“Ben Collins is named as the Stig” Sky News (a sister company of Harper Collins) proclaimed on its news ticker after the High Court today refused to grant the BBC an injunction blocking the publication by the company of an autobiography which would reveal the identity of Top Gear’s mystery driver.
The BBC claimed that the former Formula Three driver is bound by a confidentiality agreement and that revealing who he is would spoil viewers’ enjoyment of the hit BBC Two show.
But, after taking legal submissions in private, Mr Justice Morgan ruled for HarperCollins. Robin Shaw, solicitor for the publishers, said: “The judge has said he is not going to grant an injunction in this case. Reasons are to follow and will be given in a private judgment.”
The BBC said the judgment did not prevent it from pursuing the matter to a full trial of the issues.
Collins has presumably taken his last spin around the track for Top Gear. With the mystery over his identity resolved, there must be concerns that the chief selling point for his memoirs will be juicy backstage gossip about Jeremy Clarkson and co.
It’s a blow for Andy Wilman, the Top Gear producer, has been fuming over the apparent betrayal. In an uncompromising blog on the Top Gear website, Wilman argued that the BBC had the right to spend money on protecting the intellectual property it has created in Court, because it “does belong to the licence payer, and not to some opportunists who think they can come along and take a slice when they feel like it.”
Andy Wilman: pushed to the limit
The whole point of the Stig is the mystique, Wilman argued, and “everyone who’s ever worked on Top Gear has kept the Stig thing a secret, and the person who wears the suit has signed confidentiality agreements to do the same.”
But a biting Stephen Glover column in the Daily Mail, called the Top Gear team greedy, public school bullies (Wilman and Jeremy Clarkson are Repton School alumni).
It speculated on the money generated by Top Gear’s global popularity (£2 million a year?) and asks why the Stig, having done his job over the years, cannot now earn his share of the financial rewards.
Wilman responded: “The Stig does make money for BBC Worldwide, which is a business, and some of it is invested back into the business, some of it is paid out in dividends, and crucially, some of it goes back into funding the TV show. And the show needs that money, ‘cos this ain’t a cheap piece of telly.”
Wilman concluded that the Top Gear had worked “bloody hard for many years to make the Stig something worth caring about, and that includes protecting it from a bunch of chancers.”
Wilman will be disappointed to lose the case but Top Gear viewers are already over it. The Stig was first “outed” by papers more than a year ago.
How about a viewer competition to find a Stig replacement, this time without the mask of mystery? Although presumably only professional racing drivers need apply.
I hope they fire Collins for revealing he’s The Stig.