Satire

MITCH BENN asks why the PM would compare himself to the Hulk – a personification of uncontrolled anger, fury, and whose alter ego is desperate to escape. It doesn’t seem to take much these days to get me feeling old. Mind you, that’s been the case since I was about 24; sometimes I wish I […]

MITCH BENN on Boris Johnson becoming the first prime minister since 1894 to lose his first commons vote and also reducing his from +1 to -43 in a week. So this time last week, you may or may not recall, I was bewailing the near-impossibility of submitting a regular current events-based (and specifically Brexit-related current […]

As a comedian, MITCH BENN knows how it feels to stand before a crowd that’s booing you. Here’s when it happened to Prime Minister. Of all the disparate elements in the jumble of intermittently remunerative hobbies which in my case passes for a ‘career’, writing this column is one of the most rewarding (and indeed […]

The Edinburgh Fringe is over for another year and Mitch Benn says it’s been a good one. So the Edinburgh Fringe is over for another year; I’m not going to start bandying figures about but suffice to say I’ve had a really good one, both in terms of audience numbers and response. This is gratifying […]

Even the legendary patience of the Scots is being exhausted as the country is dragged out of the EU against its will, says Mitch Benn. I’ve returned to my adopted hometown of Edinburgh to partake in the annual month-long ritual of comedy industry chiselling which is the Festival Fringe (my show is called Ten Songs […]

US politics tends to be a more colourful and kinetic affair than our own variety, although of course there are always parallels to be drawn says MITCH BENN. Prime Minister Boris Johnson with Home Secretary Priti Patel attending the first meeting of the National Policing Board at the Home Office in London. Picture: Kirsty Wigglewsorth/PA […]

Comedian and host of People’s Vote campaign rallies, MITCH BENN calls on remainers to reclaim the flag in the name of true patriotism. There’s just over a week to go before I head up to Edinburgh to perform my show Ten Songs To Save The World at the Festival Fringe (Underbelly, 3.45pm, in case you […]

Nelsonian traditions are one thing, but some of our modern political practices need to go out with the tide, says MITCH BENN. A few weeks ago I was asked to perform a short set at a Naval Officers’ Mess Dinner at HMS Sherwood in Nottingham. Attentive readers with a smattering of British geography will already […]

MITCH BENN says it’s time we all call out the lies and expose the liars peddling the myths about the EU and Europe. I’m in the home stretch before heading up to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August, so my life consists primarily of coffee-fuelled songwriting and joke-rewriting sessions, interspersed with preview shows, each slightly […]

MITCH BENN discusses the issue of anti-Semitism in the Labour party. At time of writing, I don’t know whether Chris Williamson has been re-admitted, re-expelled or re-re-admitted to the Labour Party. I do know that Alastair Campbell is still out for the foreseeable, as he told me when we met at the People’s Vote rally […]

If you’re making excuses for someone on your team you wouldn’t make for someone on theirs, you’re part of the problem says MITCH BENN. Let’s get one thing straight before we start; I don’t know what was going on in Carrie Symonds’ flat in Camberwell the other night, and neither do you. Nor indeed do […]

MITCH BENN on watching a video by the campaign supporting Boris Johnson’s (currently swaggering) effort to become leader of the Tory party and prime minister. British Conservative Party politician Boris Johnson gives a speech. Photo by Paul ELLIS / AFP – Credit: AFP/Getty Images I find myself in a philosophical frame of mind, so here […]

The issue here isn’t drug use – it’s hypocrisy, says Mitch Benn. And they’re off. The hitherto ever-expanding field of candidates for the leadership of the Conservative Party (and thereby the prime ministership of the country) has contracted somewhat, as they clear the first hurdle, and we’re now left with the ten ‘serious’ contenders. Perhaps […]

MITCH BENN on Rory Stewart, why good guys can be bad and what sci-fi can teach us about politics. We seem to have arrived at one of those awkward lulls, don’t we; not much is actually happening Brexit-wise but it’s still difficult to talk, think or indeed write about anything else. The big story politically […]

MITCH BENN on why Nigel Farage’s election win was not a call for speeding up Brexit. Right, brace yourself because I’m about to ruin your day. If you’re standing up, sit down; if you’re sitting down, lie down. If you haven’t had breakfast, don’t have breakfast yet and if you have had breakfast, I’m terribly […]

MITCH BENN takes a look at the end of an eight year era as Game of Thrones comes to an end and explores how the ending for our own story has not been written. Game of Thrones main city, King’s Landing, is filmed in Dubrovnik. Picture: HBO/IMDB – Credit: HBO/IMDB So, Game of Thrones then. […]

