Cameron scolded over Ross show

David Cameron should not have gone on the show, said Lord Tebbit

Former Tory minister Lord Tebbit has scolded David Cameron for being part of an "obscene" interview about Margaret Thatcher with Jonathan Ross.

The BBC chat show host asked the Tory leader on Friday if he ever had schoolboy sexual fantasies about the former prime minister.

Lord Tebbit said on the BBC's Sunday AM that Mr Cameron had made an "awful mistake" by appearing on the Ross show.

The BBC said it stood by the interview, screened after the 9pm watershed.

Mr Cameron changed the subject when asked if he had fantasies about Lady Thatcher "in stockings", and later laughed off another suggestive question.

Lord Tebbit said Mr Cameron had been "thoroughly embarrassed by Ross using the occasion for making an obscene attack on - and I use the word literally, obscene - on Margaret Thatcher".

"He should never have been there," he said.

The former Tory minister, a close ally of Lady Thatcher, also told the Daily Mail that the BBC ought to take action against Ross.

"The BBC was always against Lady Thatcher; now it is stooping to childish abuse," he said.

A BBC spokeswoman said 27 complaints had been received about the programme, with four related to Ross's interview with Mr Cameron.