Comedian Lucy Beaumont reveals herself as David Walliams whistleblower

Comedian and Taskmaster star Lucy Beaumont has come forward as one of the whistleblowers who spoke out against David Walliams.

Earlier this week, Walliams was accused of using his fame to “prey” on a number of young women, as well as engaging in “inappropriate” sexual relationships. The report by The Guardian also accused Walliams of inappropriate behaviour while working on Britain’s Got Talent, though the production company behind the show claimed they never received any complaints about the judge.

Walliams has denied all accusations. “Whilst a power imbalance is inevitable when one party is famous, abusing that power is something else entirely and it is something that I never did,” he said in a letter to journalists working on the report. “I am not a sexual predator. I have not broken the law, but I am devastated that some of the women I met 10 to 20 years ago have now expressed hurt or anger towards me.”

Speaking to Sky News, Lucy Beaumont says she was one of the people who helped the allegations come to light.

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During the 20-minute interview, Beaumont confirmed that she has never worked with Walliams and doesn’t know him personally, but three years ago, she was approached by a young person who had previously worked with Walliams. “They took me aside and confided in me [about] some of his conduct that they were really worried about.”

“His job was to take young girls to Walliams’ dressing room. The thing that struck me about it was that he said they were very working class girls, some of them had never been to London before, they’d never been around TV before, and he felt they were vulnerable. He didn’t think there was a way to let people know within the TV company what was happening,” said Beaumont.

“I did as much as I could do privately. Whenever I’ve heard a rumour about anyone, I’ve done everything I can,” Beaumont continued. “[But] there’s only so much you can do. I’m not the police.” She spoke to The Guardian about her concerns.

“People say ‘why tell journalists’ but there’s no HR department in TV. There’s no proper duty of care. It’s partly because the industry is well managed. It’s full of very polite, hard-working people. These things slip through the net because there’s no process. It does need looking at. And unless you do talk about it frankly, I don’t think anything will change.”

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Beaumont says she tried to get in contact with some of Walliams’ alleged victims, one of who was in a “bad way”.

“I was really worried about her. I was worried she was going to take her own life because of it.” According to the girl, she had been “forced” to sign an NDA after she posted about her experiences with Walliams online. “How can there be an NDA taken out against someone who feels like they were groomed as a child [that stops her from] talking to friends or a therapist about it,” asked Beaumont.

“I offered to pay her legal fees to try and get her some protection. I’m not saying necessarily what she said was true, but I wanted to help her because it was a world she was out of depth with.” The alleged victim declined Beaumont’s offer of support because she was “worried” about the legal ramifications.

Beaumont went on to say that she doesn’t think she’ll work in television again after speaking out against Walliams. “The reason high profile people aren’t saying anything is because you lose work. You’re seen as a trouble causer. In TV, we’re all paid so well and no one wants to mess that up,” she said. “I’m talking so frankly about it because I feel like there’s a window of opportunity to change things.”

“It isn’t about the industry or the people that have been named necessarily, it’s about society seeing there’s a massive problem here and doing whatever we can to do whatever we can [to protect young girls].”

For help, advice or more information regarding sexual harassment, assault and rape in the UK, visit the Rape Crisis charity website. In the US, visit RAINN.