Dan Walker has been announced as the host of this year’s Wirral Business Awards, which will take place at the Floral Pavilion in New Brighton. Wirral Business Awards is one of the largest business events in the North West and will celebrate the best of the business industry. A statement confirming the BBC Breakfast star’s role in the celebrations, read: “We are pleased to announce that our host for this year’s awards will be BBC television presenter Dan Walker. “Dan is the weekday news anchor of BBC Breakfast and is the current host of BBC One’s award-winning Football Focus.”
The announcement comes after Dan spoke out about his co-host, Louise Minchin, walking off set during a recent episode of BBC Breakfast.
Louise Minchin was mortified on Tuesday’s episode when her mobile phone went off during a live broadcast after she accidentally sat on the device.
The 50-year-old journalist was left red-faced when a podcast began playing, forcing her to remove herself from the set and leave Dan to hold the fort for a moment.
At the time, the mother-of-two apologised to viewers at home, before walking out of view of the camera to hand over her mobile to a member of the crew.
“Oh God sorry, that is so embarrassing,” she exclaimed.
Remaining on set, Dan laughed: “She’s walking off set. She’s embarrassed. That’s Louise’s new podcast.”
Returning to her position, Louise declared: “I’m really properly embarrassed. How have I done that? I really do profusely apologise.”
“It was your phone and you pressed play,” Dan explained, to which she replied: “I don’t even know what I did. I apologise profusely.”
Following on from the incident Dan later took to social media to tease his fellow news anchor about the unfortunate situation.
The father-of-three questioned why his co-star had walked off set instead of turning down the phone.
In a post shared with his 70,600 followers, he said: “I love the fact Louise Minchin was so embarrassed by her phone playing a podcast live on telly, that rather than turn it down she walked off the set.”
“She has no idea how she did it,” the father-of-three added.
Although, Louise was clearly humiliated by the on-screen gaffe, her fans managed to see the funny side to it.
Commenting below Dan’s tweet, one person wrote: “Well done, Louise made my day, can’t stop laughing about it.”
“That’s why people love Louise,” another admirer added, as a third gushed: “We love you Louise.”
BBC Breakfast airs weekdays on BBC One at 6am.