The government announced today that it was creating a new ministry, complete with its own building in Whitehall, to deal with any issues recently raised by a hard-hitting TV drama.
“Now I know what you’re going to say - policy-making shouldn’t be dictated by television programmes,” said Toby Shirtsleeves, the first Minister for Whatever was Recently on Telly. “But on the other hand… well, the thing you have to realise… yes, I think we need to come up with a better answer for this before we go public.”
An early plan to site the ministry within Broadcasting House, in the hope they would get wind of programmes while they were still being made rather than waiting for them to be shown, was nixed on the grounds that it’s never the BBC that makes these programmes anyway.
Critics have suggested this reactive approach to policy-making might mean that certain issues, like teenage boys falling prey to toxic online “influencers” or sub-postmasters being wrongly accused of fraud, receive more government attention than, say, the amount of sewage pumped into our rivers and seas by negligent water companies.
“Yes, I think the nation’s screenwriters have really dropped the ball on that one,” agreed Shirtsleeves. “They need to be more proactive - don’t wait for someone to commission you, just write the thing and submit it to everyone you can find. How else will we ever get to the point where the government is pressured into doing the bare minimum to make it look like we’re taking it seriously?”
Some have said this whole approach is symptomatic of a populist government that never looks beyond the next day’s headlines, leading Shirtsleeves to reply “Are you sure? I didn’t see anything about it on telly.”