It is not the worst felony on Boris Johnson’s Egyptian scroll of a rap sheet but the shambolic former prime minister has bequeathed to his political successors a nervous broadcast media that is allowing Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer to escape the mockery they really deserve.
The mealy-mouthed leaders of Britain’s two main parties are living through a time in Westminster history when the art of political lampooning has been knocked out of kilter by the calculated media bullying and deliberate self-caricature of Johnson and his confederate in populism Donald Trump.
The Economist this month formally declared a “bust” period in the ancient cycle of British satire, bemoaning that because Sunak and Starmer do not show the eccentricities of Johnson or Liz Truss, they are simplistically designated as “grown-ups” when their cynical ambition cries out for a verbal takedown.
Supporting evidence for this “satire bust” thesis includes the demise of several satirical TV shows, notably Mock The Week, The Mash Report and Frankie Boyle’s New World Order, which were all canned by the BBC last year. ITV gave up on its expensive relaunch of Spitting Image after two series.
Yet the success in print of Private Eye suggests that the public appetite for satirical content has not abated. Britain’s biggest news and current affairs magazine grew circulation by 5 per cent last year.
Editor Ian Hislop rejects the idea that the extravagance of Johnson and Trump makes Sunak and Starmer look grey and uninteresting to readers. “If your politicians are a bit duller, satire is slightly easier because you don’t have to exaggerate so much” he says. “The cynicism of the current two is absolutely ripe for satire.”
Although the Eye does not confine its satire to political targets, its regular features include “The New Prime Minister’s Highly Confidential WhatsApp Group”, which imagines Sunak’s self-serving phone-based interactions with colleagues, such as Tory deputy chairman Lee “Anderthal” Anderson.
The magazine has a spoof Keir Starmer column that depicts the Labour leader as the computer-generated character Max Headroom.
Hislop is, of course, a team captain on Have I Got News For You, the great survivor of satirical TV. HIGNFY has been accused of abetting Johnson’s cultivation of a buffoon persona by repeatedly booking him. But it gleefully celebrated Boris’s political resignation. “I always disliked him,” says Hislop. “I tried to get him when he came on the show. I was often criticised for being obsessed by Boris but I think it was worth being obsessed by him.”
In spite of the resilience of BBC1’s HIGNFY, Hislop has an explanation for the current pressures on satirists. “The fact that the BBC dropped three shows might be more a sign of their nervousness about satire than the fact that nobody likes satire.”
Having championed the 60s British satire boom with That Was The Week That Was, the BBC – now governed by Ofcom and cowed by threats to its funding from Johnson and his cohorts – has become “scared” of the genre, says Jon Thoday, co-founder of comedy powerhouse Avalon.
“The impartiality rules make it very hard to do because, really, satire is partial. For some reason, in the 1960s it was all right for the BBC but now it’s not,” he says. “I don’t think the partiality rules for serious television and news should extend to entertainment shows.”
The result, he believes, is that satirists are denied TV opportunities that live ticket sales suggest they merit. Matt Forde’s Inside No. 10 show has been hugely popular on the Edinburgh Fringe this year but the hit podcaster is overlooked by big broadcasters.
Satirical talent, says Thoday, is “definitely out there, but because broadcasters aren’t championing it you don’t see it”. Hislop points to “a generation of really funny stuff online in terms of satirical pieces”.
When Louis Theroux gave the Edinburgh Television Festival MacTaggart Lecture on Wednesday, he said an “atmosphere of anxiety” and fear of “giving offence” was undermining TV’s confidence in risk-taking.
Guest opportunities remain on affable panel formats such as Channel 4’s Taskmaster and SkyMax’s reboot of Never Mind the Buzzcocks but, in another era, witty commentators on our political and social culture like Ahir Shah and Nabil Abdulrashid would have their own shows.
The danger is that comedians turn away from satire. Shah aside, satirists were missing among nominations at this year’s Edinburgh Comedy Awards. Nica Burns, awards director, said there was a determinedly “optimistic” mood among the nominees. “They want to make people laugh and forget their troubles for a while.”
Yes, the world is beset by problems. But the political leaders who create them too often use the media for their own ends. They should be subjected to the barbed observations of satire, and broadcasters must find the courage to support that.
