This article titled “The Jeremy Clarkson crisis: how David Cameron was overtaken by events” was written by Marina Hyde, for The Guardian on Thursday 12th March 2015 17.30 UTCWhy did it take more than a day from the news of Jeremy Clarkson’s suspension for the prime minister to break his silence on it? Peter Morgan, screenwriter of The Queen, is already said to be working on a dramatisation of those 26 hours. Cameron’s ball-dropping is said to have caused something close to panic across a range of agencies all too painfully aware of how crucial the first few hours of a national crisis can be.
According to government sources, any seismic news related to the Top Gear presenter should have activated a high-level protocol known as “KURTZ”. Under this set of procedures, Cameron would have been extricated from whatever he was doing, and the traffic lights would have been phased to allow him to be driven without pause to Downing Street. There, he would have been fitted with a tie in a pre-arranged shade of mauve, before stepping out to a waiting lectern to address the media. His statement would have acknowledged the gravity of the situation, confirmed that US president Barack Obama had asked to be kept closely informed, and provided an emotional centre around which the nation could huddle until the next development.
A Whitehall investigations team is now trying to establish why that didn’t happen this week. Of particular concern is the fact that it was only four months ago that government departments, emergency services and the armed forces participated in a preparedness exercise designed to assess how Britain would cope with the next row involving the presenter of the popular BBC2 motoring show. That vast simulation – codenamed Imperial Sunset – was generally regarded to have been a success, albeit one that determined the establishment of martial law would be a necessity within four to five days.
According to one senior architect of that exercise, now seconded to the rolling Cobra meeting that is coordinating the response to the real-life crisis: “We’re fairly confident we can correct to the plan established in the evaluation stage of Imperial Sunset.”
So what is that plan? It is my understanding that under this settlement, Clarkson, the so-called “Prime Minister Over the Water”, would be given total control of the Isle of Man, and, in the words of one general, “told to shit or get off the pot”. He already owns property on the isle: this solution would see all non-essential island staff rehoused on the mainland, with their homes given over to 80,000 people who answered NO-YES to the following question sequence:
1. Do you think your boss should be allowed to hit you?
2. Would hitting you be OK if your boss was Jeremy Clarkson?
(A running online tally suggests there are currently at least 700,000 people who would answer along these lines; further recruits are sought on the basis that the first few batches of islanders may be “used up” as Clarkson’s populace adapted to the new social norms. On that note, neighbouring St Patrick’s Isle would serve as an overspill mass grave.)
The Isle of Man itself would be renamed – either as Clarksonia or the Isle of Manliness – and the long-held wet dream of Clarkson caressing the levers of power would start to become a reality. If the trial were successful, it would be rolled out to rest of the country by Christmas.
The next key area of concern is the BBC, which – according to most modellings of the scenario – will now have a scheduling gap and an empty Surrey aircraft hangar to fill. Yet contrary to expectation, the corporation will not be caught on the hop. For the past five months, and in conditions of utmost secrecy, BBC director of television Danny Cohen is believed to have been trialling an updated, reality TV version of the Milgram experiment to fill the slot. Provisionally entitled “The Clarkson Experiment”, the show would once again draw participants from the pool of people who answered NO-YES to the questions:
1. Do you think your boss should be allowed to hit you?
2. Would hitting you be OK if your boss was Jeremy Clarkson?
The Clarkson Experiment seeks to explore that elasticity within a light entertainment format. In the show, participants would be told that they were following direct orders from Clarkson (in fact, a producer would be calling the shots), and the game would determine their willingness to obey commands that might otherwise be expected to go against the voice of their conscience. In the early rounds, “Jeremy” would instruct them to administer mild electric shocks to people such as cyclists and Mexicans, before moving through the gears to tell them to punch members of the production team (all “victims” would in fact be played by other people who had answered NO-YES). The grand final would involve “Jeremy” ordering them to administer a fatal electric shock to his own personage. Anyone not driven to an on-air breakdown by the dilemma would win a hot steak.
Finally, then, to arguably the most sensitive area of Imperial Sunset, which sought to assess the potential impact of another Clarkson row on Britain’s standing in the wider world. Ought a country whose most viciously fought culture war is basically “Jeremy Clarkson” really be allowed to retain a seat on the UN security council? Ought it to be permitted nuclear weapons, even ones that it wouldn’t be allowed to use unless the Americans told it to? The conclusion, I’m afraid, was stark. It ought not. Indeed, the situation as it seems likely to unfold was judged to constitute raising a white flag to the business of international life, rendering Britain not so much a rogue state, or even a lovable rogue state: just a self-satirising irrelevance polarised to the point of lunacy on the fate of a man who – as the Daily Mirror sensationally reveals – actually drinks rosé.
Anyway, that’s where we’re at. The situation remains fast-moving, and when I know more, so will you.
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