Owing to an unfortunate Editorial decision by the Guardian we didn’t get to see Steve Bell’s take on the Election in the paper. Fortunately the NUJ’s The Journalist stepped in. Bell lists Starmer’s real Mission Statements, No.4 of which is Set Up Great British Balls.
The reference is to Great British Energy an arguably novel and as yet unproven concept. Starmer speaking in Runcorn on 25th July did underline the point about balls:
The hard graft of rebuilding this country has well and truly started, and it is vital that we begin immediately because the last government dropped the ball,” he said.
Whether Steve Bell’s ball and Starmer’s Arsenal football amount to quite the same thing I’m not sure.
Of course ‘Great British Energy’ is an unproven concept. It’s not been done before. Had it been, we might be in a better position than we are now.
Honestly, if you take the precautionary principle to these extremes then you’ll never do anything.
Steve Bell is a political satirist, a very long tradition in cartooning- see Private Eye. Perhaps best to understand it in that context