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21st September 2023
09:29am BST
Andrew Neil has unleashed a scathing attack on British culture, comparing the rise of Russell Brand to that of disgraced sex offender Jimmy Saville.
The former BBC and GB News broadcaster lamented how the UK "elevated people of no talent, people of no redeeming value whatsoever, to the status of national icons."
Neil appeared on Piers Morgan: Uncensored on Tuesday where he offered his opinion on the investigation into Brand, which revealed multiple allegations of sexual assault against the comic. The 48-year-old denies all criminal allegations.
The 74-year-old said Saville, the beloved TV star who - it later emerged - left upwards of 400 victims in his wake, was a "classic example" of a star with no talent rising to the top: "A man of no talent who had a hotline to Margaret Thatcher and the Royal Family and in a different way – I’m not comparing the two in terms of what they did – in a different way we elevated Russell Brand to be this man that seems to have the pulse of young people in British society, whose every word we should hang on, and was worthy of interviews on BBC’s Newsnight or Guardian conferences…"
He continued: "It’s just nonsense, and this power of celebrity which seems to have the ability to make sensible people stupid, this is another classic example of it and it is corrosive to our culture."
Neil also criticised the "hypocrisy" of people "rushing to dissociate themselves" with Brand and questioned why they were "ever associated with him in the first place". He went on to list a large number of media outlets and networks Brand had been interviewed on or, in some cases, worked on. The BBC and Channel 4 are wiping programmes that feature Brand from their platforms. YouTube has suspended ads on his content and his comedy tour has been postponed.
Neil described Brand as "neither funny but consistently vulgar, rude and unwatchable," and asked why "the BBC, Channel 4, The Guardian, The News State, the Labour Party, ever want to be associated with essentially this sleazebag in the first place?"
Brand was the subject of a joint investigation by The Sunday Times and Channel 4 Dispatches over the weekend and was accused by four women of sexual assaults between 2006 and 2013, one of whom was 16 at the time. Met Police have urged any alleged victims to contact them and have said it is investigating another allegation from 2003. The report has since led to further alleged victims coming forward.
Neil was also asked his thoughts on trial by media, as Brand has not been charged with anything. He dismissed this, saying the media is doing what it is supposed to.
Referring to the Harvey Weinstein allegations, Neil said: "Women speaking to journalists first is an interim stage before seeking wider proceedings and facilitating their ability to do so. And I think that’s another plus to it." The New York Times initially broke the allegations in October 2017, before the Hollywood mogul turned him in to police in May the following year as the case against him gathers momentum.
Neil continued: "It isn’t trial by media. The newspaper and TV station have done their job. Now if there’s going to be a trial it’s a job for the police … the job for the newspaper is to expose and reveal, that’s what they’ve done."
Earlier in the interview, Piers spoke about a 2006 interview where he had jokingly asked Brand about being a "sexual predator." At the time, Brand is said to have been in a relationship with a 16-year-old schoolgirl.
In the documentary, one of Brand’s accusers alleged he raped her against a wall in his LA home and that she sought treatment at a rape crisis centre the same day. Another alleged he assaulted her when she was aged 16 during an emotionally abusive and controlling relationship. A third claims Brand sexually assaulted her in Los Angeles and later threatened to take legal action if she spoke about the allegation to anyone else. And a fourth described being sexually assaulted by Brand and also claimed he was both physically and emotionally abusive towards her.
In a statement on Friday ahead of the report, Brand said the allegations against him “pertain to the time when I was working in the mainstream, when I was in the newspapers all the time, when I was in the movies, and as I have written about extensively in my books, I was very, very promiscuous.”
He continued: “Now during that time of promiscuity the relationships I had were absolutely, always consensual. I was always transparent about that then, almost too transparent, and I am being transparent about it now as well.
“To see that transparency metastasised into something criminal, that I absolutely deny, makes me question – is there another agenda at play?”
Brand has claimed that there is witnesses whose evidence “directly contradicts the narrative that these two mainstream media outlets are trying to construct.”
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