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The BBC is facing a fresh crisis over whether or not to show this year’s series of MasterChef, in which the sacked presenter Gregg Wallace features prominently.
The Guardian understands this year’s series, which was recorded in 2024, has been completed and delivered to the broadcaster by the production company Banijay. Wallace appears as a judge right up until the series finale.
It was only at that point in production that Wallace stood aside, after BBC News said it had heard from 13 people alleging he had behaved inappropriately at work, including by making inappropriate sexual comments, on occasions over a 17-year period.
Details of a report into his behaviour, commissioned by Banijay and overseen by the law firm Lewis Silkin, are expected to be published imminently.
Meanwhile, BBC News says it has been approached by more than 50 further people with fresh claims about the presenter. They include allegations, denied by Wallace, of groping one co-worker and having pulled his trousers down in front of another.
It now falls to Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, to make a decision over the series’ fate. Wallace’s presence throughout is understood to be significant enough that editing him out is not a realistic option.
However, shelving the series entirely could be seen as disregarding the huge amount of work involved in putting the show together, on the part of the production team and the contestants. In the case of the latter, exposure on MasterChef has frequently lead to life-changing opportunities.
Last year’s series of MasterChef had already been shown in its entirety on BBC One by this point in the summer. Its first episode aired in April 2024, with the final broadcast in May.
This was followed by new runs of Celebrity MasterChef and MasterChef: The Professionals, both of which also featured Wallace in a prominent role. In December, Grace Dent was announced as Wallace’s replacement for the next celebrity series.
Davie’s dilemma comes hot on the heels of controversies around the BBC’s Glastonbury festival coverage and its decision not to show a documentary about medics in Gaza. His stewardship of the BBC began in 2020, and his allies now fear it could be at risk.
Last month, the BBC failed to end a Glastonbury livestream that showed the duo Bob Vylan leading the crowd in chants of “death, death to the IDF”, referring to the Israel Defense Forces.
Afterwards, Davie, who was at the festival on the evening of the performance, was given the full backing of the BBC board and its chair, Samir Shah.
At the same time, the BBC was already facing criticism for not broadcasting the documentary Gaza: Doctors Under Attack, citing concern that it could create a “perception of partiality”.
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Davie is also waiting on the outcome of an internal inquiry into the making of an earlier documentary, Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, which was pulled from the BBC iPlayer in February after its child narrator was revealed to be the son of a Hamas official.
Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, has questioned why no one at the BBC has lost their job over the documentary and accused the corporation of failing to give clear explanations over recent issues.
On Wednesday morning, Philippa Childs, the head of Bectu, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme she was not surprised by the further allegations about Wallace and said the broadcasting union had also received complaints about his conduct.
“Lots of these people are young female freelancers, and there is a real fear,” Childs said. “I can’t overstate the fear freelancers feel about coming forward in such cases. Because, first of all, they think … someone like Gregg Wallace is extremely powerful, and therefore who’s going to listen to them?”
Among the new allegations revealed by BBC News was a claim that Wallace took his trousers down in front of a woman in a dressing room. The woman, who worked on MasterChef between 2011 and 2013, described the alleged incident as “disgusting and predatory”. At the time, MasterChef was made by Shine, a company now owned by Banijay.
A BBC spokesperson said: “Banijay UK instructed the law firm Lewis Silkin to run an investigation into allegations against Gregg Wallace. We are not going to comment until the investigation is complete and the findings are published.”
Banijay also said it would not comment on the report until it was officially published.
