Blunkett TV drama row
Channel 4 will be happy that their new satire on the David Blunkett and Kimberly Quinn love affair is today.
Called A Very Social Secretary, it's due to air as part of the first night of programmes on their new digital spin-off channel, More4, on Monday 10 October.
Bernard Hill, perhaps best known as Yosser 'gizza job' Hughes from Alan Bleasdale's Boys from the Blackstuff (1980), plays the former Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Secretary David Blunkett - the man who very publically proved that blind people can shag, embarrass themselves over a woman, have a child and also screw their lives up just like everyone else. Um, nice one, bruv.
According to this afternoon, Blunkett is none too happy about this drama. It says that Blunkett's lawyers have written to the broadcaster, warning that he may take them to court to stop them showing it.
Though clearly the drama will add to the embarrassment Blunkett has been dealt by the media, he is reportedly concerned about the right to privacy of the child at the centre of the 2004 scandal. When Toby Young and Lloyd Evans' play Who's The Daddy? premiered on the London stage last month, Blunkett's lawyers threatened to halt the play for similar reasons, as it too contained material about the Blunkett/Quinn affair and reported lovechild.
Blunkett is said to have had a telephone conversation with Channel 4 chief Andy Duncan seeking reassurances about the drama's content.
More4 is a channel aimed at over 35s; will air a diet of documentaries, news content, comment, drama and film.
Another pot shot at the politician is due on the London stage soon, in the form of Blunkett: The Musical. The former Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Secretary, resurrected as Work and Pensions Secretary, must be worried that this new wave of public ridicule could again harm his career and hurl water at his post-election return to public life.
