GREGG Wallace has dropped his £10,000 case against the BBC for “distress and harassment” caused by his MasterChef sacking.
The presenter, 61, launched legal action after he was axed from the cooking competition in July last year following allegations of “inappropriate behaviour”.
Wallace sought damages of up to £10,000 from the BBC and and BBC Studios for “distress, harassment and loss of amenity”, court documents showed.
But the corporation today confirmed Wallace discontinued the claim ahead of a planned court hearing earlier this month.
A spokesperson added: “Shortly in advance of a hearing, due February 16, Mr Wallace discontinued his claim.
“He is not receiving any payment in costs or damages from either BBC or BBC Studios.”
Barrister Lawrence Power previously said Wallace had requested “personal data” from the BBC and BBC Studios related to “his work, contractual relations and conduct” last March.
BBC Studios said it would “endeavour to respond” within a month, the papers state.
On August 7, the corporation emailed Wallace to apologise for the delay and said it was “taking all reasonable steps” to process the request in “a timely manner as possible going forward”.
But Wallace claimed he still had not received a response and that BBC Studios said it was withholding parts of his personal data due to “freedom of expression”.
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Mr Power said that the body had “wrongly redacted” information and had “unlawfully failed to supply all of the claimant’s personal data”.
He argued this breaches their “statutory duty” and in doing so, “caused distress and harassment to the claimant”.
But Jason Pobjoy KC, for the BBC and BBC Studios, said it was “admitted and averred that primarily due to the lack of proportionality and scale”, it had not provided Wallace with “a substantive response” within three months.
He also said the BBC responded to Wallace on October 7 with a copy of his personal data, which he was entitled to, and had apologised in August.
Mr Pobjoy told the court the “voluntary disclosure demonstrates that the claimant has no basis to claim damages for distress, or otherwise, in respect of the withholding of such information”.
Wallace was fired after a damning report upheld 45 of 83 complaints between 2005 and 2024.
It found the “majority of the substantiated allegations against Mr Wallace related to inappropriate sexual language and humour”.
The report concluded a “smaller number of allegations of other inappropriate language and being in a state of undress were also substantiated”.
Wallace’s co-star John Torode, 60, was also fired in the wake of the report following an upheld complaint he used an “extremely offensive racist term”.
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The former greengrocer said previously: “For eight months, my family and I have lived under a cloud. Trial by media, fuelled by rumour and clickbait.“None of the serious allegations against me were upheld.
“I challenged the remaining issue of unwanted touching, but have had to accept a difference in perception, and I am deeply sorry for any distress caused. It was never intended.”
