'It was always going to infuriate some'

The BBC has defended Have I Got News For You against claims it was disrespectful to Lady Thatcher.

The panel on Friday’s show included former London mayor Ken Livingston, who had many run-ins with Thatcher when she was PM.

However the BBC was keen to point out that it was the media coverage of her death that was the butt of any jokes, not Thatcher herself or her legacy.

At one point, Paul Merton made a jibe at Thatcher’s expense after host Brian Blessed called Hislop ‘a goldmine of information’. Merton replied: ‘If Ian was a mine of information, Margaret Thatcher would have closed him down years ago.’

The corporation said it had received a number of complains with ‘some viewers... disappointed by the comments made about the late Lady Thatcher.’

However the BBC complaints department pointed out that it was impossible to ignore such a big story story.

They said: ‘HIGNFY’s purpose is to be entertaining as well as satirical and it has a tradition of irreverence and sailing as close to the wind as possible on the subjects it covers. The very fact that the programme covered the death of Lady Thatcher was always going to infuriate some viewers, however they should know what to expect from the show after 23 years.

‘If you look closely at the content of the show you will see that at no point did we make fun of Lady Thatcher herself or put forward a critique of her record – everything was based around the reaction to her death by other politicians and public figures, and the row over the cost of the funeral.’

Here is how they handled it:

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Published: 16 Apr 2013