The MP for West Suffolk was expected to appear on Good Morning Britain to chat to hosts Susanna Reid and Ed Balls about his controversial appearance on the reality show, but he has since refused to do any interviews.
Making an announcement to ITV viewers this morning, Susanna said: “Matt Hancock has pulled out of doing any interviews. Why do you think that is?”
Her co-host and former politician Ed Balls then make the presumption that the MP is now ‘probably tired’ from the show and the real reason for him refusing interviews was not revealed.
Matt Hancock was hired to appear on I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! for one specific reason. He was going to turn up, get bullied by his incandescent campmates then be forced into endless consecutive Bushtucker Trials until his will was broken, at which point the British public would gang up and send him packing.
Clearly, something went wrong. Because last night Hancock came third on I’m a Celebrity. He made the final. And I think I know why. We forgot to account for the fact that Hancock might actually be a really good reality television contestant.
Don’t get angry. This isn’t a compliment. “Really good reality television contestant” is the last thing you’d want to be said during your eulogy. But the fact remains that whatever personality flaws Hancock has – and they are both numerous and yawning – they slot very nicely into the needs of the reality TV industry.
As soon as his appointment was announced, Hancock made a lot of fuss about showing his human side. In this regard, he failed. It’s fairly safe to say that Hancock doesn’t have any discernible personality. During his time in the jungle, he was extraordinarily passive and stunningly incurious. He just sat there, powered down, until someone asked a question about politics, at which point he’d briefly whirr back to life.
Then there were the Bushtucker Trials, during many of which Hancock seemed to fully dissociate. During his first episode, Hancock and Seann Walsh were made to crawl through a pitch-black tunnel full of rats and maggots. In the grand tradition of the genre, Walsh duly yelped and screamed as if his life was in danger. Not Hancock. He simply shut down and went through the motions. It was the same with all the trials he did. No matter how gruesome they were, he just blanked out, got the stars and clicked back online when it was all over. As a way of completing tasks it was effective, but it didn’t half give him the air of a serial killer.
Sadly, while these qualities are useful for eating a plate of animal penises, they are also exactly what made him a terrible politician. There was never any sense that he was balancing risk, or that he was able to think things through in any meaningful way. There’s a fundamental lack of humanity that at times is quite chilling.
You can take a man out of politics, but you can’t take politics out of the man…why is everyone so surprised when he behaves like a politician? Those traits are par for the course, it seems…
Or is it D,it would be pointless asking him anything as being a lying cheating b/stard/politician he would not / could not answer a question truthfully.
But it’s all irrelevant … he is, by modern standards , now a celebrity and successful and earning wads of cash.
He is, more than likely, happy with his current lot in life.
The disgraced MP missed his earlier planned flight because he was taking part in a lucrative interview where he is expected to try to defend his decision to leave his constituents without an MP for a month to appear on I’m A Celebrity.
It meant he also abandoned girlfriend Gina Coladangelo, who had to fly home alone on Monday. Instead, Hancock is now believed to have flown home around six hours later, although he managed to sneak through the departures area without being photographed.
His decision to fly home late on Monday flies in the face of his earlier claims he would go straight back to work after leaving the jungle.
Writing about his decision to do the show, days before he entered the Jungle, Hancock wrote: “As soon as my time in camp is up, I will return to Suffolk to hold a surgery where I will catch up with my constituents and discuss matters of concern.”
Since the show ended he has now spent a day with Gina at a plush hotel, then gone on a night of partying with all the contestants and now spent a day completing what is believed to be a photoshoot and paid-for interview. This all appears to leave little time for office work.
Gina checked in with Jill and Shelly
A spokesperson for Matt Hancock had insisted: “Matt will be in West Suffolk this week and the second reading of his Dyslexia Screening and Teacher Training Bill will be heard in Parliament on Friday.”
