Growing up in Dubbo, James Glenday always knew he wanted to travel and see the world. He had a couple of possible careers in mind. One of those was working in intelligence or foreign affairs.
“But I’m no good at keeping secrets!” he tells TV WEEK with a laugh.
Fortunately, the other career James was considering would allow him to share stories with people every day.
“I’d watched the ABC and listened to the ABC and I thought, ‘Oh, I’d like to work for the ABC overseas,’” he says. “And I was lucky enough to end up in London and then Washington DC with the ABC for five years.”
Now the father-of-two is based in Melbourne, where he co-hosts News Breakfast on weekdays.
“It’s such a good job,” says James, 40. “I think it’s probably the best job in the ABC. I love it because you just meet so many different people.”
James’ first job in journalism was not with the ABC but with WIN TV in Canberra. It was there that he first set eyes on another journalist called Lisa.
“I saw her and I was like, ‘Oh, she’s lovely,’” he remembers. “Pretty quickly I knew that she was special and I thought that I would maybe like to marry her! And, a couple of years later, we were married.”
He says Lisa has been very supportive of his career and has moved with him “many, many times”, including a move to London in 2015 when their first daughter was just seven weeks old – and then a move from London to the US in 2018 when their second daughter was seven weeks old!
“I wouldn’t recommend this,” he says, “but it’s how it worked out.”
Between moves, James also left Lisa in London for four weeks while he was covering the FIFA World Cup in Russia.
“It was a record-breaking heatwave in London and she was heavily pregnant and on her own and looking after another child,” he remembers. “So, yes, she has been very, very supportive of my career, and I couldn’t do it without her.”
While based in London, James reported on some terrible events, including the 2017 Grenfell Tower fire and a series of terrorist attacks. One of those was the attack in Nice where a man drove a truck into a crowd, killing 86 people.
“That was particularly horrific,” he says. “I remember sitting in a café in central London and having breakfast and not being able to sit there because we were so close to the road and just being irrationally worried about people driving into us.
“It definitely has an effect on you, even if you don’t think so at the time.”
He also remembers chasing an interview with British politician Boris Johnson before the Brexit referendum and being told that, if he stood in a certain spot at a certain time, Boris would appear.
“So we were standing there when a guy with a helmet, looking a little bit dishevelled, came riding towards us on what was known as a ‘Boris bike’, a hire bike,” James says. “He rode up very theatrically, took his helmet off and said, ‘Hello, hello, Australian TV! Jolly good to see you here.’ And then he gave us quite an entertaining interview.
“Then, as soon as he finished, he was like, ‘Okay, you’ve stopped filming?’ and he became very businesslike.”
In 2020 James and Lisa left Washington and returned home, for the sake of their two daughters.
“It was just to bring them back to Australia and to have a more relaxed life,” James says. “They were starting school as well, and I wanted them to be here for that.”
Since taking on the role of News Breakfast co-host last year alongside Bridget Brennan, replacing Michael Rowland and Lisa Millar, James has had an “aspirational bedtime” of 8pm and an alarm set for 3.20am. After he leaves work, mid-morning, he likes to “blow the cobwebs out” with some exercise.
“I swim a lot in the bay here in Port Phillip,” he says. “The colder, the better. Even if it’s only for five minutes, I find that shock of the cold water resets everything. People look at you as if you’re slightly mad!
“I find it just helps. Then I’m refreshed for the school pick-up and whatever family dramas or work things have come up during the day.”
Having spent years covering major world events, James says what he loves about News Breakfast is the mix of stories – everything from coverage of the war in the Middle East, to a chat on the couch with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, to interviews with movie stars.
“We’re offering that light and shade, which I think everyone needs in the world at the moment,” he says. “They want to know the news, but they want something that brings a smile to their face. So that’s why I like what we do.”
James also loves that News Breakfast has been on the road so much this year, with more trips planned for the coming months. They’ve done broadcasts from the Gold Coast, Ballarat, Perth… and even James’ hometown of Dubbo.
“It was so great, walking around seeing all these people who I hadn’t seen for a really long period of time,” he says.
“And, since we went there, I’ve just been inundated with people who I grew up with or knew emailing and getting in touch. So that’s been really, really lovely.”
James says Dubbo was an “amazing” place to grow up, and he loves the idea of living in regional Australia again at some point.
“But I don’t know,” he adds. “I’ve been the one who’s pulled the family around up until now. I think the kids or my wife will be choosing where we go next!”
Catch News Breakfast at 6am weekdays on the ABC or ABC iview.
