Stacey Dooley is blasted by Q&A audience over her ‘white saviour’ filming trips to Africa as boyfriend Kevin Clifton’s attempts to play peacemaker fail

• Dooley was accused of acting like ‘white saviour’ by Labour MP David Lammy
• It was after the 32-year-old posted a picture of Instagram holding Ugandan child
• At a Sheffield Doc event Ms Dooley did not apologise for the controversial photo
• Her boyfriend Kevin Clifton also attempted to intervene and defend Dooley 

Stacey Dooley has been blasted by a Q&A audience over her Comic Relief filming trips to Africa.

The Strictly Come Dancing winner was accused by David Lammy of acting like a ‘white saviour’ after posting a picture of Instagram holding a Ugandan child while the broadcaster was filming for Comic Relief back in February.

At the Sheffield Doc/Fest event on Monday, the 32-year-old did not apologise for her controversial photo and boyfriend Kevin Clifton attempted to defend his partner, as reported by The Sun.

Audience member Annalisa Toccara tweeted about her experience and said Ms Dooley showed ‘a lack of understanding’ and was called out by one of the filmmaker’s.

Dooley posted this picture on Instagram while she was holding a Ugandan child as a representative for Comic Relief, sparking fury from David Lammy 

Audience member Annalisa Toccara said Ms Dooley should have shown some humility

She added that their was ‘complete defiance on her part’ and a man at the back ‘called her out’

Annalisa then claims she chatted to Kevin Clifton who ‘spoke to me like I was a piece of s**t’

Annalisa ended up leaving and said the experience ruined the documentary festival in Sheffield

She said: ‘Thoroughly disappointed in the @StaceyDooley event at SheffDocFest tonight.

‘An acknowledgement with humility should have been coming out of her mouth when the question was raised about @DavidLammy’s #WhiteSaviour tweet. 

She went on to say that a man who spoke to her ‘like I was a piece of s**t’ was Strictly professional Kevin Clifton. 

A source close to Ms Dooley told The Sun said: ‘She went to talk to the audience member after their exchange and gave contact details to carry on their conversation.’

In February Labour MP David Lammy said: ‘The world does not need any more white saviours.

‘As I’ve said before, this just perpetuates tired and unhelpful stereotypes. Let’s just promote voices from across the continent of Africa and have serious debate.’ 

Mr Lammy added in another tweet it was his job to ‘represent the views of my constituents not to cheerlead.’

It comes as Comic Relief will stop sending white celebrities to Third World countries in the wake of the Stacey Dooley row. 

Screenwriter Richard Curtis, who set up the charity after visiting Ethiopia during the 1985 famine, has said it was not the way forward this week.

Stacey Dooley pictured with boyfriend Kevin Clifton on This Morning in December last year

Mr Lammy tweeted this in response to a photo cradling a black child Miss Dooley had posted while she was filming in Uganda for Comic Relief

Lammy followed up with this tweet, warning that colonial attitudes are alive after some criticised him for describing Dooley as perpetuating a ‘white saviours’ narrative

 Dooley, 32, was criticised after she posed for a selfie hoisting a five-year-old boy onto her hip during a trip to Uganda earlier this year. Labour MP for Tottenham David Lammy accused her of ‘white saviourism’ after she posted the picture on Instagram. He said she was ‘perpetuating tired and unhelpful stereotypes’ which risked presenting a distorted image of Africa from the colonial era.

Addressing the International Development Select Committee on Monday, Curtis, one of Britain’s most successful comedy writers, said that Comic Relief didn’t act ‘robustly’ to the criticism because it was just focused on raising money.

He added: ‘If people who live in this country with African backgrounds feel as though they’re sort of in some way demeaned or negatively affected by Comic Relief, then we really have to listen to that.’ Curtis, who wrote Four Weddings and Funeral and Notting Hill, both staring Hugh Grant, said he understood the criticisms and was looking to address the problem.

‘It is a really complicated issue because we feel this desperate passionate need to raise as much money as we can, but if we’re doing harm as well, that won’t do,’ he said.

When asked about how Comic Relief would operate in the future, Mr Curtis told MPs: ‘I think we are at a very interesting moment in terms of raising money online and raising money as a result of the television programme.

‘We’re on a big journey to work out how a lot of the most successful fundraising initiatives at the moment don’t have television exposure. We’re not strong on that yet.

‘I imagine as we go into this new future, that will not be based on celebrities going abroad. I suspect we will start the new initiative not going that way. On TV, I think it will be heading in the direction of not using, and particularly being very careful to give voices to people abroad.’ 

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