THE BBC has been accused of censoring “patriotic” jokes by one of its own satirists. Ned Sherrin said that three jokes about the French were cut from Radio 4’s Loose Ends.

Mr Sherrin, who said that the BBC’s action was going back to the Dark Ages, told the jokes during recording on Saturday afternoon but they were left out of the broadcast on Saturday evening.

Sherrin made a joke about the British and sought to balance it with a series of jokes about the French, he reveals in a letter to The Times today.

He said the French would enjoy a joke about the British: “What do you call a pretty girl in London?” “A tourist”.

That made it on to the broadcast, but these jokes did not: “What do you call a Frenchman advancing on Baghdad?” “A salesman”; “What is the difference between a road accident involving a hedgehog and a Frenchman?” “There are skid marks before the hedgehog”; and “What do you call 20 French politicans face down in the English Channel?” “A start.”

Sherrin, 72, said: “I was annoyed and piqued to find that for some dumb reason the balancing jokes were censored.

“They left in the French joke about British women and left out the attempt at Frog-bashing. I’m sure they felt we’d upset the sensitivities of our gallant allies, the French, but why should we be sensitive about this?” The censorship row follows a series of complaints that the BBC has been guilty of a biased “anti-war stance”.

A BBC spokesman said: “It’s just an editing matter. The programme is recorded live and is always edited to fit the slot.”

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