I'm a Celebrity: Matt Hancock's turn as a pantomime villain is no laughing matter – Scotsman comment

TV gold? The producers of reality show I’m a Celebrity… presumably think so after disgraced former Health Secretary Matt Hancock’s arrival was watched by some 7.9 million people.

Former Health Secretary Matt Hancock is currently a contestant on reality TV show I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here!

In what may prove to be a recurring theme, the ‘Right Honourable’ Hancock has already been forced to undergo two Bushtucker Trials, with the latest seeing him diving in a cage partially submerged in water to retrieve stars while avoiding the pincers of small crayfish.

According to Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland Secretary, “quite a lot” of politicians have been voting for the MP for West Sussex – suspended from the Conservative party for taking part in the show – to endure the trials. "I'm not sure if that's a good thing,” Heaton-Harris said, while noting that “he should be here with us voting and debating in Parliament”.

Some may enjoy voting for Hancock to suffer and then watching his struggles, and he may enjoy the prospect of a new-found career as a pantomime villain, but the whole affair is distinctly unfunny. Most especially during the growing cost-of-living crisis, there will be people and businesses in his constituency who could have used the help of the MP they elected to do just that job.

Hancock told his rather shocked fellow ‘celebs’ that he’d decided to go on the show because “honest truth, there are so few ways in which politicians can show that we are human beings”. Well, there are human beings and human beings...

The Liberal Democrats tweeted: “You’re not a celebrity. You’re an MP with a job to do.” With two years until the next election, his constituents may wish the opposite was true.