ITV’s boss has responded to Eamonn Holmes’ complaints against the network, calling them “defamatory.”
Since Phillip Schofield resigned This Morning before confessing that he lied about having an affair with a younger runner on the show, Holmes has been one of the show’s harshest critics.
Despite ITV chief executive Dame Carolyn McCall explaining in a committee session that Schofield and the runner, referred to as ‘Person X,’ were questioned on several occasions about whether they were involved – which they both denied – Holmes recently claimed that Schofield was not questioned about the relationship by the broadcaster.
Holmes, who formerly worked on This Morning with his wife Ruth Langsford before going to GB News, gave a shocking interview regarding Schofield, accusing ITV of a “complete cover-up.”
During a Culture, Media, and Sport Committee hearing on Wednesday, June 14, an ITV executive present, including chief executive Dame Carolyn McCall and managing director of media and entertainment Kevin Lygo, was asked about a tweet written by Holmes.
‘Did that come as a major surprise to you, because it came as a huge surprise to me, the vituperative eruption that happened as a result of these disclosures?’ the query continued.
‘For instance, Eamonn Holmes said in a tweet that Schofield “has finally been caught out, but he’s not the only guilty party.
“Four high members of ITV management knew the sort of man he was, and never once took action to prevent him controlling or taking advantage of young people.” That’s an extraordinary tweet to come out with and I would imagine extremely damaging. You must have been surprised to receive that.’
Dame Carolyn clarified: ‘We didn’t receive it, it was on Twitter. Don’t look at Twitter.’
She then continued: ‘I think it’s probably… it’s actually defamatory, never mind anything else. But of course we wouldn’t say that, because it would just inflame the situation.’
The CEO then turned to face Lygo, who proceeded.
‘It’s worth an observation here that there’s been a very vocal criticism and mention of all this toxic culture and everything like this, and it’s quite a few people who have got a platform now,’ he began.
‘It just occurred to me the other day actually, that a lot of these people, there aren’t a lot of them, but the few that there are, they worked as presenters on ITV for a very long time some of them, over 10 years. There was never any complaint from them whilst they were there. If they wanted anything it was more work please, we love it here, can we do more.
‘And then where I have some sympathy for them is… presenters of programmes often have a slight feeling of divine right to stay there forever. And obviously ITV is a company of producers of programmes maybe have a different agenda and want to change and refresh, want to bring on new people and so forth.’
Lygo explained that he had ‘sympathy’ when ITV have ‘difficult conversations’ with presenters to outline that while they’re ‘really good’, they’d like for them to ‘do less’.
‘Because this is their life, they love it, they never complain, they thoroughly enjoy it. And their reaction is always one of disappointment,’ he shared, outlining why he usually never just ‘cuts’ talent, but reduces their workload if they want to make changes.
‘They have been generally speaking loyal servants to ITV. But it’s not surprising is it that when they go, they’re suddenly I hate ITV, it’s awful. When for a decade they were there, reaping the rewards and enjoying the job and everybody seemed to get on,’ he stated.
Source My Celebrity Life.
