Wurzelgate: Shamed Ant and Dec TV show 'duped viewers by allowing fake fan to meet with band'

ITV has begun an investigation after allegations that viewers were duped when the Geordie presenters interviewed a stand-in instead of the real guest.

Viewers saw the duo "surprise" a member of the audience for their show's "Jim Didn't Fix It" slot - an updated version of the BBC1 show Jim'll Fix It - in which Ant and Dec made wishes come true for people who had written to the original programme.

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The presenters told the audience the man, apparently called George Adams, had always wanted to meet West Country band The Wurzels, whose Seventies hits included I've Got A Brand New Combine Harvester - and then revealed them on stage and introduced them to "Mr Adams".

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Yet "George Adams" was actually George Allen, a record producer behind The Wurzels' latest album, Never Mind The Bullocks, 'Ere's The Wurzels.

According to The Wurzels' manager, Mr Allen had been drafted in at the last minute with the approval of ITV producers after the real fan had failed to turn up for the show.

The fakery allegations come days after the show was criticised in a report by ITV's auditors Deloitte.

Deloitte found that Takeaway was one of three shows which conned viewers out of £7.8million in premium-rate phone charges through rigged competitions.

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The Serious Fraud Office is reviewing evidence about ITV's breakfast show GMTV, and may widen its investigation to include Takeaway, Soapstar Superstar and Ant And Dec's Gameshow Marathon.

Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly issued a statement yesterday saying they were "upset" by the findings and insisted they had no idea the phone competitions were not run properly.

The fake guest appeared in the second series of Takeaway, on ITV in February 2003. Wurzels manager Sil Willcox said: "They had a guy who had written to Jim'll Fix It. We did the second rehearsal and the guy hadn't shown up. I thought we were going to get pulled from the show, so I spoke to one of the producers, "Is this going to happen?"

"They were like, "Don't know, don't know," and there was lots of panic and people rushing around.

So I told the producer, "We've got this guy who will do it.î It was our first national TV in ten years and I could see we were going to get pulled.

"They were quite happy with that [suggestion], so we brought him up to London. It was the guy who had produced their Christmas single, George Allen. I don't know if Ant and Dec knew or not. We only met them afterwards. But the producers certainly knew it wasn't a real fan."

Mr Allen confirmed that he had appeared as the fake guest. He said: "I'd just been working with The Wurzels and Sil had asked me to do him a favour, so I went on the show. I don't want to say any more than that."

MP John Whittingdale, chairman of the Commons Media Select Committee, said: "This is symptomatic of an attitude which has lain behind all these instances - basically that it doesn't matter if you deceive viewers for the sake of making an entertaining programme, that if you have to lie to viewers then that is part of the business. It's not as bad as if you're taking money from people, but it's not acceptable."

An ITV spokesman said: "We are looking into these claims. The producer and the executive producer have since left the company."

A spokesman for Ant and Dec said: "They absolutely know nothing about any claims of fakery during The Wurzels' slot."