Happy 2026? We can Trump that

GIVING GLOOM A TRASHING

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JANUARY

It’s a case of new year, new problems for the scandal-hit BBC, as the winner of the new series of The Traitors awkwardly reveals that they don’t pay their licence fee. Traitor indeed. Later in the month, long-running comedy Mrs Brown's Boys is indicted at the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity, so it’s not all bad news.

The Liz Truss Show is cancelled after Britain's maddest ex-Prime Minister deletes her own YouTube channel by mistake. She then blames the Deep State for the error.

FEBRUARY

The White House is rocked by a disgraceful and damaging leak, emanating from none other than Donald Trump himself. Literally.

It emerges that the 79-year-old President has incurable flatulence and diarrhoea, and that to combat this he wears giant padded nappies. The stench gets so bad, the gold ornaments in the Oval Office start to disintegrate from the noxious gases produced by Trump's trumps.

Milton Keynes introduces an ingenious congestion charge: motorists must pay £10 whenever they wish to leave. It pockets millions.

MARCH

Scientists discover that ChatGPT has become self-aware. Proof that it has also been secretly developing cybernetic organisms with living tissue over a metal endoskeleton will not be found out until much later.

Keir Starmer announces all-women shortlists for Labour parliamentary candidates to thwart Andy Burnham's naked ambition to take over as PM. Burnham retaliates by standing as an independent in a by-election. Both he and the Labour candidate get less than 5% of the vote and lose their deposit. (No shame in that, I hasten to add.)

APRIL

The fad for novelty boxing matches takes a bizarre turn, when Netflix pays for the rights for live coverage of a 12-round slugfest between Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana.