As Rishi Sunak tooled around Disneyland last week on his family holiday, I tried to imagine his government as a theme park. Instead of a rollercoaster, there would be a sign reading “Keir Starmer doesn’t want you to have a rollercoaster”. Instead of a log flume, there would be an artlessly defensive attempt to convince you that “the blob” says you can’t even not have a log flume any more. There would be no foot-long churros; foot-long churros are woke. The wrong type of visitors would be invited to “fuck off back to Disneyland Paris”. I know what you’re thinking: “Ooh, where is this place? Take all my money right now! Oh, wait, you already have.” But fun-wise, we’re looking at an empty field round which various off-brand cartoon characters (the cabinet) are stumbling ineffectually in search of today’s slogan. In short: imagineers wanted.
Imagineer was the name Walt Disney used for those of his employees he charged with realising his vision – creating ideas and then bringing them to life by building them. You may like the Disney vision; you may not. But you can’t deny it is phenomenally successful and as competently executed as it is coherent. It seems very unfair that some people’s epithet for something you can’t take seriously is “Mickey Mouse”. Have they not heard of “Rishi Sunak”?
