Brussels Sprouts prove healthy fodder for best modern cracker joke

Puns about Jeremy Corbyn, Roy Hodgson and Sports Direct also make it into the top 10, as part of the poll of original material by TV comedy channel Gold.

Amateur comedians were challenged to write their own festive funnies for the competition, which were put to an anonymous public vote to reveal the winning gags.

The winning submission was from Laura Don, who received a £1,500 holiday voucher.

The entry, polling 20% of the vote, reads: How will Christmas dinner be different after Brexit? No Brussels.

Critic Bruce Dessau, who headed the judging panel, said: “One thing the British will always be good at is finding the funny side to almost any situation, and it’s no surprise that Brexit featured as one of the dominant topics of this year’s jokes.

“But it wasn’t all about the EU - there were lots of cracking gags, with this year’s news about Sports Direct, BHS and Bake Off also featuring in winning one-liners - all of which will hopefully get the Great British public laughing their socks off, as well as being the perfect way to launch the series of Christmas specials on Gold.”

Entries were submitted via Twitter and shortlisted by a panel of judges before being put to a public vote of 2,000 British adults.

The top six jokes are included in bespoke boxes of Christmas Gold crackers, which were presented to this year’s winners.