Leila McKinnon Biography
Leila McKinnon is an Australian television personality working as A Current Affair’s reporter and presenter on Nine News. She is also the editor of Australia’s Favourite Recipes, a cookbook that raises money for the Legacy charity. Previously, she was the co-host of Weekend Today. She also co-hosted the sixth season of Australian Ninja Warrior in 2022.
Leila McKinnon Age
McKinnon is 51 years old. She was born on September 28, 1972, in Tehran, Iran.
Leila McKinnon Height
She stands at a height of 5 feet 6 inches (1.68 m).
Leila McKinnon Nationality
She is Australian by nationality.
Leila McKinnon Education
McKinnon attended MacGregor State High School and Trinity College Australia. She then studied journalism at the Queensland University of Technology graduating in 1993 with a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism.
Leila McKinnon Parents
Leila was born in Iran to an English mother and a New Zealand father Dugald ‘Mac’ McKinnon. She grew up in Auckland and moved to Brisbane when she was 15. Her father worked as a service manager to the late Shah of Iran’s fleet of vehicles. After being in an induced coma for more than a month in 2017, her father died on September 17, 2017.
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Leila revealed to 9Honey that she had given her late father a fuss-free funeral. She wrote that she and her family spent approximately $3,000 on the no-frills ceremony by organizing it themselves.
She said, “There was no coffin, no hearse, and no funeral director. Which doesn’t sound much like a funeral, but it was perfect and very affordable.”
The Nine News reporter also found a service that respectfully transferred her father from the hospital to the crematorium and delivered his ashes.
Leila McKinnon Sibling
McKinnon has a brother. However, not much is known about him.
Leila McKinnon Husband
Leila is married to David Gyngell, an Australian businessman and the former Chief Executive Officer of Nine Entertainment Co. which owns a string of businesses including the Nine Network and Nine Radio.
Her husband David was born in 1966 and is the son of Australian television pioneer Bruce Gyngell. David was the CEO of the Nine Network before resigning in May 2005. After a period of declining ratings compared to Channel Seven, he returned to the job in September 2007, succeeding Eddie McGuire. In November 2013, he was appointed as the CEO of Nine Entertainment Co. He resigned as CEO in 2015 and was replaced by Hugh Marks.
David’s second cousin is Kym Gyngell.
The couple got married in 2004 and they share two children: son Edmund born in 2012, and daughter Gwendolen, born in 2014.
Leila McKinnon Nine News
McKinnon has reported for Network Nine’s A Current Affair and was co-host of the Today Show on Saturday and Sunday mornings. An accomplished journalist and presenter, she is intelligent and friendly – the perfect host for a corporate event or celebration.
Unafraid to tackle hardline issues, McKinnon has extensively reported on topics that include increasing gang problems, drug issues, and the controversial Gordon Wood trial. As a foreign correspondent for the Nine Network, based in Los Angeles, she was the first journalist to track down and confront the notorious doctor Jayant Patel, who was later extradited to Australia to face charges of negligence due to deaths in a McKay hospital. She also reported extensively from Guantanamo Bay on the David Hicks affair.
McKinnon’s career in the media began with the completion of her journalism degree in Queensland and her first role on television in Rockhampton in 1993 with WIN television. She moved to Cairns to work with the WIN network in 1995.
In early 1996 McKinnon moved to the Nine Network to report and present the weather for the newly created Nine Gold Coast News. She went on to report for A Current Affair and read the National Nine News with Karl Stefanovic in Brisbane before moving to Sydney in 2001 and returning to the news department.
Joining Today as a news presenter in 2005, she later returned to presenting the morning National Nine Morning News bulletin.
In 2007, McKinnon traveled extensively through the United States to report for the first two seasons of the hit prime-time show What’s Good For You. On her return to Australia, she was announced as co-host of Weekend Today, appearing on Australian screens on weekends between 2008 to 2014. She also co-hosted Nine’s award-winning coverage of the 2012 London Olympic Games and conducted the first live interview with Princes William and Harry.
She’s also an avid cook and edited the best-selling cookbook Australia’s Favourite Recipes (2012), which raises money for the Legacy charity.
Leila McKinnon Accident
In April 2022, Leila revealed she was rushed to hospital after suffering a horror accident while skiing. She shared details about the accident that caused her shattered knee on social media.
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Leila McKinnon Salary
She earns an average annual salary ranging from $150,000 – $475,500.
Leila McKinnon Net Worth
She has an estimated net worth of $4 million.
