John MacKenzie Nicolson (born 23 June 1961) is a Scottish journalist, broadcaster and Scottish National Party (SNP) politician.
Since the 2019 general election he has been the SNP Member of Parliament (MP) for Ochil and South Perthshire. He was previously the MP for East Dunbartonshire, having been elected at the 2015 general election, and defeated at the 2017 general election.
He is the SNP Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, a member of the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee, Chair on the All Party Parliamentary Group for Democracy & the Constitution and Deputy Chair of the APPG on Global LGBT+ Rights.
Early life
John Nicolson was born in Glasgow, the son of John Donald Nicolson and Marion Nicolson. His ancestry is Hebridean and Orcadian on his father's side. His mother came from Scotstoun in Glasgow. His father died of lung cancer when he was at school. He won a bursary to Hutchesons' Grammar School. Nicolson is the first generation of his family to go to university. He graduated from the University of Glasgow with a MA (Hons.) in English literature and Politics. He was awarded a Kennedy Scholarship for postgraduate study in the United States, and was Harkness Fellow in American Government at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard. He was a member of Adams House at Harvard.
As a student, he won the Scottish, British Isles Observer Mace (now the John Smith Memorial Mace), and World Universities Debating Championship in the same year, winning the World Championship with his debate partner Frank McKirgan at Princeton University, New Jersey. He returned to the Glasgow University Union in 2012 to debate against other former World Universities' Championship winners on a motion welcoming Scottish independence.
After Harvard, he worked as a speechwriter on Capitol Hill for Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (Democrat, New York) specialising in Israel-Palestinian issues, the Irish peace process, and gun control.
Broadcasting career
BBC
While a student, John Nicolson appeared on BBC Scotland's Mr Speaker Sir – a series pitting undergraduate debaters against prominent politicians and public figures. He went on to replace Magnus Magnusson as presenter of the show.
He returned from Washington D.C. to work full-time for the BBC when offered a job presenting the network 'DEF 2' youth strand discussion programme Open to Question.
After three series he moved to London as one of the launch reporters for the BBC's flagship Sunday politics programme On the Record. He made the documentary 'A Question of Consent' for the BBC's Public Eye. The documentary examined the discriminatory laws targeting gay men in the UK, and asked why the Conservative Party continued to support them.
He went on to work as a reporter for a range of high-profile BBC news and current affairs shows including Panorama, Assignment, and Newsnight.
He also presented Watchdog Healthcheck on BBC1, appeared as a panellist on Radio 4's comedy show The News Quiz, and was a guest reporter on both the BBC's arts magazine The Late Show and its travel show Holiday. He was a correspondent on numerous live General Election, European Election, and Budget programmes.
He was the BBC presenter on 11 September 2001 when the Twin Towers in New York were attacked, anchoring and providing live commentary on BBC News 24 and BBC One – a broadcast which won the BBC a Foreign Press Association award for best live breaking news coverage. Of the broadcast, Nicolson has said, "My time on air seemed dream like, with hours passing in an instant, and yet individual moments seeming to linger endlessly."
ITV
After more than fifteen years at the BBC, Nicolson moved to ITV as a presenter, anchoring both ITV 1 news bulletins, and the ITV News Channel show Live with John Nicolson, a three-hour morning news magazine.
He has said in later years that he preferred the interview environment at ITV. In stark contrast to the BBC, his ITV bosses were happy to go over time if the party’s press office was unhappy with his probing questions to a politician.
Other media work
John Nicolson has written for a wide range of newspapers and magazines including The Times, The Herald, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Sunday Times, The Sunday Telegraph, The Guardian, New Statesman, The Daily Record, and the Harvard International Review. He appeared as himself in The Trial of Tony Blair for Channel 4.