GLASGOW'S annual comedy festival is back for its 13th year, with more than 400 shows at 46 venues in the city.

As well as well-known comedy names such as Frankie Boyle, Jimmy Carr, Dylan Moran and Stewart Lee, the festival will also feature special events including a discussion on the state of political comedy in the run-up to the looming General Election.

There will also be specially programmed films at three venues - Cineworld, The Grosvenor and Govanhill Baths - which will include a celebration of the late Robin Williams.

The political event, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Westminster is being hosted by Herald and Sunday Herald writer Iain MacWhirter at the Citizen's Theatre on March 26.

The festival, which runs from March 12-29, will offer 106,000 tickets for the shows.

Tommy Sheppard, director of the festival organiser's the Scottish Comedy Agency, said as the festival enters its "teenage years" it has reached "a plateau" of how big it can be in the city.

"We cannot really grow much more in the city," he said.

"We are very pleased with it and how things went last year, I think audiences reacted favourably.

"But comedy has taken a bit of a hit in recent years, it is not recession-proof: there are not as many gigs as there used to be and some venues have been reducing the nights of comedy - we have tried to resist that at The Stand [which he runs] and so far we have managed to do so."

Headline acts include Jimmy Carr, Dylan Moran and Stewart Lee who will all perform at the Clyde Auditorium.

Fred MacAulay is part of a King's Theatre programme which also includes Al Murray, Tom Stade and Michelle McManus.

The King's Theatre line up also includes a gala benefit to raise in support of Gordon Aikman's campaign to raise funds for MND Scotland, featuring Boyle and Stewart Francis.

At the Citizens Theatre, the comedy festival will take over for a full two-week run with a line-up including Shappi Khorsandi, Paul Chowdhry, Mark Steel and John Shuttleworth.

Scottish acts include Jerry Sadowitz at the King's Theatre, Susan Calman and Des Clarke in the Citizens Theatre, and Craig Hill, Hardeep Singh Kohli and Phil Differ in Oran Mor.