This Morning’s Dermot O’Leary was forced to correct Alison Hammond on Monday morning as the pair hosted the show during Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield’s Easter break.
Dermot and Alison kicked off the show with a chat over the day’s headlines alongside guests Gyles Brandreth and Beverley Turner.
Alison, 47, turned the conversation to Helen MacNamara, a former Whitehall ethics chief, who has reportedly been fined by the Metropolitan Police in connection with a party held during lockdown.
The ex-deputy cabinet secretary was handed a £50 fine after police investigators found she had breached Covid laws by attending a lockdown karaoke party where she provided a karaoke machine, reports claim.
Alison noted that she “just can’t believe” that the karaoke machine was hers, before co-host Dermot had to interject quickly to qualify that it was “reportedly” hers.
He added: “We don’t know for sure,” after which Alison stopped, saying: “Oh, is it reportedly?” and glanced down at her notes.
She continued: “Well, it’s a karaoke machine. She’s been fined £50, but if you remember rightly a lot of people were fined £10,000 at the time.”
Elsewhere at the beginning of the show, Alison was left presenting This Morning alone as Dermot was missing - but he soon emerged in a tiny car as he drove into the studio.
As Lorraine host Ranvir Singh was ready to hand over to the pair, she was shocked to see an empty chair next to Alison.
The presenter explained that Dermot was running late and that he would hopefully be on the show soon.
Welcoming viewers to the show later, Alison was still alone as she said: "Hello, it's supposed to be me and Dermot, this is really embarrassing."
But soon afterwards, it emerged that Dermot was late because he was driving the world's smallest car into the studio.
As he rode the tiny blue car onto the set, Alison said: "I can't believe this, you're so extra... you know what the weird thing is? This looks like your normal car."
Waving hello to viewers as he managed to clamber out, he said: "Morning everyone, hope you're well... we thought we'd show the world's smallest and economic car!"
And viewers were divided over the skit, with one tweeting: "Cringe start of the show time.”
Alison and Dermot are covering for Holly and Phil over the Easter holidays, as Kate Garraway stood in for Susanna Reid.
This Morning airs weekdays at 10am on ITV and ITV Hub.
