why can’t we have women on television who are also heading in that direction?” There have been loud calls for Dimbleby’s replacement to be a woman and it is hard to see past Wark as the ideal candidate.

Who would your choice be? Let us know in the comments below.