How Freya Leach went from Sydney University exam complaint to Sky News controversy

Some have argued privately that Leach has been hung out to dry by the network compared to other older, male hosts, who are often criticised for offensive comments on air.

The same critics argue Sky management should shoulder responsibility for assigning Espiner, a junior staffer with a background in podcasts in New Zealand, as the show’s only producer, putting out a live program anchored by an inexperienced host.

But former Media Watch host and University of Technology Sydney professor Monica Attard believes Sky’s response was appropriate.

“There have been presenters on Sky who have made comments and done interviews which have been deeply offensive to some sectors of the community, but in this instance, it’s good to see that they’ve acted so unusually swiftly to ensure that perhaps it won’t happen again.”

There were signs Sky was wise to the unpredictable nature of its newest host from the outset. Her experience consisted of a handful of months co-hosting its panel show The Late Debate, which she retains amid the fallout.

After this masthead requested an interview with Leach the morning after her first show, the up-and-coming host responded the following day, proposing a chat that afternoon. Twenty five minutes later, the interview was scuppered when a member of Sky’s communications team said Leach was “currently unavailable for an interview as she focuses on her show commitments”.

A week later, an unprompted email arrived from Sky with a request: “Please can you refrain from contacting our staff directly.”

Rise and Fall

Leach has been groomed as Sky’s next star, and has deep roots at the conservative news network, the Liberal Party and Sydney’s inner-city Christian society.

Having made news headlines over her exam complaint, Leach ran unsuccessfully as the Liberal Party candidate for Labor-safe seat Balmain in the 2023 New South Wales state elections. Then just 20-years-old, she received swinging endorsements from prominent party figures, but could only muster 19 per cent of the vote in the electorate which includes her native Rozelle.

She took a job with the Liberal-aligned Menzies Research Centre, home to News Corp luminaries like Nick Cater, a columnist for The Australian and host on the right-wing news network ADH TV, which rebranded to Newsmax Australia this year, but no longer broadcasts.

Leach opted to focus on her media career, rather than a budding career in politics, but it appears she didn’t close that door completely. In the lead up to the last Federal Election, Leach featured in online advertisements posted by the Liberal Party of Australia’s Instagram page, with a soft interview with prime ministerial aspirant Peter Dutton about his favourite music and election recaps.

A full-time gig at Sky might have suggested those ties would be cut. But Leach, with her show deemed too controversial for the News Corp-owned network, is scheduled to appear at a party fundraiser “Combatting Wokeness in Education” on October 12 in Dee Why in Sydney’s Northern Beaches.

In December last year she married NSW Young Liberals secretary Cooper Gannon, who is now the chapter’s president, making them a power couple amongst young, right-wing circles.

It was only last month that the Young Liberals of NSW had urged the party to shift away from Sky News’ echo chamber, arguing the “mirage of the Maga movement” had turned off women and multicultural voters in the election, according to The Guardian.

While immigration, anti-Welcome to Country messaging and trans issues have become key talking points for Leach online and on air, Israel is a central issue for her.

Similarly, the subject of Israel and Gaza have helped her father Mark Leach, a former Anglican minister at a Sydney Church, Darling Street, to build an online audience.

Like his daughter’s first run-in with Sky, Reverend Leach thrust himself into the headlines two years ago, showing up to a pro-Palestine march flying an Israeli flag on October 9, 2023, two days after Hamas’ murder of 736 Israelis in the largest single biggest killing of Jews since the Holocaust.

Despite a warning from police not to attend the march for his own safety, according to Leach, he did anyway, claiming he was chased through the streets by protesters.

The day after, he appeared on The Bolt Report to discuss his attendance and has been interviewed on the network several times since.

Son to a German-Jew mother who escaped the country and the Holocaust in 1938 and a Christian father who was a stolen emerald and diamond smuggler in Africa, Leach grew up in civil war-torn Rhodesia before moving to Australia.

On Tuesday last week, after this masthead reported Sky had moved to review and pre-record Leach’s show following Williams’ appearance, Leach senior said the guest owed “Freya and Sky an apology” for the stunt, designed to boost clicks from his own base.

Courting controversy

In mid-2024, he quit his job as a pastor to focus full time on his controversial advocacy group Never Again Is Now, a Christian-led group he founded with his daughter, Freya, advocating against anti-semitism and supporting the State of Israel. The pair travelled to New York last year to give a keynote speech, while the pastor has said the conflict in Gaza is an example of the “clash of civilisations”.

