Jonnie Irwin claims that his TV show let him go, after revealing terminal cancer

• The British TV personality, 49, claimed in a statement to the Sun that his contract with Channel 4’s home improvement program.
• Since then, Irwin has survived thanks to medicine, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy.
• Despite appearing “thinner” and “without hair,” he has since secured a job on Escape to the Country.

Jonnie Irwin is talking openly about how receiving the news that he has terminal cancer has changed his life. The British TV personality, 49, claimed in a statement to The Sun that his contract with Channel 4’s home improvement program A Place in the Sun, which he had hosted on-air since 2004, had been terminated after he revealed his terminal lung cancer diagnosis in 2020.

Freeform Productions and Channel 4 issued the following joint statement to the source: “Since Jonnie has been a vital member of the A Place in the Sun family for more than 18 years, we were all extremely grieved to learn of his condition. The production company tried everything to allow the much-loved Jonnie to continue his international filming with us during Covid, but they were unable to find him an adequate insurance policy.”

“As soon as people find out you’ve got cancer, they write you off,” he explained. “Yes, I have stage four, and it’s terminal — but not yet, so let me live my life while I can.”

“As soon as I told A Place In the Sun about my diagnosis, they paid me for the rest of the season but didn’t renew my contract. They knew I wanted to carry on. That hurt. That broke my heart. I feel hugely let down. I can’t even watch the show now,” Irwin added.

When he was initially diagnosed in August 2020, physicians gave him a six-month prognosis because they believed the lung cancer had gone to his brain. Since then, Irwin has survived thanks to medicine, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy.

Irwin claimed he concealed his illness for two years following the purported termination of his contract with the program out of fear of losing more business. Despite appearing “thinner” and “without hair,” he has since secured a job on Escape to the Country.

“But I didn’t get that support from A Place in The Sun. I told them I wanted to work,” he recounted. “When I said I can get you doctor notes and assurances from my oncologist that I am fit to work, I was told, verbatim, ‘Oh, you really don’t want to go down that route, do you?'”

When the show’s producers said they “don’t think” they could get insurance, he claimed it “affected my mental health.”

“Within two weeks, someone else was on TV doing my job. I just feel I earned a bit more from them after 18 years. That was my first job in TV, and it was special to me,” Irwin added.

Irwin also discussed the need to “put a roof over our heads and food on the table” for his wife Jessica Holmes, 40, and their three sons, Rex, 3, and twins Rafa and Cormac, 2, who are also his children. He stated, “I want to go knowing that Jess and the boys are taken care of.

Irwin revealed Thursday on Good Morning Britain that he’s documenting his final months for his young children after announcing his cancer diagnosis in November 2020.

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