- Ofcom is reportedly investigating the now-former “Good Morning Britain” anchor Piers Morgan.
- Morgan and ITV announced Tuesday that he resigned from the program.
- The agency, which regulates British TV, reportedly received more than 41,000 complaints about him.
- Visit the Business section of Insider for more stories.
Ofcom, the agency that oversees the broadcasting, telecommunications, and postal industries in the United Kingdom, is investigating ITV’s “Good Morning Britain” and former anchor Piers Morgan following his on-air rant about the Duchess of Sussex, Meghan Markle.
After Ofcom’s announcement, ITV in a Tuesday statement announced that Morgan had resigned from GMB.
And in a tweet Tuesday, Ofcom confirmed it was investigating the Monday episode of the popular UK breakfast TV program, saying the agency had received over 41,015 complaints about the show. The agency confirmed the investigation to Insider and said it was looking into the program under its harm-and-offense rules.
The investigation comes after Morgan, 55, incited a fierce response over his criticism of Markle and Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, for their tell-all interview with Oprah Winfrey that aired Sunday.
The agency’s rules on harm and offense are applied to “ensure that generally accepted standards are applied to the content of television and radio services so as to provide adequate protection for members of the public from the inclusion in such services of harmful and/or offensive material,” according to Ofcom.
A spokesperson for “Good Morning Britain” did not immediately offer a comment on the investigation.
Ofcom has several tools at its disposal after it concludes an investigation. It can order that a show not be re-aired, order a statement of correction, a fine, or most severely, revoke an outlet’s broadcast license, according to Politics.co.uk.
Morgan on Monday expressed outrage and said he was “sickened” by the interview he dubbed “absolutely disgraceful.” He claimed Markle was acting and dismissed several claims she made, including her admission that she previously faced suicidal thoughts.
In addition to his on-air comments about Markle, Morgan, who from 2011 to 2014 was a CNN primetime anchor in the US, shared similar sentiments on Twitter.
“Let’s be clear: Prince Harry and his wife just spent two hours trashing everything the Queen stands for & has worked so hard to maintain, whilst pretending to support her,” he wrote Monday. “And they did it while her 99yr-old husband Philip is seriously ill in hospital. It’s contemptible.”
When confronted about his Monday comments during a Tuesday broadcast of Good Morning Britain, a frustrated Morgan stormed off the set, refusing to entertain the criticism from his co-host.