Henry was born in Auckland, New Zealand. His parents separated when he was 11, and in 1971 he moved with his English-born mother to Bristol, United Kingdom, where he finished his education and won a drama school scholarship.Paul and his mother Olive lived in a council flat. Olive worked triple shifts in a plastic bag factory to make ends meet. Henry says that when he was 25 he discovered that he is a "Gypsy".

Paul Henry started his broadcasting career working for the BBC, in which he worked with Sir David Attenborough on the World Around Us series. Returning to New Zealand, he worked as a producer on National Radio.

Radio

Henry worked as a breakfast host on 2ZD Radio Wairarapa with a fictitious chook called "Gungadin".

Henry left 2ZD to set up his own radio station. He launched TODAY FM 89.3 in 1991, and worked as the breakfast host along with local identity Rick Long, and former 2ZD station manager John (Johnnie) Shearer. Notable employees of TODAY FM included Hilary Pankurst (now Barry), current co-host of 3 News, and Georgina Beyer, who would later become the world's first openly transsexual mayor and MP. The radio station had a unique local format including morning talkback. Henry hosted the breakfast show with his former manager, John Shearer. The breakfast show gave Henry free licence to shamelessly promote his radio station. His co-host Shearer was often at the receiving end of Henry's jokes. Henry would famously say he doesn't want to hurt his feelings and every morning when Shearer signed off, Henry would warn listeners to "take care on the roads now John Shearer's on the roads". At one time the station even flew a helicopter through the breakfast show with Shearer reporting from the air.

Henry hosted six breakfast shows per week and often worked late at night and right across the weekend at the station, with outside live broadcasts. In 1992, Henry sold the station, which later became HITZ 89FM and now exists as More FM 89.3, 105.5 Wairarapa. For a time there were three radio stations in Wairarapa, TODAY FM, Radio Wairarapa and Radio Pacific. Henry had hosted or co-hosted a breakfast show on each of the stations.

Henry went on to be a foreign correspondent for Radio Pacific and weekend talkback host.Paul Henry presented Radio Pacific's Breakfast - "The Morning Grill" with Arch Tambakis, then Pam Corkery in the mid 1990s.

Later he was the drive host on Radio Pacific, then later Radio Live.

TVNZ

Henry co-hosted TVNZ's Breakfast between 2004 and 2010. In 2009, ratings for the show had improved to around 150,000 viewers from a base of around 100,000.

Paul won the People's Choice Award, Best Presenter at the 2010 Qantas NZ Film and Television Awards.His outrageous acceptance speech has attracted more than 100,000 views on YouTube in one day alone.

On 10 October 2010, following Henry's controversial comments about the New Zealand Governor General, Sir Anand Satyanand, and the Delhi chief minister, Sheila Dikshit, TVNZ announced that Henry had resigned.

Henry ran as the National Party candidate for the Wairarapa electorate in the 1999 general election. He lost to former radio colleague and New Zealand Labour Party candidate Georgina Beyer by a majority of 3,033 votes.

Female facial hair

In March 2009, Henry caused offence by pointing out the facial hair of female guest anti-nuclear campaigner and Greenpeace worker Stephanie Mills. TVNZ stated that it had received a "handful" of complaints. Henry stated to the Sunday Star Times: “I certainly have no intention of apologising to people who have written in and complained. The key thing to me is what a fortunate life they must have that they can afford time and energy to complain about such an insignificant thing.”

Gays

In August 2009, Henry referred to homosexuals as “unnatural”, prompting a complaint to the Broadcasting Standards Authority, which regulates broadcast radio and television content within New Zealand. In February 2010, the Broadcasting Standards Authority declined to uphold the complaint.

Susan Boyle

In November 2009, Henry sparked controversy over comments he made about singer Susan Boyle and his on-air use of the term 'retarded' to describe her. His comments led to almost two hundred complaints to the Broadcasting Standards Authority and an apology from Television New Zealand.

Governor-General of New Zealand Sir Anand Satyanand

In October 2010, Henry was again the subject of complaints, after questioning whether the Governor-General, Sir Anand Satyanand, was "even a New Zealander". He went on to ask "Are you going to choose a New Zealander who looks and sounds like a New Zealander this time ... are we going to go for someone who is more like a New Zealander this time?" Sir Anand, who is of Indian descent, was born and raised in Auckland. Henry attracted criticism from public figures including Prime Minister John Key, whom Henry was interviewing when he made the remarks, Labour's leader Phil Goff and New Zealand's race relations commissioner Joris de Bres. Henry later issued a statement of apology for his comments. After initially expressing its support for Henry, TVNZ announced the following day that it had suspended the presenter for two weeks without pay.

Sheila Dikshit

Following the decision to suspend Henry, it also emerged that TVNZ had continued to promote a recent clip in which Henry referred to New Delhi's chief minister Sheila Dikshit as "the dip shit woman" and "Dick Shit", going on to state that "it's so appropriate, because she's Indian, so she'd be dick-in-shit wouldn't she, do you know what I mean? Walking along the street... it's just so funny." New Zealand Indian Central Association president Paul Singh Bains said the fact that TVNZ was still promoting the clip on its website showed it had "totally lost the plot" and was insensitive to the offence Henry had caused.Following at least four complaints against this video, TVNZ channel removed it from the 'Video extras" section of their website.

India summoned New Zealand's high commissioner Rupert Holborow to protest Henry's "racist and bigoted" comments, and Holborow expressed his regret for the deep hurt they had caused.

In the wake of the controversies, TVNZ announced on 10 October that Henry had resigned from the broadcaster, effective immediately.