Nicholas Parsons: joke about my age as much as you like The BBC has repeatedly been accused of ageism over its lack of older, female presenters with Miriam O'Reilly, 55, winning an age discrimination case last year over her dismissal from Countryfile. Anna Ford, 68, who left the BBC six years ago, last weekend accused the BBC of "tokenism" over its bid to combat the accusations by hiring a handful of female broadcasters in their fifties and sixties, saying more should have been done sooner. Speaking about the ageism row, Parsons said: "I feel very strongly it should be based on talent. Sometimes people get older and they age more rapidly than other people. If you've got the talent for the job they should go on employing you. And you don't bring in someone new because they're younger. You bring in someone different because they've got a different talent or a different perspective. Parsons said he was confident the programme, in which guests must talk lucidly on a designated subject for a minute, would succeed on television despite previous failed attempts to bring it to screens. He admitted that his attempts to keep the show relevant and fast-moving had alienated some former regular guests but said the show would not have survived so long in its original form. Clement Freud, he said, had "got a bit crabbit" in his later years and resented attempts to modernise the programme while Wendy Richard had been too "miserable" for an audience show. He said: "Clement Freud was always a bit narky and in his autobiography criticised me because he wanted to keep it the way it had started - a very sort of gentle, intellectual show where people like him and others would show off their knowledge and erudition. I maintain if we'd gone down that route we would have gone the same way as My Music and My Word. Excellent shows - but of their time. They had their sell-by date. On Richard, he added: "I was very fond of her but she used to look miserable in Just a Minute. And if you're doing an audience show you've got to look as if you're enjoying yourself. "She'd say to me, "Nicholas, why aren't I back doing that show? You know I love doing it and I think I'm quite good. And I'd say, "Wendy you're marvellous and I've suggested you should come back." But I couldn't say to her, "Darling - chill out a bit. Enjoy it.""