Senior political journalist Laura Kuenssburg pulls no punches in this three-part BBC behind-the-scenes, up-close-and-personal excoriation of the U. K. Conservative party's calamitous managing of the country since it sensationally voted for Brexit in the 2016 referendum called by then Prime Minister David Cameron.
In succession, after Cameron's hasty resignation, we have been run (or run-down, even run-over) by the successive administrations of the dithering Theresa May, buffoonish Boris Johnston and kamikaze-like Liz Truss in a run of first ministers who future analysts and historians will surely forever group at the bottom of any ranking list.
Cameron gets off pretty much scot-free with no lead-up as to how the referendum came about in the first place and there's similarly very little mud cast on the current P. M. Rishi Sunak, but Kuennsburg certainly doesn't miss as she lines up in her cross-hairs the three in-between.
What struck me about the three of them was their completely misplaced trust in all-powerful political advisers, all of whom themselves came unstuck, prefiguring each of their own downfalls. History can decide which of the three did the country the most harm, but both individually and collectively they certainly greatly diminished the status of their high office.
With interviews both contemporary and revisionist with most of the main bystanders, it's no surprise that neither May, Johnston or Truss appear on-camera to retrospectively attempt to defend their policies. It's a pity that Johnston's right-hand-man Demonic, sorry that should read Dominic Cummings, couldn't be persuaded to participate on-camera unlike those of May and Truss and also that the BBC's avowed balanced coverage seems at times ridiculously misplaced, but this was nevertheless, a timely, compelling and necessary holding to account of the party which sees itself as the self-styled natural guardian of the nation's interests.
One can only hope as we consign these three incompetents to the scrap-heap that politics and politicians in this country can somehow regain the trust and respect so spectacularly lost over the 2016 - 2022 period.
What is for sure is that we're unlikely to ever again see another train or should that be trainwreck of events in politics such as are depicted in this eye-opening set of documentaries.
In succession, after Cameron's hasty resignation, we have been run (or run-down, even run-over) by the successive administrations of the dithering Theresa May, buffoonish Boris Johnston and kamikaze-like Liz Truss in a run of first ministers who future analysts and historians will surely forever group at the bottom of any ranking list.
Cameron gets off pretty much scot-free with no lead-up as to how the referendum came about in the first place and there's similarly very little mud cast on the current P. M. Rishi Sunak, but Kuennsburg certainly doesn't miss as she lines up in her cross-hairs the three in-between.
What struck me about the three of them was their completely misplaced trust in all-powerful political advisers, all of whom themselves came unstuck, prefiguring each of their own downfalls. History can decide which of the three did the country the most harm, but both individually and collectively they certainly greatly diminished the status of their high office.
With interviews both contemporary and revisionist with most of the main bystanders, it's no surprise that neither May, Johnston or Truss appear on-camera to retrospectively attempt to defend their policies. It's a pity that Johnston's right-hand-man Demonic, sorry that should read Dominic Cummings, couldn't be persuaded to participate on-camera unlike those of May and Truss and also that the BBC's avowed balanced coverage seems at times ridiculously misplaced, but this was nevertheless, a timely, compelling and necessary holding to account of the party which sees itself as the self-styled natural guardian of the nation's interests.
One can only hope as we consign these three incompetents to the scrap-heap that politics and politicians in this country can somehow regain the trust and respect so spectacularly lost over the 2016 - 2022 period.
What is for sure is that we're unlikely to ever again see another train or should that be trainwreck of events in politics such as are depicted in this eye-opening set of documentaries.
