Mark Solomons

The problem with Jeremys

  • From Spectator Life
Jeremy Clarkson in 1997 (Allstar/Globe Photos/Alamy)

Why is Jeremy Clarkson in trouble so often? Is it because he often appears arrogant, entitled or untouchable? Or is it for a much simpler reason: he’s called Jeremy?

This week, in a column for the Sun, he suggested a rather unsavoury Game of Thrones-style punishment for the Duchess of Sussex. The article prompted 20,000 complaints to Ipso – more than the press regulator received in the whole of last year – and led to 64 MPs signing a letter of complaint to the paper’s editor.

Clarkson has made a grudging non-apology and persuaded the paper to remove the article from its website, but unsurprisingly this is unlikely to satisfy the lynch mob already digging out those pitchforks ready to march on his well-publicised farm.

As for the man himself, opinions over the years tend to be polarised between those who think he is a bully who once punched a Top Gear colleague for no reason and those who adore him for once punching Piers Morgan for, probably, a very good reason.

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