It’s actually quite rare that people swear on live radio. It’s even rarer for a politician to do so. If they do, it can have very serious consequences for the radio station concerned. It only takes one complaint for OfCom to launch an investigation. On most commercial stations there is a dump button which can either be pressed by the presenter or the producer if they hear something they think is unacceptable. Producers tend to be very zealous in pressing the button for the lightest of swear words, whereas presenters are much more lenient. Many is the time I have remonstrated with a producer for dumping someone who has said something, which in context, I couldn’t see a problem with. I’ve even once been dumped myself for saying ‘bitch’ when I was quoting someone else!

Using the ‘dump button’ invokes the seven second delay. Miss it after seven seconds and it’s too late. Some presenters leave it all to the producer but that depends on whether the producer has heard it. Often they can be deep in conversation with the Assistant Producer or Tech Op. Many a ‘fuck’ or ‘shit’ has been missed because of that! They will protest that they can’t be across every second of the output but management will respond that this is indeed exactly what their job is. Several times I have used the ‘dump button’ and incurred the grateful thanks of the producer. But let’s not run away with the thought that it happens all the time. In nine years on air, I’ve probably pressed the ‘dump button’ twenty times.

OfCom have published their list of offensive words, and graded them. You can read the full list HERE.

These are words that Ofcom class as “mild”. No sniggering at the back please…

“Arse, Bloody, Bugger, Cow, Crap, Damn, Ginger, Git, God, Goddam, Jesus Christ, Minger, Sod-off”

I am pretty sure I have said 8 of those on air. I do remember blurting out a ‘bugger’ fairly recently, which was dumped by my producer.

These are the words that Ofcom classes as “strong”. I suspect you’ll now be unable to stifle a snigger…

“Bastard, Beaver, Beef curtains, Bellend, Bloodclaat, Clunge, Cock, Dick, Dickhead, Fanny, Flaps, Gash, Knob, Minge, Prick, Punani, Pussy, Snatch, Twat”

I can categorically say I have never used any of those. There are only three words in the ‘Strongest’ category…

“Cunt, Fuck, Motherfucker”

One wonders what has happened to the words ‘wanker’ and ‘tosser’ as they don’t seem to be listed.

Which leads me on to the reason for this post.

I had an example recently where an MP was in the studio for a live interview and was talking about overcrowded trains. I admit I wasn’t paying particular attention as I was thinking what to ask next, but I then heard this…

“And sometimes it’s so overcrowded you might as well give the person next to you a handjob…”

Gulp. It was followed up with…

“Sorry, maybe I shouldn’t have said that.”

I looked through the glass at my producer who immediately said in my ear…

“I’ve dumped it.”

Now, she was absolutely right to do that, but there was a big part of me that was very annoyed she’d heard it as I am sure it would have made quite a big story in one of the papers.

At the end of the interview I thanked the MP as usual and made no reference to the faux pas, because no one had heard it apart from those in the studio. The MP has no idea we dumped it and to this day will still labour under the belief that it went out to the nation. It didn’t.

The reason I’m writing about this is to illustrate the farce of the Ofcom rules. We have the whole thing captured on video, including the look on my face when it was said. LBC could quite happily put it on their website. I could include it in this blog and suffer no consequences at all from Ofcom, yet if it had gone out over the airwaves we could have had our knuckles rapped or been fined. Utterly ludicrous.

As a presenter I like to treat my audience like adults. I don’t see the harm in the odd ‘bloody’ or ‘bollocks’ on air, depending on the context. I draw the line at some of the more serious words, especially during daytime radio, but if the odd ‘twat’ is said in an overnight show, is anyone really going to be offended? Well, there’s always one, I suppose. But so what.

We live in 2018, not 1898.