* YOU BEEN SNAP* Women know I won't steal their husbands so they like me now, claims Claire Balding"

By Miss FB Lyimo*

No threat: Claire Balding, who came out in 2003, is in a civil partnership with Radio 4 presenter Alice Arnold, left

Clare Balding claims coming out as a lesbian has made her a better broadcaster – and that women prefer watching her now as they know she won’t steal their husbands.
The BBC sports presenter said in an interview: ‘For the most part people are accepting. Personally I am a much better broadcaster for not hiding who I am.
‘In a way it makes me much less of a threat – and women are funny the way they watch telly, because they don’t like women who they think might nick their husband.
‘Seriously, they watch someone in a little tight leopard-skin dress and they think, “Oh, I don’t like her”. And the husband is going, “She’s fantastic!”.
‘But then I come on and they’re all right with that. It’s fine. And that could be hugely to my advantage. I hope so,’ she told Radio Times.
The 40-year-old, who is in a civil partnership with Radio 4 newsreader Alice Arnold, admitted that she ‘lied’ about her sexuality for six or seven years, because she was ‘scared’ of the public reaction, until coming out in 2003.
She added that while she did not necessarily ‘trumpet’ the fact she is a lesbian, she felt that coming out has helped women who are in similar situations.
The presenter also spoke of the furore over her mocking 2009 Grand National-winning jockey Liam Treadwell’s teeth at his moment of triumph – saying that she was trying to ‘make him memorable’.

 

Memorable: Miss Balding also spoke of the furore over her mocking 2009 Grand National-winning jockey Liam Treadwell's teeth at his moment of triumph

BBC'S 'BROKEN PROMISE'

A journalist chosen to boost the BBC’s on-air presence of older women has attacked the corporation for presiding over a ‘PR stunt’.

Carole Walker, 50, above, has written to BBC in-house magazine Ariel, saying Mark Thompson, the director general, had broken his pledge of giving her more presenting shifts, after she was allocated just one so far this year.

The BBC was shocked into using more mature female presenters after an industrial tribunal condemned it for axing Countryfile’s Miriam O’Reilly in 2009 because she was too old.

The BBC said: ‘Last year Carole was given the number of shifts we had agreed with her. We were fully intending to do the same this year.’

She admitted that she had made a mistake telling him to ‘get his teeth done’ on live TV.
The BBC was forced to apologise after viewers complained that she had spoiled the highlight of the jockey’s career.
Miss Balding said: ‘The big mistake I made with Liam Treadwell and the reason why that was so bad – and I totally accept that – was that I was trying to be too much one of the lads. And you can’t do it.’
But she then tried to justify the gaffe, saying: ‘I was doing it for a reason, which was in this big story where you have a 100-1 winner (Treadwell’s ride, Mon Mome) and a female trainer and a fantastic owner who is a crazy lady who plays bridge, not to let Liam Treadwell get forgotten.
'So I was trying for something to make him memorable… but what it says to me is to go steady. You don’t have to write the headline every time.
‘Now, that doesn’t make me less ambitious, I just don’t want to be too clever because that upsets people.’
The full interview is in this week’s Radio Times.