Clarkson

He's still all over the news so once more with some compassion.

Jeremy Clarkson has a problem or several, I think that's been obvious for a while, I hope he's getting help. He's also a very rich man and from what I can tell a loyal and discreet friend.

Loyal because he has not given into the tendency to dump aging co stars. He has kept the same team on Top Gear almost since the beginning, no fluffy young wannabes take up residence on his show although many are eager to co star from time to time. He's discreet because you don't get the like of David Cameron rushing to call you a friend if you're not.

He may be, probably is a bit of a bastard but the producer he's alleged to have smacked owes his job to Clarkson not the other way round, more than that is hard to prove. The dispute between Clarkson and the assistant producer is a difficult thing to judge. A show on location is not an office, shop or a factory where strict rules apply and where at the end of shift everyone goes home leaving their colleagues behind.

The people on location live, eat, sleep and work together sometimes for weeks or months at a time. In this particular case it was probably no more than a few days but tensions could still arise and have nowhere to go.

None of us know what really happened what we do know is a young assistant may well find discretion is beyond price and perhaps its his own job he should be worrying about.

We all have bad times at work most of us get to go home at the end of every shift and recover Jeremy Clarkson couldn't do that and neither could his assistant producer.

Its all very well for us to cast blame and its true Jeremy Clarkson has some form he did try to hit Piers Morgan. As far as I'm concerned all that shows is he has the right attitude. If anyone deserved a smack its Piers I didn't know hacking was going on at the Daily Mirror and I definitely didn't know the pictures of British soldiers were fake Morgan