Lord Sugar was accused of ‘bashing’ the contestants (Picture: BBC)
Former The Apprentice candidate Amy Anzel has launched a petition to replace Lord Alan Sugar with Steven Bartlett, after accusing the tycoon of ‘verging on harassment’ by ‘bashing’ contestants.
The ‘gay icon’ missed out on Lord Sugar’s £250,000 during last year’s competition, which was won by Harpreet Kaur.
Amy went on to be pretty vocal about her experience on the show, and was recently blocked by Lord Sugar on Twitter.
She’s now launched an online petition, saying: ‘It’s time for Lord Sugar to make way for the next generation to take the reigns before The Apprentice is ran into the ground by a poor production team of people who have decided that the show should spend it’s time making a complete mockery of the candidates and being nothing but damaging to British entrepreneurship… at this point the show is verging on bullying it’s own candidates!
‘GET LORD SUGAR OUT!’
So far, Amy’s petition only has a handful of signatures, but one who signed commented: ‘Alan Sugar is way past his best,’ while another penned: ‘It’s the right thing to do’.
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The petition comes after Amy spoke out about Lord Sugar’s behaviour and ‘manipulation’ on the programme.
Talking about being blocked by Lord Sugar, Amy began: ‘Well, I’m very proud of that moment last week, actually. It was not the experience I thought it would be.
‘The show in my opinion and my experience on the show was very manipulated and not just in the edit, that’s what I thought that’s the worst that can happen.
‘It was like real time manipulation and not everyone experienced the same amount of that and I feel that was very unfair.’
Amy was a contestant on The Apprentice last year (Picture: PA)
She continued to Brett Harris on Gaydio’s drivetime show: ‘I remember when Lord Sugar said, “This is the biggest most important interview of your life,” and you think, “Well if I was spoken to this way and treated this way, I probably would walk out of the interview”.
‘So it’s so not like in real life, and I also think that Lord Sugar, the way he bashes them and criticises them and you know, on the verge of harasses them, I just don’t think that’s of the moment.’
Amy added: ‘I think you need a younger billionaire, like a Steven Bartlett for example, who would probably treat the process differently and have more respect for the candidates, and that would be, I think, embraced by the viewers and obviously the candidates.
‘Would it make for good car crash TV? I don’t know, but I think it needs to change.’
She’s suggested Steven Bartlett take over (Picture: BBC)
This comes after Lord Sugar insisted The Apprentice would ‘flop’ without him, and claimed to be ‘underestimated’.
He said: ‘I don’t want to sound too big-headed but a lot of people underestimate me. They hear me talking like a cockney, but I know everything, I really do.
‘I’m not degrading people like (Dragons’ Den star) Peter Jones, because they’ve done a lot also. But none of them have done as much as I have.’
The tycoon continued: ‘Who would I put in my place? I can’t think of anybody. There’s loads of people that would queue up.
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‘‘There’s no reason why I can’t go on to do 25 years. I’m very fit, so I don’t know whether it stops at 20. But if I ever did stop, I get a feeling the BBC wouldn’t stop it.’
Lord Sugar added to The Sun that if the broadcaster found ‘someone new’ to replace him, ‘that’s where it may kill itself off’.
The Apprentice is available to watch on BBC iPlayer.
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MORE : The Apprentice viewers furious after Lord Sugar clip ‘ruined’ finale
‘GET LORD SUGAR OUT!’