Angus Deayton faced his sternest critics last night following revelations of his cocaine-snorting sex romps. Steve Pratt watched as he was thrown to the Have I Got News For You lions.

When presenter Richard Bacon was caught taking drugs, the head of children's TV appeared grim-faced on the nation's screens to announce that his Blue Peter badge was being taken away and he was being expelled from BBC Television Centre.

When Have I Got News For You host Angus Deayton's nights of cocaine-fuelled sex with a prostitute were revealed, the main thought was the ratings boost it would give the programme.

Auntie's more permissive these days. In the late 1980s, Grandstand and Nationwide front man Frank Bough was banished from the airwaves for attending sex-and-drugs parties. But in January, ex-Live And Kicking presenter Jamie Theakston's visit to a bondage dungeon and vice girls was treated as a drunken lark.

After apologising to family and friends for the embarrassment, he was allowed to present Top Of The Pops as normal. His worst punishment - outside the dungeon - was to become the butt of jokes by writers and comedians for a few days.

If the BBC was required to ban everyone who'd indulged in sexual activity with someone other than their partner or had sniffed, snorted or inhaled an illegal substance, it would be reduced to screening the test card round the clock.

All a suitably red-faced Deayton was required to do was grin and bear it on last night's edition of Have I Got News For You. Being mocked by regular team captains Ian Hislop and Paul Merton was Auntie's way of rapping him over the knuckles for his less-than-gentlemanly behaviour.

As soon as Sunday tabloid revelations about sex romps with a vice girl and snorting cocaine in hotel bedrooms became public knowledge, the script for his comeuppance began to take shape.

Friend and top PR Matthew Freud embarked on a damage limitation programme. Allegedly (to use one of the quiz's favourite words), a deal was struck to ensure tabloid tittle-tattle was as positive as possible in the circumstances.

His partner Lise Meyer, with whom he has a child, agreed to stand by her man, while Deayton himself high-tailed it to his Italian farmhouse to dodge door-stepping photographers in the wake of the expose.

His real punishment was yesterday's trial by television. Those who live by the comic sword must expect to die by the comic sword. Deayton, in the news quiz and his other presenting roles, has perfected the smug put-down. He makes a living from ridiculing others' peccadilloes and making snide remarks about those in the news.

He could expect no mercy. A public humiliation, in front of eight million or so viewers, was only to be expected. And if he showed he could take it as well as give it out, his reputation wouldn't suffer.

This outcome suited BBC executives, who've milked the situation for all it's worth. The week-long publicity could only boost ratings on the night the show faced stiff competition as a new Big Brother series began on Channel 4.

As the show was recorded on Thursday night, the BBC had ample time to decide exactly how severe a comic drubbing Deayton should receive. It's well known that recordings last much longer than the 30-minute time slot, so executives had time to trim anything too offensive.

The other guests, London Mayor Ken Livingstone and comic Dave Gorman, were reduced to cameo roles as regular jokesters Hislop and Merton wasted no opportunity to make fun of Deayton's misdemeanours. PR guru Max Clifford has no doubt that facing the viewing public was the right thing for Deayton to do. "He's got to try and make as much fun of himself as possible," he says.

"He's got to take it all with as much grace as he can possibly muster. Otherwise he wouldn't be able to do his job every week. He would just make it worse for himself, and people would turn against him."

Another public relations consultant, Kizzi Nkwocha, says: "If he gives the impression he is a big personality who can laugh at himself, he will find the public will warm to him even more than they have done in the past."

For viewers, this was the chance to see the biter bit - a comic replay of Gladiator as Deayton was thrown to the lions, in the shape of Hislop and Merton, while armchair spectators cheered for the witty barbs to strike home.