{"id":640899,"date":"2026-06-16T02:36:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T02:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/640899\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T02:36:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T02:36:08","slug":"married-at-first-sight-australia-allegations-disturbing-says-watchdog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/640899\/","title":{"rendered":"Married at First Sight Australia allegations ‘disturbing’, says watchdog"},"content":{"rendered":"

Allegations that Married at First Sight Australia stars were not told about their on-screen partners previous drug and violence convictions are “serious and disturbing,” the country’s media watchdog has said.<\/p>\n

The claims, reported in a BBC News investigation<\/a> on Saturday, have also prompted a response from the UK’s media regulator Ofcom, who called them “deeply concerning”.<\/p>\n

Several male contestants have been allowed on the show – known to many as MAFS Australia – despite having been convicted of, or having faced allegations of, violence, assault or drug use.<\/p>\n

The Australian broadcaster Channel 9 and production company Endemol Shine Australia, which makes the show, have said they have “strong protocols in place to ensure participant safety and wellbeing”.<\/p>\n

As well as being a huge hit in Australia, the show is popular in the UK and is shown on Channel 4.<\/p>\n

Channel 4 has pulled all the UK episodes of MAFS from its streaming service All 4, but MAFS Australia remains available to watch.<\/p>\n

It comes after the British version of the show was plunged into crisis after BBC Panorama reported rape allegations<\/a> from two women contestants – allegations the men involved have denied.<\/p>\n

Channel 4 has commissioned an external review into contributor welfare on MAFS UK which is due back later this summer.<\/p>\n

MAFS UK is made by a different production company to the Australian version.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Allegations that Married at First Sight Australia stars were not told about their on-screen partners previous drug and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":640900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[96,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-640899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}