Colleague

---

By Paul Glynn & Ian YoungsBBC News

An ITV executive has defended The Network 's duty of care to staff after the furore over Phillip Schofield 's affair with a much younger Colleague .

The This Morning host left ITV last month after admitting he lied to bosses and workmates about The Affair .

There have also been allegations of a wider " toxic" culture at the programme.

Magnus Brooke, ITV's director of strategy, policy and regulation, told MPs bullying was " unacceptable" and would be " dealt with appropriately".

" There's a very sophisticated and a significant system of safeguarding and duty of care at ITV with a very significant set of policies, " Mr Brooke told A House of Commons committee on Tuesday.

" We have a code of conduct, which sets out our expectations about how people behave, and that deals with A Number of different issues, from equal opportunities to respect to work, dignity and understanding.

" We then have an important set of requirements, which hold people to account internally. "

However, SNP MP John Nicolson told Mr Brooke he had spoken to whistleblowers at ITV, and that it " seems like a very unhappy place".

Mr Nicolson also referred to remarks about aubergines by This Morning editor Martin Frizell in response to A Question from Sky News about whether there was a " toxic" environment on The Show .

'Extremely ill-judged'

: " I'll tell you what's toxic and I've always found it toxic. Aubergine. Do you like aubergine? "

Mr Nicolson described those comments as " surreal and bizarre" adding: " I wouldn't like to be a young staffer going in talking to that editor about bullying given that that's The Way he treats the subject matter on camera in public. "

Referring to the aubergine remarks, Mr Brooke accepted it was " extremely ill-judged to say what he did".

" But I can reassure you on behalf of ITV that we do take all of these allegations very seriously, precisely because we do have a culture in which people's conduct matters enormously to us, " he added.

The broadcaster last week announced it had asked a barrister, Jane Mulcahy KC, into its handling of The Relationship between Schofield and his Colleague - who he met at the Age Of 15 and helped to get into the industry.

Mr Brooke suggested The Move demonstrated that The Network " takes these issues very seriously".

He Said he hoped the review " establishes the facts" and " gets to the bottom of what's happened".

He also told Parliament's culture, media and sport committee: " Bullying is absolutely a breach of our code of conduct is very clearly set out and we have a set of policies around bullying and harassment at work, and clearly it's unacceptable.

" If we find bullying, it's inconsistent with our policy, we'd expect people to report it and we'd expect it to be dealt with appropriately. "

, Schofield denied there was a toxic environment on This Morning , as well as claims that he had become too powerful or was unpleasant to work with. " I'm not rude on the studio floor, I don't bully people, " He Said .

That came after Dr Ranj Singh , who worked on This Morning for a decade, criticised the " toxic" culture at the programme.

He Said the issues " go far beyond" Schofield and that he took his concerns " directly to The Top of ITV" but found the subsequent process " pretty heart-breaking".

ITV has said that after Dr Ranj's complaint, an external review " found no evidence of bullying or discrimination".

Former This Morning co-host Eamonn Holmes has also accused Schofield of " toxicity".

The broadcaster's chief executive Dame Carolyn Mccall will discuss The Matter when she appears in front of the same committee next week.

Related Topics

Source of news: bbc.com