The ABC will apologise to The Australian's conservative columnist Chris Kenny on air on Wednesday night for offending him in a comedy sketch last year.



The TV apology will be broadcast in the same timeslot as the offending program The Hamster Decides in which Kenny was photoshopped so that it looked like he was having sex with a dog.



A spokesman said the ABC had reached a legal settlement with Kenny and was pleased to see the matter resolved.



The apology reads: “The ABC wishes to apologise to Mr Chris Kenny for the controversial The Hamster Decides skit run by ABC-TV in September last year and which has formed the basis for legal proceedings. This is further to the apology issued by the ABC’s Managing Director, Mark Scott, on 14 April 2014.

“Having reviewed the issue, Mr Scott, as the Editor in Chief of the ABC, has come to the view with the ABC’s Director of Television that the ABC should not have put the skit to air.

“The ABC apologises to Mr Kenny for having put the skit to air, his depiction in the skit and because it was triggered by his criticism of the ABC. The ABC is sorry for the distress this incident has caused Mr Kenny and his family.”

Kenny was reported in the Australian on Wednesday saying the ABC would pay his legal costs and damages.

Despite a personal apology from Scott, Kenny continued to pursue the matter in the courts until the settlement was reached.

"It shouldn't be this hard to get the taxpayer funded national broadcaster to behave decently but at least it's finally happened," Kenny told the Australian.

"I was singled out because I've been a critic of the ABC and it was an attempt to silence me. "



It has been a nine-month war of words between Kenny and the comedians from the Chaser who declined to apologise for the segment even after the managing director’s apology, which the Chaser's Julian Morrow followed by tweeting a mocked up image of Scott having sex with a dog.



An internal review had found the sketch met the ABC's editorial standards for satire.