HIGNFY did not cross the line

Have I Got News For You has been cleared after a viewer complained that a gag Ross Noble cracked on the show was offensive.

The BBC Trust - the independent body governing the corporation’s output – ruled that the joke was at the ‘margins of acceptability’ but did not overstep the line.

In a sequence discussing a KFC advert in which women spoke with their mouths full, Noble made a comment about the actors having attended ‘The John Merrick School of Drama’ – and did an impersonation of John Hurt in the film The Elephant Man.

The complainant said this made fun of people with disabilities and so encouraged ridicule and bullying.

She said the impression was ‘cruel and gratuitous’ and implied that ‘ridicule of John Merrick in particular and speech-impaired’ people in general is acceptable’.

However, in a ruling published today, the committee concluded: that the programme, which originally aired in June last year, was not in breach of the BBC guidelines on harm and offence.

Although the watchdogs conceded ‘some viewers may have been offended’. they said that the remarks referred to actors in a commercial and were not intended to stereotype people with a disability..

Published: 12 Mar 2013