Strictly Come Dancing’s Shirley Ballas hires assistant to ‘syphon through’ hate messages

Judge nearly quit the BBC One series due to the abuse she received from trolls in 2022

Strictly Come Dancing’s head judge Shirley Ballas has revealed that she hired a personal assistant who “syphons through” the hateful messages she is sent.

Ballas, 63, who is currently a judge on the 21st season of the popular BBC One dance competition series, has been the victim of severe online trolling.

Last month, the former professional dancer admitted she nearly quit Strictly due to the online abuse she received, which she said left her in tears after every episode in 2022.

During a Channel 5 News appearance on Tuesday (17 October), Ballas was asked by Dan Walker – who competed on Strictly in 2021 – if she has got better at dealing with some of the “horrible stuff” she received on social media.

“I think with the social media, yes. This year I’ve taken on Harry as a PA [who] also syphons through all those really unbelievable messages that you couldn’t even repeat to a human being,” she said.

Discussing how difficult it can be to avoid hateful messages, Ballas added: “Unfortunately they come up, you know, if you’re scrolling or you’re looking or, you know, when I did my Sky challenges for [charity] Calm, they come up and I’m trying to help people as well, so I don’t want to just ignore all the good people, ‘cause there’s more good people than bad people.”

‘Strictly’s’ Shirley Ballas (Laura Lewis Photography/PA)

To raise money for suicide prevention charity Calm (Campaign Against Living Miserably), Ballas undertook a Skyatholon challenge in August, which involved a zipline, wing walk and 13,000ft skydive.

Elsewhere in the interview, the former ballroom dancer also spoke about her new book Murder On The Dancefloor, co-written by Sheila McClure, which follows dance superstar and world champion Lily Richmond and private investigator Susie Cooper as they try to unveil the identity of killer.

Talking about the novel and whether the level of drama is representative of the dance industry, Ballas said: “I’ve lived it. I’ve been part of it... not the murder part but everything else that went with it, you know the backstabbing.

“And it’s such a competitive industry and people will do whatever they need to do to get wherever they need to go.”

Last season, Ballas received a barrage of offensive social media comments. “Some of the messages were so cruel,” she told The Times in September. “Just, how ugly you are and how fat you are, and how you’ve got horrible arms, and, ‘You don’t like men. You don’t like women. You don’t like Black men. You don’t like Black women.’

“And then once it starts steamrolling, it goes even further, and then it gets personal, about your being, how you look.”

Of her PA Harry, a 21-year-old mathematician from Manchester University, Ballas told The Times: “He’s going to do all my social media. He will be filtering. My mother adores him. Sorry, trolls, but Harry will be intervening this year.”

Additional reporting by PA