Last night's 'Tower Block of Commons' on Channel 4 was highly illuminating. Not only did it show Mark Oatcakes in a good light for once as some one willing to meet and engage with people in all circumstances, it also made the deck-shoed Tory shadow minister (posh name, anonymous face) look equally positive as a role model for politicians. Ian Duncan-Smith started badly, patronising his host unbelievably ("You know Big Ben? Well the building below is where I work...") and then had to leave due to his wife's illness. Fair enough.
But plaudits for sheer front and ghastliness go to Old Labour lag Austin Mitchell. Mitchell, the finest Labour could offer to this interesting social experiment, was quite simply a snob. This horny handed son of toil with his authentic northern accent refused to live with a council tenant as the programme had planned, insisted his partner came along with him to help him to patronise the people he met (when she is down she doesn't reach for a drug of choice but a nice New Zealand Chardonnay, apparently. What larks!) and then went to a friend's house for a sumptuous meal to avoid the indignity of having to eat the kind of food fit for his constituents. During the day he went with the woman he deigned to share a tower block with - being given his own flat to avoid having to mix with 'common' people - to get her methodone fix for the day. His response was quite Panglossian: he simply went into denial in front of the cameras and wittered about getting the daily papers.
I hope Mitchell is standing down in May because if he isn't those traditional Labour voters might choose to give their view on this hideous man's approach to them. But then, that's the trouble with labour voters: not only would they vote for a donkey if it had a red rosette on, it seems they will even vote for someone who has clambered up the greasy pole and is now busy kicking out violently at those seeking to follow him.
Great programme, as much for what it said of the three parties and how little the big two have changed as what it said about the often atrocious conditions people still have to live in across the country. The Tory was astonishingly posh but very affable and approachable, Oatcakes was the image of the good LD activist and Mitchell was a selfish, small-minded 'socialist' of the old school. Quite what the legacy of New Labour, suburban John Major and Grocer's daughter Margaret Thatcher has been in terms of changing the fundamentals of our society is put into sharp focus when programmes like this are aired. The best thing is that we are on the side of the angels, which is not a phrase I would readily have attached to Oatcakes beforehand.
To end on a positive note, by far the best performance came from a delightful little girl who came up to the camera during a walkabout and made the most lucid and sensible points about problems around the area, including drugs and regular assaults. Her comments were followed by images of kids being kids, which always inspires confidence for the future. Perhaps this little girl should be sent to Parliament instead of Mitchell as she at least inhabits the real world.
Image to end on: MPs concluding a particularly fiery and divisive debate to go and sit on a load of cushions at the end of the chamber to drink their milk and have some quiet time. We can dream...