Coalition wear and tear

Let’s talk about Tucker. The Beeb’s mockumentary The Thick of It has been hailed as a brilliantly incisive glimpse into the corridors of power, and its diabolical protagonist, the scheming spin-merchant Malcolm Tucker, is regarded as a hilarious portrait of a modern political propagandist. That’s one view, anyway. Maybe I’ve got a blind spot. Maybe my sense of humour’s gone missing. Maybe I romanticise the ideals of public service because my mum and dad worked in Whitehall, but I’ve never understood the praise heaped on this cruel and distorted fantasy.

It’s possible to overlook the relentless swearing, the vapid characterisation and the ever-predictable storylines. It’s even possible, although it’s much harder, to ignore the scriptwriters’ self-imposed ‘squashed testicle’ quota, which stipulates that a new variety of scrotal mutilation must be mentioned every two minutes. But what’s impossible to accept is that Malcolm Tucker could work as a ministerial adviser. An obsessive violent thug like him would be unemployable by a firm of bailiffs, never mind by the government.