Never Again Is Now has held numerous events since October 7, platforming a series of far-right figures, including agitator and alt-right reporter Avi Yemini.

The left-leaning Jewish lobby group The Jewish Council of Australia denounced the “pro-Israel Christian fundamentalist” rallies, their platforming of speakers openly hostile to Islam and partnership with Yemini.

Another speaker is Stephen Chavura, history lecturer at Campion College in Parramatta, a liberal arts College with heavy-links to Sky News, News Corp and sections of the Liberal Party, including Tony Abbott and John Howard.

Chavura, a weekly guest on The Bolt Report on Monday nights, was a keynote speaker at one Never Again is Now event and regularly promotes the March for Australia, which have been attended by Australian Neo-Nazis.

Chavura has increasingly espoused far-right and Islamophobic language on his social media channels, including anti-immigration sentiment echoing the far-right, white nationalist Great Replacement Theory, a conspiracy theory that western elites and Jewish people are actively trying to replace people of European descent with those of African and Asian descent, which was responsible for the 2019 Christchurch massacre.

“Aussie values immigration = population replacement. Open your eyes,” Chavura posted on his Instagram on Friday, alongside an AI-generated image of a supposed Muslim immigrant named Mohammed Jihad.

Last week, Chavura stated on X that he does not care about Australian values, rather Anglo-Celtic and more broadly European values, is firmly against “global south immigration” and increasing white, Christian values in society.

There have been increasing examples of similar rhetoric aired on Sky, which has concurrently upped its campaign of support for the state of Israel in the past two years.

Pauline Hanson was recently hosted on the platform, railing against the “tentacles of Islam” while Andrew Bolt last year said the Albanese government is “replacing Australians with immigrants as well as tearing down our national symbols, our tradition”.

“This is not a conspiracy theory – ‘the great replacement’ – it’s fact,” Bolt said during a broadcast in October which received little to no media attention.

When Liz Storer was sacked by Sky earlier this year, making way for Leach to replace her on The Late Debate, Storer told fellow ex-Sky News host Chris Smith on his 2SM radio show she was sacked for not toeing the company editorial line on the conflict in Gaza.

“They are only going to pump out the same propaganda that Israel has done so relentlessly,′ Storer said. “When it comes to Israel, I wouldn’t get your news from Sky News Australia.

Leach’s co-host on The Late Debate, James Macpherson, who was until last year a senior pastor at Calvary Christian Church, a super church with campuses in Townsville, the Sunshine Coast & Cairns, and has worked as a journalist alongside Yemini at alt-right publication Rebel News.

Both Chavura and Macpherson have been members of Leach’s Darling Street Church in the past, according to Mark Leach.

In June this year, Leach posted a picture of Macpherson, his daughter and Chavura together on Sky with the caption “So good to see the old @darlingstreetchurch evening service crew on national tv!“. The trio were back together on air on Monday night, as guests on The Bolt Report, which Macpherson has been hosting for the past month, before Leach’s return to The Late Debate several hours later.

So those with this knowledge saw it as no surprise that Leach was Storer’s replacement alongside Macpherson on The Late Debate. Macpherson has also rallied against Islam and the recent Islamophobia envoy’s report into Islamophobia in Australia.

“Islam is not a person or a race or a culture; Islam is an idea […] Take away our right to be prejudiced against bad ideas and you don’t have tolerance; you have tyranny wrapped in diversity brochures,” he said on Bolt.

Anti-Islamic immigration is a touchpoint Leach herself does not shy away from.

“It’s not racist to say you’re proud of your Anglo heritage. It’s not xenophobic to say Australia can’t accommodate infinite migration. It’s not Islamophobic to say we don’t want Sharia Law. It’s just common sense,” Leach posted to her TikTok on August 12, the week of her first After Dark show with the caption “It’s time we defend Australia, our values and culture”.

Freya Fires Up is said to have incensed Sky’s daytime news team, which features anchors like Laura Jayes and Kieran Gilbert, who operate from the Federal Press Gallery and trade in the nation’s capital as a serious news outlet.

The question for Sky News, which is often criticised for its content, is why this is where they have decided to draw the line.

Whether this is a change in strategy for Sky, or a matter of face-saving, is still to be seen. But don’t expect Leach to back down.

Mark and Freya Leach, Espiner, Chavura and Sky News were all approached for comment.