After the war, he began to work as a comedy actor on radio in "Waterlogged Spa", alongside Eric Barker, and "Puffney Post Office" in which he played a hapless old postman with the catch-phrase "It doesn't matter what you do, as long as you tears them up." On 15 November 1948, at the Wood Green Empire, he was billed as "The Most Versatile Voice in Radio – Jon ('Tear 'em Up') Pertwee from the Radio Shows "Merry-go-Round" and "Up the Pole"". From 1959 to 1977, he performed the role of the conniving Chief Petty Officer Pertwee in "The Navy Lark" on BBC Radio. The fictional ship in the series HMS "Troutbridge" almost shared its name with the real HMS "Troubridge" whose commanding officer was a relative of Pertwee's who wrote to the BBC to provide details of comic incidents on the ship which were then used in " The Navy Lark's" scripts. After Ronnie Barker left the series Pertwee took on various additional roles in the series. These included a villainous character called the Master, whose voice Pertwee said was an impression of Herbert Beerbohm Tree. Pertwee did not appear in the 1959 film version of "The Navy Lark". In his 1996 memoir he attributed this to producer Herbert Wilcox refusing to employ his co-star Dennis Price on the grounds that "he was gay", a decision Pertwee made clear that he thought "was ridiculous". Shortly after voicing his support of Price he found out he had been dropped from the film's cast and replaced by Ronald Shiner.