The trouble with Nick Robinson’s Thoughts for the Day

Thought for the Day appears every morning on BBC Radio 4. This preachy slot is hallowed by longevity, if not because of its content. But when Nick Robinson presents the accompanying Today programme, he often uses the moment after the hourly news and papers to contribute a political Thought for the Day of his own. Before he settles down to attack a government minister with his dentist’s drill, Nick likes to deliver his own wisdom about the foolishness of political leaders. ‘Making promises is easy,’ he told listeners on Tuesday. ‘Explaining how you’ll pay for them is rather harder, as the Chancellor and the Prime Minister are beginning to discover.’ What is the point of such remarks? Can there be a single listener who needs telling that promises are more easily made than fulfilled? Is it credible that the Chancellor and Prime Minister (‘beginning to discover’) have never thought of this before? The purpose – perhaps unconscious – of Nick’s Thoughts is to establish the superiority of interviewer over ministerial victim. This may be factually correct: we may agree with Nick that he is more brilliant than anyone who holds elected office. But it serves the licence-payer badly. The interviewer is not supposed to interpose his body (or his brain) between the listener and the politician, but to assist communication between the two.

While following the coverage of Michael Gove’s intrigues at the Conservative conference, I happened to be re-reading Right Ho, Jeeves. I found the following words highly applicable. ‘To be quite candid, Jeeves,’ says Bertie Wooster, ‘I have frequently noticed before now a tendency or disposition on your part to become – what’s the word?’ ‘I could not say, sir.’ ‘Eloquent? No, it’s not eloquent. Elusive? No, it’s not elusive. It’s on the tip of my tongue. Begins with an e and means being a jolly sight too clever.’