DAVID CAMERON has "shown off his sense of humour", delivering a series of gags to an audience of journalists at the annual Westminster correspondents' dinner, The Guardian reports. Here are the PM's five best jokes:
The Bullingdon Club joke
Surveying his audience - who were dressed in black tie - and the grand surroundings of the House of Commons Members' dining room, the PM quipped: "The last time I was at a dinner this posh, Boris [Johnson] spent the rest of the night in prison."
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NB: Cameron and Johnson are both former members of the Bullingdon Club, the notorious Oxford University society famous for wrecking the restaurants at which it dined.
The Boris Johnson joke
The PM recounted a day spent canvassing with the London mayor, when a woman answered their knock on the door with the words: "Boris, you're the father of one of my children."
A moment's horrified flustering by Johnson was ended as she added: "It's your daughter; I'm her maths teacher."
The barber joke
Referring to the controversy over his hairdresser being awarded an MBE in the New Year's Honours, the PM said: "If you can make cuts and stop recession at the same time, you deserve an honour."
The Penny Mordaunt joke
Tory MP Penny Mordaunt's decision to appear on the reality TV show Splash! inspired this wisecrack: "If every Tory MP who's taken their clothes off in recent years had had such noble intentions, we would be in a much better position."
The Ed Balls joke
The PM claimed he had a lot in common with the shadow chancellor. "We both love The Sound of Music, we both love Delia Smith - for different reasons - and we both like The Antiques Roadshow," he said. "I like it for the heartwarming stories, Ed likes it when they sell the family silver."