Gregg Wallace says he did not say “anything sexual” while appearing on a BBC game show more than half a decade ago.
The 59-year-old MasterChef UK judge was responding to reports that there was an alleged incident in 2018 when he appeared on Impossible Celebrities, which was investigated by the BBC.
The Saturday night quiz show, hosted by Rick Edwards, ran for eight series between 2017 and 2021.
In an Instagram story following the front-page story on Monday, Wallace said: “The story that’s hitting the newspapers this morning was investigated promptly when it happened six years ago by the BBC.
“And the outcome of that was that I hadn’t said anything sexual. I’ll need to repeat this again. I didn’t say anything sexual.”
Wallace presented Inside The Factory for BBC Two from 2015 to 2023, when he stepped away and said he wanted to focus on taking care of his autistic and non-verbal son, Sid, who he shares with his wife, 39-year-old caterer Anne-Marie Sterpini.
Follow Sky News on WhatsApp
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
The couple married in 2016 in Haver Castle in Kent with MasterChef co-presenter John Torode as best man, after meeting three years earlier on Twitter when she asked him his opinion on pairing duck with rhubarb.
In a second short video, the former greengrocer said: “Despite what the newspapers are suggesting, nobody six years ago accused me of flirting with anybody or hitting on anybody.
Advertisement
“And the reason I say this is because of my wife Anna. I have always been true to my wife Anna and have never flirted or hit on anybody in the 12 years that I met her and fell in love with her.
“And it’s important that – so that people don’t misunderstand that – that I am true to my wife.”
A BBC spokesman said: “Whilst we do not comment on individuals, if issues are raised they are dealt with swiftly and appropriately at the time.
“We do not tolerate any form of inappropriate behaviour and have robust processes in place.”
Wallace, who has been married four times, has two children, Tom and Libby, from a former relationship.
In 2019, he co-wrote Gregg’s Italian Family Cookbook with his current wife Anna, who is a caterer.
Wallace has featured on various BBC shows over the years, including Saturday Kitchen, Eat Well For Less, Supermarket Secrets, Celebrity MasterChef and MasterChef: The Professionals, as well as being a Strictly Come Dancing contestant in 2014.
He was made an MBE for services to food and charity last year.
Sky News has contacted Wallace for further comment.
Kate Moss has made her Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show debut, following her daughter on the catwalk – as the US lingerie brand brought its famous show back after six years.
Some of the world’s most famous models and musicians took part in the fashion show in New York, including sisters Gigi and Bella Hadid, Tyra Banks, and Adriana Lima.
Valentina Sampaio and Alex Consani also made history as they became the first transgender models to walk the famous Victoria’s Secret runway.
The show, which launched in 1995, was watched by millions of viewers each year at its peak.
However, it was cancelled in 2019 after suffering its lowest ratings the previous year. It had also begun to attract criticism for lack of diversity.
Now, it is “celebrating all women” with its return, the brand said.
Moss, 50, made a surprise appearance during the event in New York – appearing on the runway wearing a pair of feathered angel wings, walking to I Love Rock’n’Roll, just moments after her 22-year-old daughter, Lila.
Bella Hadid, 28, emerged during a performance from Cher – who sang a medley of her 1998 tracks Believe and Strong Enough, leading the show’s first line-up of all female music performers, including K-pop star Lisa and South African singer Tyla.
Banks, the former America’s Next Top Model host, returned to the show for the first time in two decades.
Advertisement
The star, 50, broke her retirement to close the event, her first Victoria’s Secret runway since 2005.
Brazilian model Lima also made a comeback, having announced her retirement in 2018.
Cher’s boyfriend Alexander “AE” Edwards and US actor Dylan Sprouse were among the crowd, with Sprouse cheering on his model wife Barbara Palvin – showing family support with cardboard cut-outs of their pets.
Ozzy Osbourne’s former guitarist has been shot multiple times as he walked his dog in Las Vegas.
Jake E Lee, who helped write the 1983 album Bark At The Moon, is conscious and “is expected to fully recover”.
Tim Heyne, manager for Lee’s rock band Red Dragon Cartel, told The Associated Press: “By the grace of God, no major organs were hit, he’s fully responsive, and expected to make a full recovery.”
A spokesperson for the musician said: “As the incident is under police investigation, no further comments will be forthcoming.”
Las Vegas police said the shooting happened at around 2.40am on Tuesday – in a neighbourhood around 10 miles from the Strip.
No arrests have been made, and the police department said its investigation was ongoing.
Lee, 67, played guitar in several bands in the glam metal scene of Los Angeles’ Sunset Strip in the 1980s, including an early version of Ratt.
He played for Ozzy Osbourne’s band from 1982 to 1987 and was later involved with Badlands.
Actor Jeremy Strong has said Donald Trump calling those involved with his new film The Apprentice “human scum” is “all the more reason” cinemagoers should go and see it.
Ahead of the UK release of the biopic which depicts the presidential candidate’s rise as a New York property developer back in the 1970s, Strong told Sky News: “We all knew we were playing with fire getting involved with [this], but it also felt just supremely important and meaningful to try and understand and tell the story about how Donald Trump became who he is now.”
While Marvel actor Sebastian Stan plays Mr Trump, the Succession star plays notorious lawyer Roy Cohn, a mentor of sorts to Mr Trump, whom it’s claimed taught him power plays like denying everything and to “attack, attack, attack”.
“As a film I think it stands on its own but there are also things in it that I think a lot of the American public certainly don’t know about and, because of the stakes right now, it would behove everyone to become informed about where this is all coming from and how we got here,” Strong insisted.
Co-written by Vanity Fair journalist Gabriel Sherman who has penned biographies on both Mr Trump and Mr Cohn, not only does the film show the former president having cosmetic surgery and popping diet pills – most controversially it depicts him raping his first wife Ivana.
An incident based on an assault that was detailed in her divorce deposition – a claim she recanted years later.
Mr Trump has repeatedly denied the allegations.
After premiering at the Cannes Film Festival at the start of this year, lawyers for Mr Trump unsuccessfully filed a cease and desist notice to the team behind the film.
This week, in a 1am rant on his Truth Social app on Monday, Mr Trump called the film “FAKE and CLASSLESS”.
Referring to those involved as “human scum”, he hit out at the timing of the movie’s release, calling the film a “cheap, defamatory, and politically disgusting hatchet job” aimed at thwarting his re-election attempts.
“I feel very proud of being part of this film,” Strong said.
“It’s also unsettling to be kind of, you know, at the sharp end of the spear and intersecting with history and politics in this moment… for Trump to call us ‘human scum’ is a heavy thing but also, to me, the fact that he felt compelled to do that is just all the more reason why I think it’s essential for people to see it.”
Strong claims Mr Trump’s early morning post is exactly what his character Mr Cohn would advise, “always attack, deny everything and never admit defeat”.
Strong explained: “The veracity of the film, that he’s attacking us, once you start to see the playbook and you realise what these tactics are, you see that it permeates literally everything that [Mr Trump] does.”
The Apprentice is released in the UK & Ireland on 18 October.