TV presenter Jeremy Clarkson has been criticised by the media watchdog Ofcom for using a term which was "capable of giving offence to homosexual people".
The Top Gear host described a vehicle on the BBC Two show last July as being "very ginger beer", taken to be rhyming slang for the term "queer".
Ofcom said there was "no justification for using the word in this way".
In December, the BBC complaints unit said there has been "no editorial purpose" for the remarks.
Ofcom said the complaint had been resolved because the BBC had already warned the production team and producers not to repeat the offence.
The regulator decided the use of the word "gay" was not necessarily offensive, but Clarkson's use of the term was "clearly linking the reference to homosexual people".
Clarkson used the phrase during a discussion with the studio audience about the two-seater Daihatsu Copen.
Last year, he was cleared of making a racist slur about Germany because this was adjudged to be amusing rather than offensive.
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