Let Gregg Wallace be a lesson to TV execs – no more free passes for entitled ‘Talent'

Scottish Sun

a day ago

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I'VE always had a problem with being called The Talent.
Sometimes it's said with a cheeky wink, other times muttered behind a clipboard.
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Gregg Wallace, who has been sacked from MasterChef following a probe into inappropriate behaviour
Credit: Getty
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Columnist Zara Janjua takes issue with being called 'The Talent'
Credit: The Sun
Either way, it sticks in your throat like overcooked linguine. It's the kind of label that reinforces a hierarchy where charm can curdle into entitlement, and where bad behaviour is whisked into the mix under the guise of personality.
Which brings us to Gregg Wallace – the former MasterChef presenter who has been sacked from the show following a nine-month investigation into allegations of inappropriate behaviour.
This week, he broke his silence with an Instagram statement declaring: 'I will not go quietly.'
Wallace has been cleared of the most serious allegations – many of which, he claims, were made by 'middle-class women of a certain age'.
But the report, commissioned by Banijay UK and led by law firm Lewis Silkin, found him guilty of 'inappropriate language' between 2005 and 2018.
It came just hours before 50 more people came forward to the BBC with further claims – ranging from verbal harassment to groping and dropping his trousers.
Wallace's response reads like it was prepped under pressure: part sympathy soufflé, part counterattack casserole.
He insists he was hired as the 'cheeky greengrocer' – a man of warmth, rough edges and ripe innuendo. And now? He's just a man whose flavour has apparently gone out of fashion.
I've worked with men like him. Men who test the temperature of a room by how far they can push a joke. Who repeat sexual remarks until they become part of the recipe.
I once walked into a room with two young work experience women and heard the male presenter say, 'Two out of the three of you would get it'.
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That's not banter, it's a power play – and it's exhausting.
Wallace insists he's a victim of a 'sanitised world'. But let's be clear: what's really boiling over here is not political correctness – it's accountability. Saying 'I was just being myself' isn't a defence when yourself makes others feel unsafe or objectified.
He also raises his recent autism diagnosis – a detail that deserves compassion but not carte blanche. Autism can explain difficulty with social cues, but it doesn't strip away basic respect.
Neurodivergence is not a free pass to harass. And using it that way risks further marginalising those who live with it daily without ever crossing lines.
Yes, it's deeply sad that Wallace has struggled with his mental health – he's said he contemplated suicide and was recently hospitalised. That matters.
WE'VE BEEN LOST IN TRNS-IT
ONCE upon a midge-bitten time, Scotland's musical mecca meant tents in a field of Buckfast, three-day hangovers, and waking up to someone urinating on your pop-up dome.
But since 2017, TRNSMT has rewritten the rulebook – no camping, no cows, and increasingly, no diversity of thought.
What began as the heir to T in the Park now resembles a Love Island reunion with better wristbands.
Axed from this year's line-up was controversial Irish rap trio Kneecap, above, after concerns were raised by police – and the First Minister.
John Swinney declared their appearance 'unacceptable', prompting the band to sell out Glasgow's O2 Academy instead.
From the stage, Mo Chara rallied the crowd: 'They stopped us playing TRNSMT, but they can't stop us playing Glasgow.'
If politics has no place in music, where exactly should it go?
Let's not forget: Glastonbury was founded to support nuclear disarmament. And T in the Park was all about diversity and discovery.
Yes, today's festivalgoers may be more Coachella-core than counterculture. Maybe the mainstream never had an appetite for the alternative.
But I suspect most TRNSMT punters this weekend will be more concerned with Factor 50 and 50 Cent than any existential crisis.
The loudest protest you're likely to hear is someone refusing to pay £10 for a toastie and £7 for a pint.
But what now? Well, Baroness Helena Kennedy – who chairs a watchdog on behaviour in the creative industries – has warned Wallace not to discredit women's testimonies.
She's right. For too long, TV has been a pressure cooker of silence, where junior staff are told to laugh along, to be good sports, to play the game.
We need safer routes to speak out, better training, clearer consequences – and fewer fawning apologies after the cameras stop rolling.
Because when you call someone The Talent, you elevate them above criticism. You wrap them in a mystique that allows misconduct to simmer unchecked. And then, when the heat finally rises, everyone acts surprised that it boiled over.
It's time we binned the label altogether. No more pedestals. No more passes.
And no more hierarchies. And let's stop ignoring the stuff that's festering at the back of the fridge, before it turns to rot.