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Miriam Margolyes’ comments about Boris Johnson during a recent appearance on The Last Leg have sparked a wave of complaints to Ofcom.
On Friday night, the outspoken actor was a guest on The Last Leg Locked Down Under, and admitted she’d had “difficulty not wanting Boris Johnson to die”, as a result of how his government has handled the coronavirus pandemic.
“It’s a disgrace, it’s a scandal,” she said, speaking over video-link. “I had difficulty not wanting Boris Johnson to die. I wanted him to die. Then I thought that will reflect badly on me and I don’t want to be the sort of person that wants people to die.
“So then I wanted him to get better, which he did do, he did get better. But he didn’t get better as a human being. And I really would prefer that.”
TV watchdog Ofcom has now revealed they have received 241 complaints about the broadcast.
As is standard procedure, they will be assessing these complaints individually “against [their] broadcasting rules”, before deciding whether to take the matter any further.
A spokesperson for The Last Leg told HuffPost UK: “The programme is live and unexpected comments can happen. In this instance Miriam went on to say that she wanted him to get better.”
Miriam previously made her thoughts about Johnson’s competence as prime minister known during an interview on This Morning last month.
Speaking to hosts Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield, she said: “I actually don’t give a stuff about the economy, I want people to survive. So I think Boris Johnson is completely right about that. He’s not right about anything else, but he is right about that.”