Tim Davie is worried about Tory bashing on the BBC – so I’m afraid the news, like The Mash Report, must now be axed

So long then, The Mash Report. Not so much cancelled as rescheduled, from Friday nights on BBC Two to the white hot heart of the UK culture war.

Was it cancelled because its time had come? Or was it, as “BBC sources” have told The Sun, the first victory for new BBC director general Tim Davie in his “war against woke lefties”?

It can, of course, be a bit of both. The Mash Report had its moments, and some of them may have been less than outstanding. But as someone who has, for the entire four years in which the show aired, also been trying to write political satire and is easy to contact on social media, I know that both I and others can confirm it is not always easy.

How does one satirise that which is already beyond satire? Armando Iannucci has said countless times that the job of poking fun at politics is now far beyond even a man of his gifts. What can you do when nine times out of 10, there is no way of making events more ridiculous than just writing them down?

How, for example, do you satirise the following? The BBC appoints a new director general whose first act in the job is to tell his staff they can’t go on marches because of the threat of “perceived bias”. Not actual bias, just perceived. Oh, and what do you know, this chap who now runs the BBC and is determined to liberate it from any perception at all that it could be anything less than entirely politically neutral, also once stood for election as a Tory Party councillor and was deputy chair of his local Conservative Association.

Look, none of us are saying Tim Davie has a politically biased bone in his body. Accidentally running for elected office can happen to anyone.

And there’s also no reason to believe that, just because he’s started with the “Tory bashing” Mash Report, his honourable crusade against perceived bias won’t reach all the way to the top in the end.

It will be fascinating to see what will now come along on Friday nights, to meet this new, rather tricky brief of political satire, that’s funny, but not too mean about the government. There are only 125,000 dead, after all.

The BBC is never happier than when very publicly self-flagellating, and it is also always looking for ways to save money, so perhaps some kind of Line of Duty/W1A synergy might do the job.

We follow Tim Davie and his fearless quest to root perceived bias out of the BBC. First, the junior script editor off Peaky Blinders is slung for some bad tweets, then The Mash Report’s cancelled and then all of a sudden we’re in the interview room, and there’s the big guy looking sheepish.

“Mr Davie, do you recognise this picture? For the benefit of the tape, it’s you, in 1994, knocking on doors wearing a dirty great big blue rosette.”

“Urgent Exit Required.” Ideally to the top job at a FTSE-100 media company.

Of course, the most certain proof that the BBC isn’t biased is that absolutely everybody thinks it is. Brexiteers hate the BBC. Jeremy Corbyn hates the BBC. Hating the BBC is the only thing that unites them both. Well, that and Brexit.

As the makers of The Mash Report and anyone else in their line of work knows, satire is very hard when events are self-satirising. When the mere act of saying out loud what the prime minister has done cannot be done without sounding like mockery, other parts of the BBC should start panicking now.

The BBC and we, its mere viewers, are coming up to a series of somewhat troubling anniversaries. If bashing the Tories gets you taken off air, can you afford, for example, to risk pointing out that it’s a year since Boris Johnson went on live television and bragged about going into a hospital and shaking hands with coronavirus patients?

That’s not satire. It’s straight reportage. But who can possibly tell?

Do you even dare point out that there are 125,000 dead, who knows how many as a result of the prime minister ignoring the advice of his own scientists for fear of upsetting too many people by cancelling Christmas?

Nope, this Tory bashing just won’t do. The news will have to go. [Flashback, we’re in the DG’s office.]

And Match of the Day while you’re at it; that Lineker’s been tweeting again. And Attenborough, still wanging on about climate change, is he? That guy just sees everything from the polar bear’s perspective. He’s gone on long enough.

Homes Under the Hammer? Homes under the hammer and sickle more like. Get rid.

Fade to black.

Pause.

Lights up.

Mrs Brown is thumbing a copy of the Radio Times. The TV listings show nothing but Mrs Brown’s Boys, across all BBC channels, 24 hours a day. The studio audience laughs hysterically.

Cut to close up. Slow motion. The wig is removed, the make up wiped away.

No. It can’t be? It’s him. It’s really him. It’s Davie! It was always Davie!

I told you, I told you it went all the way to the top!

Gun shots. Sirens. Credits roll.

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