First Russell, then Wossy, now Jeremy Clarkson?

Thursday, 6 November 2008

Jeremy Clarkson will be following Russell Brand out of the BBC door or being suspended like Jonathan Ross if a Labour MP has his way.

Chris Mole MP was outraged when the popular Top Gear presenter made jokey remarks about prostitutes being killed by lorry drivers.

The Press Association report Mole as saying that the 48-year-old's comments on the BBC2 show "must be a dismissible offence".

Clarkson made the in-bad-taste comments as he completed a lorry-driving task on his award-winning motoring show.

He said: "This is a hard job and I'm not just saying that to win favour with lorry drivers - it's a hard job: Change gear, change gear, change gear, check mirror, murder a prostitute, change gear, change gear, murder. That's a lot of effort in a day."

But as MP for Ipswich - the constituency in which five vice girls were murdered by former lorry driver Steve Wright in 2006 - Mr Mole has reason to feel aggrieved.

The politician told PA that he had sent a "strongly worded" letter to BBC Director-General Mark Thompson.

He is said to have written: "The murders in my constituency in 2006 were horrific and the community has spent a lot of time pulling together to respond constructively to such dreadful events."

"For Mr Clarkson to make light of murder in any circumstance must be a dismissible offence.

"To do so with complete disregard for the families of the murdered women should make this a matter on which I would expect you to take immediate action."

The BBC has been in the spotlight in the past couple of weeks following a high profile breach of editorial policy that saw highly-paid presenters Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross make lewd prank calls to actor Andrew Sachs.

Brand resigned from his Radio 2 show the day after the BBC was flooded with over 30,000 complaints, whilst Jonathan Ross was suspended from all BBC work for 12 weeks without pay.

Read all about the Ross and Brand scandal here.

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