Jimmy Savile, once the biggest star in the BBC's pop pantheon, was obsessed with sex and that fact came to light during his many visits to Ireland in the early Seventies.

According to the Daily Mail the disgraced media personality who was revealed to be a pedophile after his death was heard making suggestive comments to young Irish girls he met, sometimes in front of their own parents. Later he bounced young girls on his knee without challenge.

The star, most famous for his turns on Top of the Pops and Jim'll Fix It, was a regular visitor to Ireland throughout his decades long career and for the first time an eyewitness has come forward to document his behavior.

RTE's former head of entertainment David Blake Knox, who was paid to spend a day with Savile while he attended a charity event in Ireland in the 1970s has come forward with a shocking portrait of the British DJ and charity fundraiser.

'My abiding memory of Jimmy Savile is that he talked about sex the whole time. I was actually quite shocked because I wasn't used to hearing adults talking about sex as crudely as he did. The way he talked about young women was shocking. I remember him making suggestive comments to young girls sometimes in front of their parents, and even priests,' Blake Knox told the Evening Herald.

Knox, 59, said he did not see Savile molesting any girls, but recalled that he felt uncomfortable in Savile's company.

'His behaviour around girls was creepy, suggestive and inappropriate. He would put his arm around them, and cosy up to them.'

Blake Knox said that the function Savile was attending was a fundraiser and his abiding memory of the day is the sycophancy shown to Savile by everyone who met him.

'People fawned around him and were almost reverential in the way they reacted to him. I thought he was a lech but never realised he was a criminal and into underage sex,' said Blake Knox.

The Central Remedial Clinic, which Savile fundraised for, told the press that it was unaware of any allegations about Savile during or after his involvement with the charity, and that at no time had he been left unattended with children in his care during his visits to Ireland.

Meanwhile British comedian Freddie Starr has been arrested for a second time by detectives investigating the Savile sex scandal, which has opened 400 lines of inquiry based on testimony from 200 witnesses.

Starr, 70, was first arrested in November last year over claims he tried to grope a woman when she was 14.

The investigation into Savile has been split into three strands - allegations against him, those against him and others, and those against others.

Starr was reportedly arrested under the 'Savile and others' strand, but his re-arrest was not linked to Savile. He has denied any wrongdoing.

Starr's detention for the second time follows the arrests of pop star Gary Glitter, DJ Dave Lee Travis, publicist Max Clifford, comedian Jim Davidson and entertainer Rolf Harris.

Starr, Travis, Clifford and Davidson have all publicly denied any wrong-doing and gave statements after their arrests.