Gregg Wallace’s bid to redeem his reputation has gone up in flames after the internet united in unprecedented condemnation of the MasterChef presenter.
Revelations that the BBC received multiple complaints about him over a period of 12 years were dismissed as a handful of complaints from “middle-class women of a certain age” by Wallace which has to go down as one of the PR gaffes of the century.
Taking to social media, the long-running MasterChef presenter claimed he had worked with more than 4,000 contestants on the cookery programme since 2005, and said: “In 20 years, over 20 years of television, can you imagine how many women, female contestants on MasterChef, have made sexual remarks, or sexual innuendo? Can you imagine?”
Wallace, 60, alleged that “absolutely none” of the staff on his other shows had complained about him.
He said in an Instagram video: “Look, this is important to me. Twenty years of doing Celebrity MasterChef, amateur, professional, Eat Well for Less?, Inside the Factory. Do you know how many staff, all different sorts of staff, you imagine the people I’ve worked with. Do you know how many staff complained about me in that time? Absolutely none. Zero. Seriously.”
Wallace stepped back from his role on MasterChef last week while allegations of past misconduct – including three of inappropriate touching – are investigated.
The reaction to his latest comments on social media has been pretty fierce:
Related: WATCH: Sean Lock’s hilarious take on ‘national treasure’ Gregg Wallace resurfaces