Piers Morgan sends Gary Lineker cheeky tweet as BBC change rules for presenters after impartiality row

Piers Morgan has aimed a cheeky dig at Gary Lineker after the BBC changed their impartiality rules for high-profile presenters.

A BBC report, published on Thursday, has said high-profile presenters should be allowed to express their views on issues and policies but stop short of political campaigning.

The rules were published for the BBC flagship presenters, following a row over Lineker's social media posts on the government's asylum policy earlier this year.

Moreover, the rules come after ITN boss John Hardie published a review of the BBC social media guidelines.

The new guidance recognises the importance of freedom of expression but stresses that when a programme is on air, and for a two-week window before and after the series, presenters on flagship shows must not endorse or attack political parties.

They are also not allowed to criticise the character of individual politicians in the UK or comment on any issue of political debate during an election period.

They will apply to presenters of flagship programmes outside news and current affairs who still have "a particular responsibility to respect the BBC's impartiality, because of their profile on the BBC".

The flagship programmes in the report include Match of the Day, which Lineker presents, as well as The Apprentice’s Alan Sugar.

In response, Lineker said on X, the social media platform formally known as Twitter, that the new rules were "all very sensible".

Morgan, formally of ITV, then quote-tweeted Lineker’s response, and sarcastically asked: “Would you be allowed to say it’s not?”

Lineker replied, “Most definitely”, accompanied by the cry-laughing emoji.

SPORTbible are on WhatsApp! We've launched a dedicated news channel to send you the latest news, features and plenty more directly on WhatsApp and all you need to do to sign up is click through to our one-way broadcast channel here for 'SPORTbible News' to appear in the 'Updates' tab on your WhatsApp.