Former Loose Women presenter Carol McGiffin has said that the long-running ITV show should be axed as it “seems to be in its final throes”.
The broadcaster, 66, served as an anchor and panellist on the mid-morning chat show regularly from 2000 until 2013, before returning for a five-year stint in 2018.
Three years on from her exit, McGiffin has spoken out about the future of Loose Women and declared that it’s time for ITV to wrap it up.
“There’s nothing worse than having to watch someone you love die a slow, painful death but it’s also painful to watch when something you loved dies a slow death,” she wrote in her latest Best magazine column.
“And so it is, in my opinion, with Loose Women. It’s been happening for a while but now it seems to be in its final throes.”
She went on to say that the show used to be “full of humour, with strong sassy women, innuendo and risqué topics” and was a “joy to do and an even bigger joy to watch”.
“Watching now it’s a sad shadow of its former self, boring, strained, unfriendly and with too many rich, whinging women going on about the menopause or their terrible lives,” she continued, adding: “Time to let it go.”
The Independent has contacted ITV for comment.
McGiffin left Loose Women in 2023, revealing at the time that she was left “upset” after she was “forced” into the decision due to an unsatisfactory contract.
“The problem was, ITV were insisting, for the first time since I went back in 2018, that if I wanted to carry on doing the show, I would have to sign a contract that was totally unjust and unworkable for me, so I had to say ‘no thanks,’” she said. “I feel quite upset about it, if I’m honest, because although it is my decision, I felt it was one I was being forced to make.”
In the years since, Loose Women has faced major cuts and controversies. Last year, ITV announced its plans to overhaul its daytime output, slashing the budgets for shows including Good Morning Britain (GMB), Lorraine, This Morning, and Loose Women.
The changes resulted in hundreds of job losses across daytime, with Loose Women also forced to lose its live studio audience after moving to a smaller studio in Covent Garden. In January, it was reported that there had been “some meltdowns” over the reduced dressing room space.
Meanwhile, earlier this month, former panellist Nadia Sawalha claimed that she had been “bullied off” the series due to her vocal support for Palestine.
She claimed the channel’s decision arose from “escalating campaign of smears, complaints, hostile media coverage and targeted calls to have me removed” from the series, and threatened legal action against ITV. The broadcaster did not respond to requests for comment at the time.
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