MITCH BENN discusses the parallels between comedians and politicians attracting an audience. As regular readers will know (and as irregular readers won’t, I imagine, be particularly surprised to discover), this isn’t my day job. I’ve mentioned on a number of occasions that in my primary occupation I’ve been toiling away on the lower slopes of […]

Mitch Benn discusses why Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party is not what the UK needs. I have good news and bad news. The good news is: you’re not going mad. The bad news is: you’re not going mad. Yeah, sorry about that. There are times when it might be comforting to be able to dismiss the […]

The desire to vote against something or someone you oppose will only get you so far, says MITCH BENN, at some point you have to vote for something. I’ve got a lot of time for Tom Watson. I’ve met him a couple of times and he’s always been personable and sincere. He turned up to […]

MITCH BENN on the benefit of taking some time to regroup and plan. Ian Cognito, who died on stage. Picture: Contributed – Credit: Archant Some people have expressed alarm that, having fixed upon the in-no-way significant or ominous date of October 31 as the new deadline for resolving Brexit (one way or another), parliament then […]

Like Trump fans, Leave voters aren’t dismissing themselves as less intelligent. It’s their own leaders who think they’re ignorant. As active and vocal Remainers, we are often reminded of the importance of not yielding to the temptation of dismissing Leave voters as stupid or ignorant (and, moreover, of congratulating ourselves on our supposed intellectual superiority) […]

Mitch Benn says the Remain movement is still in full voice as Brexiteers call for the government to get on with it. It’s exhausting, this Brexit thing, isn’t it? Even if you’re not tasked with following and commenting on the whole slowly unravelling fustercluck on a semi-professional basis, just trying to keep up with each […]

MITCH BENN says there should be awkward questions for the people who’ve been making a living peddling so-called ‘polite racism’. I found myself being interviewed on Turkish television last week, on the subject of Brexit in general and Mr Tragical Misery Tour himself, Nigel Farage. I was asked if I thought Nigel Farage was a […]

Life as a Brexit true believer would be so much easier, writes MITCH BENN, but self-righteousness helps no-one in the long run. Something remarkable – indeed perhaps unprecedented – happened on last weekend’s Andrew Marr Show. A Brexiter told the truth about Brexit. Jeremy Hunt – for ’twas he – reflected on how easy it […]

Steve Anglesey on the commemorative tat celebrating Brexit and the Brexiteers of the Week. ‘A delay to Article 50 is not inevitable,’ declared the soothsayer Liam Fox the other day, prompting Expedia’s servers to crash as scores of political journalists began searching for ‘cheap holidays around March 29’. If Mr Easiest-Deal-In-Human-History says something is on […]

While much of the country consists of the sort of constituency wherein, to quote the late great Alan B’stard, they’d elect a hatstand if you stuck the right colour rosette on it, hatstands is what we’ll get. Events are developing at a dizzying rate, and I’m currently suffering the after-effects of some not entirely successful […]

Why The Independent Group must work to earn the support of Remainers. There is, as they say, nothing new under the sun; every event, however startling and novel, has its roots and causes in previous events, and similarly, every event, however unusual, will find its echo somewhere in subsequent events. It’s not often, however, that […]

There’s precious little in the news other than Brexit, but not much in the overall situation is actually changing. I think I’m experiencing a kind of Brexit numbness. On the one hand, there’s precious little else in the news right now, as is entirely appropriate given that we’re about six weeks away from an act […]

With so many reasons to abandon Brexit, writes MITCH BENN, Remain is winning the battle by a significant margin. There are literally hundreds of compelling reasons to abandon Brexit, and precisely one reason to go ahead with it. Every week that passes provides us with another couple of dozen entries for the ‘really very good […]

MITCH BENN discusses why links between Brexit and how it compares to past wars Britain have been involved in should not be made. I’ve long thought that there should be some sort of ‘swear box’ system in operation in political journalism, except with interviewees being required to cough up for clichés rather than profanities. I […]

MITCH BENN discusses the problems with a no deal Brexit and what the works no deal have become. Almost immediately after the spectacular failure of the prime minister’s Withdrawal Agreement last week, the question was asked throughout the land: ‘Okay, so now what?’ And this question was answered by everyone: ‘Literally nobody knows.’ However, one […]

Cowardice and appeasement in the face of thuggery is always deplorable but there’s a specific reason it’s a bad idea in this instance, says MITCH BENN SKZ cartoons – Credit: Archant In a previous column I dealt with the concept of ‘privilege’, in as much the word is used with regard to the concept of […]