Lobotomy central...

The art of making politics accessible to a mass audience is to ask difficult questions simply... not to ask cretinous questions badly.

This did not occur to the BBC when they commissioned The Daily Politics (and briefed its presenters). The Lib Dem leadership edition joins the list of so-bad-it's-a-scream TV along with Flash Gordon and the Lara Croft movies. I only watched about 10 minutes and it's now been replaced on the BBC website by yesterday's edition. But even 10 minutes were sufficient to have me in stitches (Stephen Tall found it more disturbing than funny). Even the timing of the show was brain-dead - carefully scheduled after the last sensible posting date for completed ballots.

The BBC obviously thinks that the average viewer has had their brain fried by reality television and can't concentrate for more than a minute at a time. So each candidate had to make a 60 second video. This meant Chris Huhne had to talkveryveryfasttosayanythingsubstantial.

Whilst he was motor-mouthing away, the camera swerved around like a drunk in a rowing boat. It swung through 180 degrees to take in a small straggle of bored-looking bystanders, zoomed alarmingly on Chris Huhne's nose and then dropped to ground-level which gave him a brooding silhouette like a statue of Lenin.

He was interviewed by Andrew Neil who used to be the UK editor of the Economist but who appeared to be doing a good impression of having received a brain donation from a newt. As the interview went on I realised it wasn't just any old newt but the Paris Hilton of the newt world on a particularly blonde day. In the minutes before I switched it off, the questioning ran something like this (this is from memory so will only be approximate - the Realplayer file is gone and I don't have a transcript... But it should give you a flavour - it was *this* bad):

Paris the Newt (smugly): The Institute of Fiscal Studies has said that your plans to remove the lowest earners from tax would cost £21 billion. How do you intend to pay for this?

Chris Huhne: As I have said in my manifesto, I'm going to raise this money using environmental taxes. I haven't done like David Davis and produced a fully costed plan during the leadership campaign [bunch of stats about contemporary taxes raised through green taxation compared with under Thatcher]. But I've costed our manifestos during previous years and I will bring fully costed plans to autumn party conference which I'm sure will be checked and approved by the IFS as they have previously

[Clever person's next question: You've said that you're going to be paying for tax cuts for the poor through green taxes but haven't quite decided the exact form this might take. Can you explain what sort of green taxes you might be thinking of?...

No such luck...]

Paris the Newt (scenting a kill): So you can't say where the money is going to come from? You've claimed that you're going to do a good thing - cutting taxes for the less well off but you now can't say how you're going to raise this money?

Chris Huhne (looking mildly bemused): As I've just said, I'm going to raise it through environmental taxes

Paris the Newt (with a sense of finality and glee): So you can't say how you're going to raise this money

Chris Huhne looks utterly and understandably perplexed (and he wasn't the only one). Back to Paris: For someone whose so interested in the environment, don't you think it's dubious having investments in mining and oil companies? Why do you have these investments?

Chris Huhne (looking like he's suddenly seen an Exeter sign when he was travelling Durham to Glasgow): Well, I thought they were good investment opportunities...
Paris the Newt: But you're investing in oil companies?

[I know, Paris, why don't we shun oil manufacturers completely and cut off the flow of oil... effective immediately... Won't that be good for the economy/human race?]

Chris Huhne: BP have a portfolio of renewable resources

[Good - it wasn't Esso. Clever person's next question: So you believe BP's claim that it's trying to be socially responsible? Do you think businesses can voluntarily act for the benefit of the environment (either out of self-interest or even alturism)? Or is it all so-called 'greenwash'?)]

Paris the Newt: But what about investing in a MINING COMPANY? Drilling for gold in Egypt in the Red Sea

[Ok, you've lost me now, Paris... So you think we shouldn't mine anything? Even most plants mine some stuff out the soil! What did he want him to say "I've moved into an eco-commune and this suit is made of my own saliva"? Where's the scandal?]

Chris Huhne (gently rebuking): They're prospecting for gold, not drilling

Paris the Newt: But they're drilling! For gold! In Egypt! In the Red Sea!

[Not sure which was worse here. Chris thinking the drilling mistake couldn't be overlooked or Paris making the mistake and then repeating it... this caused at least 20 seconds of Chris trying to interrupt Paris to tell him it wasn't drilling 10 seconds previously and it *still* wasn't drilling]

Chris Huhne (looks confused): Prospecting. I don't see what that has to do...

Paris the Newt: But it's the Red Sea, in Egypt, for gold

Chris Huhne: I don't think being for the environment means you can only invest in things that are actively promoting the environment

This was about 10 minutes in, but I expect it continued in the same vein. As you can tell, the investigative journalism was as sharp as a meringue.