Schofield accuses TV of double standards

The former This Morning host, Phillip Schofield, who has been shunned by TV since admitting to a gay affair, has claimed he would have been treated differently if he had been straight.

The 62-year-old quit This Morning in May last year after it had emerged that he had been having an affair with a younger male member of the This Morning team, while remaining married to his wife Stephanie Lowe.

After first denying the accusation, Sheffield then admitted that he had had a consensual on-off relationship with the 19-year-old male member of staff.

Since then he has not worked on television until now when he is the subject of Channel 5’s Cast Away in which he spends 10 days alone on an island in the Indian Ocean.

Accusing the TV industry of double standards, he said he thought that another TV presenter “or two” would have done exactly the same thing.

Addressing the age difference, he went on to say that age-gaps were not uncommon in gay relationships.

He went on to say: “If that had been the case with me and it had been a woman. Pat on the back. ‘Well done, mate.’”

Cast Away is currently airing on Channel 5