Phillip Schofield: ITV boss responds to accusation that ‘everyone knew’ about This Morning affair

Virgin Radio

14 Jun 2023, 11:53

The boss of ITV, Dame Carolyn McCall, has slammed the accusation that more people at This Morning knew about the affair between Phillip Schofield and a young co-worker. 

Following his shock departure from the ITV daytime series, Phillip then announced he would be leaving all of ITV after confessing to a relationship with a member of the This Morning team. At the time, he was still married to wife of 30 years, Stephanie Lowe.

In his lengthy statement and subsequent interviews, Phillip admitted to the affair, and claimed he had lied not just to This Morning staff, including Holly Willoughby, but also to ITV about the nature of his relationship with the colleague. 

On Wednesday (14th June), ITV representatives sat down with the Culture, Media and Sports Committee to discuss the situation involving Phillip and the runner, referred to as Person X. 

Committee Chair Dame Caroline Dinenage addressed the panel, and suggested there had been a “common theme” in other members of the showbiz world, including James Haskell and Piers Morgan, knowing about the relationship. 

Dame Caroline said: “Do you class yourself in the category of the vast majority of people who seemed to know what was going on?,” adding that it seemed “everyone else knew” except for her and co-host Willoughby. 

Wanting to clear up “speculation, rumours and misinformation,” Dame Carolyn explained: “The people that have said they knew would only have heard rumours. If any one of the individuals you referenced had come to us and said there is evidence of a relationship, with evidence, we would’ve been able to launch a formal investigation, because the imbalance of power and dynamics makes it deeply inappropriate.”

According to the ITV boss, both Phillip and Person X “repeatedly denied” anything inappropriate was going on behind the scenes, and there was never evidence from the production team to suggest otherwise. 

Speaking about what ITV needs to do moving forward, Dame Caroline finished the questioning with: “We want to be confident that ITV is not letting star power and favouritism damage the lives and careers of people working there, and more importantly we want to be confident that where mistakes have been made ITV will be making changes rather than making jokes about aubergines."

Dame Carolyn concluded by saying that ITV were taking the accusations of their working culture very seriously, but it would be “very wrong to depict the broadcast as having an issue on this.”