Marriage speculation linked to Richard Wilkins’ split from Nicola Dale

Richard Wilkins has split from his partner of four years, Nicola Dale, with one friend insisting the relationship started cooling the day online media outlets began speculating about their marriage.

Richard Wilkins is single again after splitting from his partner of four years, Nicola Dale.

Wilkins and Dale, who were last spotted together at Derby Day celebrations in Melbourne in early November, are said to have ended their relationship shortly afterwards, pre-empting the busy Christmas party season during which Wilkins traditionally plays host to private parties at his North Shore home.

The relationship between Channel 9’s longstanding entertainment reporter and the former Qantas flight attendant had, say friends, been cooling for months before the separation.

One friend this week insisted it started cooling the same day online media outlets began speculating about possible marriage last March.

Wilkins’s commitment to his growing family, which includes five adult children and two grandchildren, aged five and three (the children of his eldest daughter Bec, 40), remain his No.1 priority along with his high-profile career.

Richard Wilkins and Nicola Dale. Picture: Monique Harmer

The relationship with Dale, who looked to outsiders like the perfect vivacious companion, came a distant third.

The veteran TV and Smooth radio presenter added to his workload in December when he accepted the role as master of ceremonies at Barry Humphries’ state memorial service at the request of the comedian’s widow, Lizzie Spender.

It was a role he plainly relished and, despite some controversy, executed with aplomb.

While Wilkins could not be contacted for comment this week, friends maintain the couple remain on good terms, with no third-party contributing to the split.

Richard Wilkins and his children Rebecca, Estella and Christian at the 2022 Oaks Day at Flemington Racecourse. Picture: Getty Images

Having forked out a small fortune to three ex-wives following the end of those failed unions, an older and wiser Wilkins is, it’s claimed, reluctant to marry for a fourth time and risk any further erosion of his personal wealth.

As a result, he and Dale, a divorced mother of two, never cohabited during their relationship.

In recent years, the 69-year-old has been selling down his property portfolio — he sold two apartments in Mosman for $1.01m and $925,000 in 2022 — to consolidate his investments. Dale has always maintained her own home on Sydney’s Northern Beaches some distance from Wilkins’s resort-styled Cremorne home, which he acquired in 2004, about eight years after the end of his third and last marriage.

That was to Michelle Burke, the mother of his son Christian, and also previously a flight attendant.

Mutual friend and 2GB radio commentator Ben Fordham is rumoured to have played a key role in introducing Wilkins and Dale, who met at a party in 2020 where Fordham was Wilkins’s wingman.

Christian Wilkins, Gabriella Power, Nicola Dale and Richard Wilkins at the Aria Awards.

Fordham happens to have given Dale’s attractive daughter Gabriella Power her media start in 2015, when he employed the straight-out-of-university communications grad to a junior production role on his 2GB drive radio show.

Power subsequently spent two years at 2GB before moving to Fox Sports and then to Sky News, where she now presents a digital news show.

The relationship with Wilkins apparently hasn’t hurt Dale’s profile.

A year into her relationship with Wilkins, she quit her international flight attendant role and moved into real estate in Palm Beach, where she maintains and runs an Airbnb property.

She also describes herself as a “aviation in-flight spokesperson for Channel 9’s Today” on her social media, and in April last year launched a podcast.

Got a news tip? Email [e-mail]