Judges Matt Preston, Gary Mehigan and the embattled George Calombaris are leaving reality cooking show MasterChef, with broadcaster Ten revealing it couldn’t meet their demands for a pay rise.
The announcement follows revelations last week Calombaris’s companies had underpaid staff at his restaurants by nearly $8m.
Ten announced on Tuesday, ahead of the season finale, that the episode would be the last show for the trio.
Chief executive officer Paul Anderson said the network had not been able to reach a commercial agreement that was satisfactory to the trio.
“We would like to thank Gary, George and Matt for their contribution over the past 11 years,” Anderson said in a statement. “We can’t wait to introduce another group – and the next generation of exceptional judges – in season 12 of MasterChef Australia next year.”
There is no suggestion the decision for the judges not to return to the show next season is connected to the underpayment issue.
“We’ve been in negotiation with the three guys for a number of months so this is not about George,” Anderson told Ten News.
“The reality is that we couldn’t meet the demands of the three judges.”
Last week unions called for Calombaris to be sacked as a MasterChef judge after it was revealed his companies had underpaid staff at his restaurants by nearly $8m.
The Fair Work Ombudsman fined his Made Establishment company $200,000 after a four-year investigation that uncovered a failure to pay award rates, penalty rates, casual loadings, overtime and other allowances.
The West Australian government has also suspended its tourism campaign featuring Calombaris.
Calombaris featured in Tourism WA’s advertising campaign Create Your Own Gourmet Escape in WA, which first aired in the eastern states on MasterChef during WA week earlier this month and was due to run until September.
Tourism WA’s managing director, Brodie Carr, said the ads with Calombaris had been suspended, although the campaign with MasterChef would continue.
“We’ve paused all of our work with George for now and we’re talking to his management about recouping some of our costs that we’ve paid him,” Carr told 6PR radio. “We’ll continue with the campaign that we’re doing with MasterChef but probably not with George.
After 11 sensational seasons, we bid a fond farewell to our judges - Matt Preston, Gary Mehigan and George Calombaris. Thank you for being a part of this remarkable #MasterChefAU legacy and helping make the culinary dreams of everyday home cooks come true! pic.twitter.com/uG0A3ec8jI
— #MasterChefAU (@masterchefau) July 23, 2019
