JEREMY Clarkson has been suspended by the BBC after a “fracas†with a producer, and it’s not quite the first time the Top Gear presenter has rubbed someone up the wrong way.
The 54-year-old has a reputation for offensive behaviour and insulting remarks, which has landed him in hot water with everyone from the Indian High Commission to Falklands War veterans.
The BBC said Clarkson had been suspended “pending an investigation†and has pulled the show from its schedules. Local reports say Clarkson allegedly threw a punch at the show’s assistant producer Oisin Tymon when he discovered there was no food prepared for a day of filming at a location in Newcastle.
The veteran presenter admitted in May that he was on his “final warning†after claims he used a racist word while filming.
Clarkson’s devoted viewers are in uproar, with no sign of when the popular motoring show will return. Footballer Gary Lineker, who was due to appear to the episode, tweeted: “I don’t think I’m ever meant to appear on Top Gear!â€
But Clarkson’s boorish behaviour has never put off a legion of fans in the UK and Australia, who adore his cantankerous, un-PC persona.
Has Clarkson finally gone too far? Here are the highlights from his charge sheet:
OCTOBER 1998: In an early Top Gear episode featuring South Korean-based Hyundai, Clarkson talks about eating dogs and says one of their designers had “probably eaten a spaniel for lunchâ€.
DECEMBER 2005: The father-of-three gives a Nazi salute during a segment about German company BMW and claims its sat-nav system “only goes to Polandâ€, in reference to the invasion that started World War II.
APRIL 2007: Clarkson calls Malaysian car Perodua Kelisa the worst in the world, attacking one with a sledgehammer and blowing it up, before likening its name to that of a disease and suggesting it had been built by “jungle people who wear leaves as shoes.â€
NOVEMBER 2008: The BBC star compares the difficulty of changing gear in a lorry to the challenges facing “Suffolk Strangler†Stephen Wright, who murdered sex workers in Ipswich. “Change gear, change gear, change gear, check mirror, murder a prostitute, change gear, change gear, murder,†he said. “That’s a lot of effort in a day.â€
FEBRUARY 2009: Clarkson calls Britain’s then-prime minister Gordon Brown a “one-eyed Scottish idiotâ€. The Scots are not overjoyed, and neither is the blind community — Brown lost all vision in one eye in a rugby accident when he was 17. Clarkson later retracted the “one-eyed†portion of his insult.
OCTOBER 2009: Clarkson tells Top Gear Magazine that TV bosses are fixated with featuring “black Muslim lesbiansâ€.
JULY 2010: The TV personality enters the burka debate, telling Top Gear viewers the garment “doesn’t workâ€. “A woman in a full burka crossing the road in front of me tripped over the pavement, went head over heels and up it came, red G-string and stockings,†he says.
AUGUST 2010: Spin doctor Alastair Campbell reveals on his blog that, when he told Clarkson he wasn’t very strong on gay rights, the response was: “Oh yes I am. I demand the right not to be bummed.â€
OCTOBER 2010: Next up, disabled people. Clarkson claims the Ferrari F430 Speciale “looks like a simpleton†and should have been christened “speciale needsâ€. Disability campaigners are unimpressed.
FEBRUARY 2011: The BBC star turns his attention to Mexicans, calling them “lazyâ€, “feckless†and “flatulentâ€.
SEPTEMBER 2011: Clarkson aims closer to home, writing in his newspaper column that the United Nations “should start to think seriously about abolishing other languagesâ€, adding: “What’s the point of Welsh, for example?â€
NOVEMBER 2011: The presenter scores a whopping 31,700 complaints after telling a BBC talk show that public sector workers “should be shot in front of their families†for going on strike. He also complains about being delayed by people throwing themselves in front of trains. The show apologises, explaining that Clarkson “sometimes exaggerates for comical effectâ€.
DECEMBER 2011: The Top Gear Christmas Special sees Clarkson strip to his boxers in India and hang banners from trains reading “British IT is good for your company†and “Eat English muffinsâ€, which tear in half to reveal offensive messages when the carriages move apart. The Indian High Commission calls the program was “tastelessâ€.
OCTOBER 2012: The BBC Trust rules that Clarkson breached disability guidelines by likening the design of a Japanese camper van to the Elephant Man and people with “growths on their facesâ€.
MAY 2014: Video footage leaked to the Daily Mirror appears to show Clarkson using a racist term while reciting the nursery rhyme Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe. The presenter later apologises.
JULY 2014: Britain’s broadcasting watchdog rules that Clarkson breached protocol by using an “offensive racial term†during a shoot in Myanmar. Regulator Ofcom said the BBC should not have broadcast Clarkson’s use of the word “slope†as slang for an Asian person, which was potentially offensive.
OCTOBER 2014: The show has to abandon filming in Argentina after angry protests from war veterans over a licence plate that appeared to refer to the Falklands War, ending FKL. The BBC denies it was deliberate, but Argentine police then find a spare that reads, “BEII ENDâ€.
