Rumour: TEN to revive Good Morning Australia?

The jungle tom-toms are beating on the future of Wake Up and making music that TEN may be mulling a return of Good Morning Australia, potentially fronted by Matt White and Kerri-Anne Kennerley.

White recently made the move from Seven to TEN for its upcoming V8s coverage, but CEO Hamish McLennan also confirmed “another show” in development would be announced closer to his July starting date.

Whispers are gathering that GMA could be produced from TEN’s Pyrmont studios, ending the expensive Manly-based location put in place by former producer Adam Boland.

Good Morning Australia aired as a breakfast show from 1981 – 1991 with KAK prior to her lengthy stint at Nine for Midday and Kerri-Anne. The GMA brand was successfully revived as a morning show for Bert Newton running from 1992 – 2005.

Since the arrival of Peter Meakin as Head of News and Current Affairs at TEN Wake Up has so far avoided any major changes to address its ailing ratings, which hover around the 30,000 mark without improvement. That’s despite on-the-record confirmation that news presenter Nuala Hafner would relocate from Melbourne to Sydney and a weather presenter would be introduced.

This week the show came under fire after a pensioner who questioned Tony Abbott was found to have Labor allegiances, which were not disclosed to the audience. Rather than finding ways to defend the show a network spokesperson admitted it got it wrong.

“Wake Up should have known and disclosed Vilma Ward’s links to the Labor Party,” they said.

But there is  also constant chatter in the industry about why TEN is persisting in breakfast television when it has more pressing concerns in primetime.

Yesterday TV Tonight asked TEN if it was committed to Wake Up in the long term.

A TEN spokesperson said, “All rumours. No changes planned.”

While rumours are commonplace in a gossip-heavy industry sometimes you also have to read between the lines.

Update: KAK denied she had signed on but told news.com.au said anything was on the cards.

“Thirty years of 5am starts, hmmm, let me think about that,” Kennerley said.

“Look it’s sort of back to the future.

“All I know is there are clearly a few issues.”