Jeremy Corbyn, David Cameron and a host of other frontline politicians are parodied as a bunch of squabbling five-year-olds in a satirical party political broadcast by the Green party.
Unlike Labour’s latest offering – shot in a sleek kitchen where the actor Art Malik discusses the government’s failings and counters with facts and figures – the Greens contrast what they regard as their commonsense policies with the infighting of their mainstream rivals.
Echoing the Channel 4 documentary The Secret Life of 5 Year Olds, the ad, aimed at persuading voters to back the Greens in May’s local elections, features suited children sparring over the “long-term lega-monic plan” beside the climbing frame, and battling over how many houses they are going to build in the sandpit.
Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, is portrayed pedalling a tricycle around the playground in the broadcast, which quickly created a storm of comment on Twitter. Mini Boris clambers to the top of the climbing frame and shouts: “Yay, look at me, I’m going to be the next prime minister!”
A tiny George Osborne responds that he wants to be the next prime minister, and has the long-term lega-monic plan. Mini Boris then says he will flush the long-term economic plan down the toilet.
Despite Corbyn’s insistence that he espouses a “kinder, gentler politics” instead of the bitter infighting of the past, the Greens’ broadcast also takes aim at Labour, with five-year-old “Jeremy” holding up a piece of paper that reads “Jerimee wears silly clothes”. “Everybody’s saying bad things about me and it has to stop,” he says. But as he walks away, it becomes clear that someone has attached a sign to his back that reads “Kick Me Out”.
Feuding over the future of Britain’s nuclear weapons system within the Labour party is represented by the “red team” wielding junk models of rockets behind their leader’s back. “Have you been playing with rockets again?” a stern-looking “Jeremy” says.
Later, the two teams of children line up opposite each other along two benches, with little Jeremy, parodying a recent encounter between Corbyn and Cameron at prime minister’s questions, saying: “Even your mum doesn’t like your policies!”
Meanwhile, mini David Cameron careers into the sandpit with a mock-up drill, saying he wants to frack everything; while little “Tim” – a child bearing more than a passing resemblance to the Lib Dem leader Tim Farron – laments that it is all Nick’s fault for going into government and being “stitched up” by David.
The Greens believe they can capitalise on the disenchantment of many voters with the adversarial, personalised nature of political debate.
At the end of the broadcast, a teacher figure strolls through the school library, promising that the Green party would adopt grown-up, commonsense policies, instead of succumbing to infighting.
