PLATELL’S PEOPLE: Shame on the women who have turned on brave Fiona Bruce
Tuning in to the BBC to watch Question Time, I was not expecting its regular host Fiona Bruce to be presenting after the week she’s had. Yet there she was calm, cool and professional.
Hardened as I am to social media abuse, I couldn’t have hosted a TV show having been wrongly battered, bruised, named, shamed and derided as some kind of apologist for domestic abuse in the way she has been.
The storm had been whipped up after she was ruthlessly slammed by two of the country’s most influential women’s charities that campaign against violence to women and girls, Refuge and Women’s Aid.
On Question Time last week, a panellist said Stanley Johnson, Boris’s father, was a ‘wife beater’.
Fiona interrupted, explaining the panellist was referring to the fact Stanley Johnson’s ex-wife claimed he had once broken her nose.
Tuning in to the BBC to watch Question Time, I was not expecting its regular host Fiona Bruce to be presenting after the week she’s had. Yet there she was calm, cool and professional
‘Stanley Johnson has not commented publicly on that,’ she added. ‘Friends of his have said it did happen but it was a one-off.’
Fiona Bruce was doing what she should do on a BBC show — providing context and balance. And since she had been an ambassador for Refuge for 25 years, it is absurd to think she was in any way condoning violence against women.
Yet the boss of Refuge, Ruth Davison issued a statement accusing her of ‘minimising the seriousness of domestic abuse and this has been retraumatising for survivors’.
Farah Nazeer, chief executive of Women’s Aid piled in, saying Fiona’s response was both ‘unnecessary and irresponsible’, witheringly informing the world that domestic abuse is ‘rarely, if ever’ a one-off. There was me thinking the villains targeted by these charities were cruel men!
On Question Time last week, a panellist said Stanley Johnson, Boris’s father, was a ‘wife beater’
The boss of Refuge, Ruth Davison issued a statement accusing her of ‘minimising the seriousness of domestic abuse and this has been retraumatising for survivors’
Women attacking women is always an ugly sight. And by trying to cancel Fiona Bruce, who has tirelessly championed charities supporting abused women, Davison and Nazeer have revealed themselves to be the worst kind of feminists — self-appointed paragons, pompously parading their outrage in the gowns of the sisterhood while casually chucking one of their own under a bus.
Shame on them. And more power to Fiona’s elbow for apologising, resigning from Refuge, then carrying on with presenting this week’s programme — despite the appalling treatment she has suffered.
How very Charitable
Is it not stretching credibility that the gorgeous Charity Wakefield is to play Princess Beatrice
Is it not stretching credibility that the gorgeous Charity Wakefield is to play Princess Beatrice (who inherited mum Fergie’s looks) in the film about Andrew’s disastrous Emily Maitlis interview? I guess Rebel Wilson wasn’t available.
Eye on the Oscars
- It was unfair to criticise Hugh Grant for his uncomfortable interview with Ashley Graham, who is unknown to most of us. Perhaps Hugh was distracted by the plus-sized model’s sheer cape over a bra that barely covered her humongous breasts, and undies so big even Bridget Jones would balk at wearing them.
- The Oscars were in inclusivity overdrive awarding almost everything to the unwatchable (I tried!) woke-fest Everything, Everywhere, All Over The Place, or whatever it’s called. It’s a joke considering this movie took $108 million at the box office while Top Gun: Maverick made $1.5 billion.
- Normal People’s Daisy Edgar-Jones and Game Of Thrones star Sophie Turner, both famous for graphic sex scenes, turn up with barely a stitch on. As Cate Blanchett proves, all you have to expose is your talent.
Strictly’s Giovanni Pernice (hottest guy ever to grace their dancefloor) and Jowita Przystal have had their last horizontal tango. The couple have split, saying it was down to ‘hectic work schedules’. Oh, why not admit it: He’s just not that into you!
Stop the hunters
African nations accuse the UK of ‘colonialism’ after Britain’s ban on importing big game trophies like animal heads and hides to adorn the homes of rich hunters.
They claim allowing hunters to pay tens of thousands of pounds for the ‘sport’ of slaughtering giraffes, rhinos, lions and elephants is essential to fund conservation projects.
Surely there’s got to be a better way.
All pundits are equal, but some…
Gary Lineker posted a picture alongside the BBC’s George Orwell statue bearing the words of the writer: ‘If liberty means anything at all it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.’ After bringing BBC bosses to their knees, some might have chosen another Orwell quote: ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.’
The real star of the Lineker show was his dog Filbert, a handsome husky he rescued from the mean streets of California and flew to London, proving he really is kind at heart
- The real star of the Lineker show was his dog Filbert, a handsome husky he rescued from the mean streets of California and flew to London, proving he really is kind at heart. The thousands of abandoned dogs in the UK that he overlooked may disagree.
ITV This Morning legend Eamonn Holmes posts a picture of himself in physio sessions learning to walk again after back surgery. Having met him this week at the GB News studio, I’m delighted to say he retains that wonderfully warm and mischievous glint in his eyes.
Wishing you a speedy recovery, Eamonn.
As a lifelong Conservative and out of sheer despair, I’ve cancelled Westminster Wars this week. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s Budget inflicted the greatest tax burden on working people and businesses since 1945.
The Tory Party has cancelled itself.
The documentary on the life of Paula Yates, reminded me of how, years ago, I wrote about her death
The documentary on the life of Paula Yates, reminded me of how, years ago, I wrote about her death — only to receive a hand-written letter from ex-husband Bob Geldof asking me to correct the word ‘suicide’. He said it was important for their children to know hers was an accidental drugs death. All credit to caring Geldof, and for adopting Tiger Lily, Paula’s child with Michael Hutchence.
Lucy on a high note
In a sometimes bleak world, a moment of magic as blind and autistic 13-year-old Lucy Illingworth won Channel 4’s The Piano talent show. Despite struggling even to hold a conversation, she started playing aged two. Her teacher says he’s never met anyone with the same depth of understanding of music. A triumph not just for Lucy but all children with autism as she gives us a glimpse of their God-given gifts.
A sad end for beautiful trees
Devastating for people in Plymouth to discover one morning that council workers had moved in under the cover of darkness to fell 110 trees in their street. After a eucalyptus sapling in my back garden had grown over 20ft and its roots were cracking through the kitchen floor, we had to kill it. Bloody broke my heart. Only consolation is its trunk is now a sculpture, covered in fairy lights.
Mother’s Day tomorrow as a poll reveals four in ten of us say their mum is their best friend and they talk to them about eight times a week. I still talk to my mum every day, seeking her counsel. This year I’ve got her a bouquet and a card with one of her favourite sayings: ‘Hold a true friend with both your hands.’ Mum may have died four years ago, but I’m still holding her tight with both my hands.
Some are outraged that the former HQ of the Dambusters will be desecrated by turning it into a base for illegal migrants who, under new laws, will be briefly housed then sent back. Yet isn’t it a tribute to those brave pilots who fought and died protecting our borders from foreign invasion?
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