C-bomb sends ripples across BBC radio

It is such an obvious trap that you would think any professional broadcaster would be able to steer around it, but yesterday two of the BBC's most experienced presenters fell right in.

Disaster No 1 occurred just before 8am local time on Radio 4's flagship programme, Today, as its presenter, Jim Naughtie, read out a routine announcement about what was coming later in the programme.

In the process, he created what will surely be remembered in Britain as the funniest broadcasting blooper of 2010, with the original slip-up enriched by Naughtie's valiant but doomed efforts to keep talking without laughing.

What he meant to say was: "First up, after the news, we're going to be talking to Jeremy Hunt, the Culture Secretary ..." But somehow, the hard "C" in "Culture" slipped forward and attached itself to the front of the minister's surname.

Naughtie instantly corrected himself, but a second or two later, the import of what he had said hit him and he involuntarily snorted with laughter, and then tried to disguise the noise as a cough.

Then suddenly the airwaves went silent. Naughtie was supposed to announce the time and read the headlines, but he was in no state to do so, and no one came to his rescue. With no choice but to struggle on, his attempts to disguise his laughter weakened with each phrase he uttered.

His co-presenter, Evan Davis, handled the interview with Jeremy Hunt. Naughtie came back on air after 20 minutes, having got a grip on himself, and apologised for the slip that he blamed on "a certain Dr Spooner" - a reference to a Victorian professor renowned for unintentionally switching the first letters or syllables of words. Naughtie added: "Some of you thought it was funny, some of you were frankly offended. All I can say is that occasionally, in live broadcasting, these things happen and I am very sorry to anybody who thought it wasn't what they wanted to hear over breakfast. Needless to say, neither did I."

Disaster No 2 followed a little over an hour later, during Radio 4's Start the Week programme, hosted by Andrew Marr, who discussed Naughtie's Freudian slip with his studio guests. "We're not going to repeat in quite the terms it happened," Marr promised - and then went ahead and did exactly what he had said he would not do. He immediately corrected himself and apologised, saying: "It's very hard to talk about it without saying it."

As if to make it a treble, the Home Office Minister Nick Herbert let slip the same word in the Commons that afternoon when he meant to say "cut".

- Independent