A boy from the Somerset Levels, Matt shunned university for the glamour of a career as a reporter in his hometown on the Taunton Times, before moving to London 2004 to seek fame and fortune as a member of the sketch comedy group Big Day Out.
Instead the three members of Big Day Out got girlfriends and proper jobs: Matt broke into Westminster as a press gallery reporter for the Press Association, spending hours day and night watching the Commons chamber from a prime seat above the Speaker, reporting on everything that was said, and learning how politics really works. He has 100 words per minute shorthand. Or used to.
He later became London Editor of the Western Morning News in 2006, political correspondent of the Independent on Sunday in 2010, and the first political editor of MailOnline in 2012, before joining The Times in 2016. There he went from writing a daily political newsletter to presenting a daily political show on Times Radio.
He has interviewed the last eight people to be prime minister, either before, during or after their time in Number 10. He is yet to interview Elton John.
Since September 2024, Matt has presented the afternoon politics show on BBC Radio 5 Live from 2pm-4pm, live from Westminster. He also hosts Americanswers on the BBC podcast Americast.
A sell-out run at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2005 with Big Day Out led to a small 14-year break from comedy before his debut stand-up tour, This Is Not Normal in 2019, during which somebody called an election. His second tour, Who Is In Charge Here?, only had to deal with a war and the collapse of the government. He managed to get through his third tour, Poll Dancer, in 2024 just before someone else called an election. Making A Meal Of It is his fourth live show.
Matt lives in Hampshire with his wife and daughter. They have a golden retriever called Poppy which he got from a party conference. Sort of.