Father Ted’s Graham Linehan has pledged to use some of a £25,000 settlement for being wrongfully arrested by police to fund the legal costs of a female pool player who was banned after refusing to play against a male.
Lynne Pinches, a professional player, has been ordered to pay £4,000 in legal costs after being barred from the sport for refusing to play against a trans identified male in the final of the Women’s Champions of Champions tournament in 2023.
Linehan, in his first TV interview since being awarded the compensation, told GB News Political Editor Christopher Hope: “I think the police were very wise not to want to drag this out in the courtroom because it would have exposed various forces at the moment in modern policing in the UK that they’re really in need of reform.
“The belief in gender ideology, which seems to have kind of swept through the entire police force, the feeling that people in the UK need to be controlled, their speech controlled rather than listened to and understood.
“It would have been a nightmare for the police, and I think that at the moment the police are in something of a crisis state. I think morale is very low, and it’s jumping to, I would say, to the aid of very dangerous trans activists. That is causing that kind of fall in morale.”
He added: “One of the things that I got into trouble for was a thing where I said if any man enters into a female-only space, he is an abusive man, and it’s very important for the police to understand that if a man enters a female-only space, according to the recent Supreme Court decision, he’s breaking the law, and the police don’t seem to understand this.
“So when I give advice for women to make a fuss, cause a scene, call for the police, and if all else fails, punch them in the nether regions, then that is the kind of safeguarding advice that any father would give their daughter. The police found this a criminal offence and it means that they are so broken off from what the ordinary parent in my case feels about these issues that it really is a crisis.”
Asked what he is going to do with the settlement money, he said: “Luckily I’m working in the US now, so I’m not as desperate as I was in the middle of my cancellation. It’s just a nice little stipend. I keep saying the word stipend. I don’t know why, it’s kind of lodged in my brain, but it’s a nice little payment.
“I will be using some of it to help Lynne Pinches in her fight against Ultimate Pool. She’s the very brave pool player who walked away from a match against a cheating man, and now she’s being punished by Ultimate Pool. I’ll probably give a little bit of money to that.”