‘I felt really awkward’: Helen Skelton reveals she was groped live on air by interviewee while pregnant

Helen Skelton has revealed that she was groped during a live television broadcast while she was pregnant.

The BBC presenter has revealed that a male interviewee touched her backside while she was interviewing him during a sporting event in 2014, leaving her feeling “awkward” and too intimidated to complain.

“Basically, this guy grabbed me on the arse when I was presenting live telly. I felt really awkward about it. I was pregnant at the time as well. I didn’t really know what to do,” she told the Telegraph.

“It’s intimidating and you don’t want to be the person who is being difficult and awkward. That’s just the culture that television breeds.”

Skelton added: “No one wants to be difficult. You want to bring solutions, not problems. We are all ‘happy, happy…'”

The Countryfile presenter didn’t disclose the identity of the man in question, nor did she reveal what programme she was hosting when the incident happened.

She went on to say that her co-host Colin Murray “kicked off” when he found out what had happened and reprimanded the man.

“[Colin] kicked off and said that needs dealing with,” she said.

“It was handled brilliantly because of that. I’d never thought about complaining. I don’t want it to become my identity.”

She added: “The man in question was punished. There was a line drawn under it, and that was that.”

Speaking about the gender pay gap at the BBC, Skelton said that she was concerned that the public would grow “bored” of the coverage.

“We have to be very careful that this doesn’t become a whingeing old boring argument. It needs to remain relevant,” she said.

“We need to – and I know this sounds awful – keep the argument sexy. We have to keep it in the public eye.”