Andy Richardson: 'With so much levity, it’s time for grace and dignity'
When the BBC was rumoured to be seeking more right-wing comedians to balance those from the left, new Director General Tim Davie could not have been expecting so many to come forward.
Showreels from Tony Abbott, the former Australian Prime Minister, who had a penchant for jokes that might have earned him a slot on a Bernard Manning cabaret circa 1972.
Abbo is threatened by homosexuality, says abortion is the easy way out, believes men are more suited to lead, reckons climate change is probably doing good, believes there’s a war to keep out asylum seekers on boats, doesn’t believe all cultures are equal and has likened unemployment to the Holocaust. He’s just the man, therefore, to lead British trade negotiations in a new post-Brexit era where we no longer have the might of Europe to bolster us.
Don’t imagine Abbo is behind the times, either, he’s got great lines on Covid – like letting the elderly die. Boom boom.
If Abbo’s show, Operation Moon Shot, doesn’t connect with the masses, we could always reprise Hancock’s Half Hour, starring Matt Hancock, in which the Health Secretary provides bone-judderingly awkward interviews on, you guessed it, his new trade envoy colleague, Abbo.
And if those don’t challenge Ant & Dec in the ratings war, Davie could always turn to the joker in his pack, Boris, with a new series for kids. Playing whack-a-mole with life-sized moles and creating CBeebies programmes on making buses from cardboard boxes, the PM could also give careers advice – like how not to get sacked from jobs for lying.
With so much levity, it’s time for grace and dignity. The legacy of Wolverhampton’s Windrush campaigner Paulette Wilson will survive for generations. Her sharing of experience helped to safeguard others whose lives would otherwise have been destroyed.
A force for good whose background in Telford and Wolverhampton affected many, she lost her benefits and was sent to a detention centre but had the courage to speak out. In doing so, she shone on a light on a risible and inhumane Government policy and became an inspiration to many. Though her bravery, fortitude and quiet strength live on, it must not be beyond the means of local decision makers to create some form of permanent memorial to a local woman who represented the best of us. Against the jokers who populate the news, she was a true hero.
