Jo Whiley has apologised to Fearne Cotton, who recently said she endured an ‘excruciating time’ while working at BBC Radio 1 and claimed she felt ‘ignored’ by her colleagues
Jo Whiley has issued a heartfelt apology to Fearne Cotton. It comes after the former Radio 1 star opened up about her time at the network and said she found it “excruciating” and felt “shame” during a time when a “life-altering” scandal came to light.
It was during Fearne’s time on Radio 1 when she said she felt a sense of “shame” herself after her former boyfriend, disgraced singer Ian Watkins, was convicted for child sex offences.
Fearne, 44, also claimed she struggled to continue working at the BBC, due to feeling as though she was being “glared at, stared at, and ignored” by fellow staff across the network. Now, Jo, who fronted the late morning slot on Radio 1 from 2001 until 2009, has issued a heartfelt apology to Fearne.
Fearne took over the slot until 2015, before moving to Radio 2. Five years later, she walked away due to suffering from panic attacks. Now, Jo has spoken out on her podcast Dig It, alongside Zoe Ball.
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She said: “I’m really sorry that I never supported you more when you were doing the Radio One show because I had no idea how hard it was for you. I was oblivious that was the worst thing. I guess I had moved on to my next thing, and I didn’t realise what you were going through.
“That you were being taken a part or that people were having a go at you for doing that show after I’d done the Radio 1 Show. I think it’s a sign of the times because we were all very insular and just kind of focus on our own things whereas now I think there’s a lot more empathy for each other.”
In response, Fearne, who now presents Sounds of the 90s on Radio 2, said: “Please don’t be sorry. Yeah but there was no space to talk about it and I had other circumstantial s*** going on that was bleak. There was no space, even on air to go ‘You know what, I’m feeling a bit rubbish today. Shall we play some music and try to make it better?’
“It was just like, ‘Crack on with it,’ and there was no room to be a human. So, please you do not need to apologise.”
She dated the singer, who was murdered last year in the early Noughties, before his sickening crimes came to light. He was murdered aged 48 last year, while behind bars serving a 29-year sentence. And in her new book, while she doesn’t name Watkins, Fearne references a “horrible news story that doesn’t involve me yet has a tenuous and life-altering link to me will be broadcast on my own radio show again that day.”
The disgraced singer was convicted in 2013, when she would have been on air. The broadcaster writes that the “shame” she felt, made it difficult to remain on the air. “I feel simultaneously glared at, stared at, yet utterly ignored by those in the office. Are they all talking about me behind my back? Or am I a narcissist for thinking that?,” she penned.
Fearne added that she attempted to remain upbeat for the sake of the broadcast and “shoved down” the “rage, sorrow and tears” that she was feeling. Nowadays, she no longer feels that shame and has found therapy beneficial. Now, she believes that the shame she felt belongs to others, mainly men. “Men who have shamed me, treated me badly and left me lumbered with it,” she said.
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