'Wank week' postponed

Channel 4 has postponed transmission of its "wank week" programming in a bid to avoid further controversy in the aftermath of the Celebrity Big Brother racism row.

The network's short season of three late night documentaries about masturbation was to have been broadcast next month, but has now been taken out of the schedule.

They are expected to be broadcast at a later date, but it is understood they may be broadcast separately and certainly not as part of a branded wank week season.

There is said to be concern at senior levels within Channel 4 about the negative publicity the masturbation documentaries have already attracted.

A number of public figures has used wank week to claim that standards are slipping at Channel 4, including former ITV chief executive Charles Allen in his MacTaggart lecture in Edinburgh last August.