The BBC says it has cut part of a satirical radio show which called Prime Minister Tony Blair a liar, but denies it had been cowed after losing a feud with the government over the Iraq war.
The broadcaster said on Tuesday it had deleted four lines from an episode of "Absolute Power", a comedy which pokes fun at spin doctors and refers to Blair's former media chief Alastair Campbell as "Alas, it's a shambles". In one offending line, a PR man says there is nothing he could "teach the prime minister about deception, manipulation and lying -- except how to do it properly".
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The show's writer, Mark Tavener, said the BBC had "chickened out" and that the satire was not out of date. "They are worried about upsetting the government," he said. "I was told I couldn't refer to Blair as a liar because Hutton said he wasn't -- quite clearly this is nonsense.
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Newspapers said the BBC had rejected its original title "Sexing it Up" -- the phrase BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan used in his contentious report on the government's Iraq weapons dossier of September 2002.
http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=entertainmentNews&storyID=451052§ion=newsThe rot has started. They interviewed the writer on BBC radio, and he said even he hadn't been told exactly which lines had been cut.
It's usually a funny programme anyway (the radio version is better than the TV one they did last year, IMHO). It's on 1830 GMT Thursday (
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/radio4_promo.shtml on the Internet).
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