Mrs Brown's Boys and the BBC's Farage problem

New Statesman​

5 hours ago

Photo by BBC
On the banks of the River Clyde in Glasgow, filming has ended on a new miniseries of Mrs Brown's Boys. In front of a whooping audience at BBC Scotland, Brendan O'Carroll reprised his role as the false-bosomed, foul-mouthed matriarch Mrs Brown. For much of the past decade, the show has been dragged out of the cupboard like tattered tinsel just once a year for a Christmas special. The mere thought of the show, with its 1970s slapstick and double entendre, is enough to bring some QI-watching liberals out in hives. Grace Dent called it 'the worst comedy ever made'. Hugo Rifkind wrote he could never be friends with anyone who watched it.
And there is a legitimate question as to why the BBC recommissioned it. Filming was temporarily paused last year when O'Carroll apologised for 'a clumsy attempt at a joke… where a racial term was implied'.
Perhaps the answer to the BBC's renewed fascination with the show lies in a meeting of the BBC's editorial guidelines and standards committee in March, at which BBC News CEO Deborah Turness gave a presentation on 'plans to address low trust issues with Reform voters'.
The BBC has a big problem with Reform voters, and Reform voters have a big problem with it. In a YouGov poll, 85 per cent of those who voted Reform last July said they didn't trust the BBC much or at all.
The meeting was told about plans to look at the low-trust issue in relation to news and drama, and the importance of local teams. The corporation is right to look beyond news in speaking to Reform voters, for whom cultural and moral issues are as important as political ones.
Which brings us back to Mrs Brown's Boys. My favourite data point from the Brexit referendum had nothing to do with immigration or sovereignty, and everything to do with the sitcom (once watched by 9.4 million people on Christmas Day 2013). A YouGov poll in 2018 found fans of Mrs Brown's Boys backed leaving the EU by 62 per cent to 38 per cent. Its viewers believed immigration, criminal justice and prisons were the top political issues. These are the people now turning to Reform from the Conservatives, and to a lesser degree from Labour. Around half of Leave voters are now Reform voters.
What else has the BBC offered such fans in recent years, beyond Mrs Brown's curlers and cardis? Not much. Yes, I hear the howls of frustration at what often feels like wall-to-wall coverage of Reform on news bulletins and interview shows. Nigel Farage is one of the most booked guests on BBC's Question Time. After Rachel Reeves' winter fuel U-turn, news bulletins gave first response to Farage (with his five MPs), rather than the Conservatives (120), Lib Dems (72), or even the SNP (nine).
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Like Keir Starmer, the BBC is now treating Reform as the de facto opposition. And on current voting intentions – if not parliamentary seats – it is right to do so. Because of this, Farage will have to face media scrutiny in a way he has previously avoided. Reform will also find it harder to continue its anti-establishment shtick when it is brought into the media fold. The argument that giving it so much airtime is adding to its momentum is, I fear, a ship long sailed. Reform is easily capable of reaching every demographic it needs through Facebook, TikTok or GB News.
The more important issue is whether our national public-service broadcaster is able to reach these people. It must do so while upholding its own standards of reporting, when there is greater competition for viewers' attention than ever – not least from Farage himself. The Reform leader, who could well be our next prime minister, has built much of his brand on attacking and undermining the BBC, calling it 'biased' and a 'political actor'.
By ignoring Reform the BBC would be ignoring almost a third of voters, while giving more credence to Farage's bleating that the BBC and the establishment are rigged against him. There are, however, concerns from inside the BBC that there is a 'mass overcorrection' going on. One insider says: 'It feels like the bosses are determined no one can say we didn't fully understand the coming of Reform in the way we were criticised for not foreseeing Brexit and the issues which led to it. But that means issues like migration and net zero are now being viewed through a 'Nigel Farage lens' – which isn't good either.'
It is doubtful whether this approach will rebuild trust among diehard Reform fans, who lost faith with the BBC a decade ago and have been frothing at the mouth at 'woke warrior' Doctor Who ever since. More important are the 'Reform curious', who are not fully convinced by the policies or character of Farage, but who want to be heard and seen in the nation's political and cultural life.
Reform has moved far beyond its base of Mrs Brown's Boys voters, probably to viewers of everything from Baby Reindeer to Springwatch. There is work to be done by the BBC to rebuild trust among many – regardless of how they might vote – in its drama output. Our public-service broadcaster has done great work in representing diverse audiences in recent years. It should not allow a populist upsurge to derail that. And yet to be truly diverse, it needs bosses and commissioners who are from diverse socio-economic backgrounds, with and without university educations, and living in the communities in which they grew up. And some who find Mrs Brown's Boys hilariously funny.
[See also: Will Iran surrender?]
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