Sarah Vine had harsh words to say about Amanda Abbington’s bullying claims against Strictly dancer Giovanni Pernice

During her first interview since her complaints against Strictly dancer Giovanni Pernice were answered, Amanda Abbington was asked to respond to Sarah Vine’s recent opinion piece

Amanda Abbington has clapped back at Sarah Vine’s claims, accusing the columnist of “throwing other women under the bus.”

The Sherlock actress, 50, received an apology from the BBC following her complaints against Strictly Come Dancing professional (and former dancing partner) Giovanni Pernice, which triggered an internal probe at the Beeb.

Following the verdict, Amanda Abbington opened up about her experience on the BBC One competition on Newsnight this Wednesday (October 2, 2024), saying that she hadn’t responded well to Giovanni’s teaching methods in an emotional discussion with Victoria Derbyshire.

But as she laid all her cards on the table, Amanda was led to react to Sarah Vine’s column published hours before in which the latter stated she “was NOT a victim in the way most people understand it.”

Amanda Abbington reacted to Sarah Vine’s column in the Daily Mail, accusing her of ‘throwing other women under the bus’ ( 
Image:
BBC)

Vine’s recent opinion piece on Amanda in The Daily Mail claimed that “Women like Abbington are part of the reason other women find themselves in genuinely awful and much more serious situations don’t get taken seriously.”

When the extract was read out to her, Amanda was clearly disappointed as she replied: “I’m always shocked when women throw other women under the bus for standing up for something they think is wrong but ok. I’ve had so many women come up to me since making this complaint thanking me for being brave enough to stand up and complain about something that was impacting me in a work situation.”

She went on to add that women have told her that her complaint has inspired them to “speak out” and many women have hugged her and thanked her for breaking her silence. “I also did it for the women before me who had gone through the same thing,” she added. “I’m not the isolated person – it hasn’t only happened to me”.

Amanda concluded saying she “loved Strictly” and never wanted to “cause any trouble or ruin any careers”, concluding: “All I did was experience something in a workplace environment that was run by a corporation that is owned by the public and I didn’t want anyone else to go through what I went through.”

The BBC made the findings of their probe public this Monday (September 30, 2024), claiming they’d found no evidence of any physical aggression but they upheld six of 17 allegations of bullying made by the actress. Giovanni was cleared of the other 11 allegations.

In a post shared on Instagram on Monday, after the results of the BBC investigation were made public, Giovanni said: “It’s over, it’s finished, six months, seven months of all of this. Seven months of reading things every day in the newspaper and not being able to respond because I wanted to keep the confidentiality and privacy of the review, (it) was a difficult time.”

Meanwhile, the BBC asserted: “Strictly Come Dancing is a family show and we rightly expect very high standards. While competition can be tough, rigorous and demanding, we want the show to ultimately be a joyous and transformative experience. It is a great shame if this hasn’t been the case for everyone who has appeared on the show. We have assessed the complaints and we have upheld some, but not all. We want to apologise to Amanda Abbington and to thank her for coming forward and taking part. We know this would not have been an easy thing to do.”