Ned has received negative criticism from Ruth Deller of television website Lowculture.co.uk. In a feature specially dedicated to Ned called "Clearing out the dead wood", Deller expressed her delight that the character was leaving "Neighbours". She went on to say "Whilst Dan O'Connor's acting has been somewhat short of stellar, he can't take the sole blame for Ned's failure at becoming a character viewers took to their hearts. The scriptwriters never seemed to know what to do with him". Deller added that Ned had been portrayed as being sometimes thick, sometimes kind and sometimes selfish. She said "The only time he almost became likeable was when his son Mickey arrived, but seeing as the kid was only tolerable in scenes with Lou and Harold, that didn’t really work, either. He did get his kit off quite a lot though, so every cloud and all that". She finished by saying that Ned was the least loved of the Parker brothers.