I hope you’ll find me true to myself in the show (Picture: Channel 4)

Given the chance to push the nuclear button, do you think I’d do it?

Well, I guess you – and I – might both find out the answer to that question pretty soon on Make Me Prime Minister, Channel 4’s politico-reality television show in which I and 11 other hopefuls are currently vying for the public’s vote to become the nation’s next alternative Prime Minister.

A fiction? Perhaps not. Since a particular Zoom meeting back in February 2021 elevated me into the public consciousness, I’ve been asked to do some pretty unusual gigs.

I’ve appeared in The Archers, participated on Celebrity Mastermind, opened the 2021 Brit Awards, and promoted the Disney+ Walking Dead Season 10 complete with a supporting cast of professional zombies.

In some respects this has all been, of course, a radical change in my life. But in other – and arguably more important ways, it hasn’t.

I remain Jackie Weaver, Chief Officer of the Cheshire Association of Local Councils. To my colleagues and the people of Cheshire I am no media personality – I am Jackie. 

Filming the show led me to reflect how much of our politics is intrinsically designed to promote conflict (Picture: SWNS)

It’s been important for me to stay true to myself – which is, I hope, how you find me in Make Me PM. Under the exacting eyes of taskmasters Alastair Campbell and Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, you will see us ‘enjoy’ challenging feedback, gruelling interviews, and a month-long series of challenges and competitions. 

Perhaps the greatest challenge, however, was trying to find ways to work collaboratively with people I – on occasion – strongly disagreed with.

I have views on how things ought to be done but I’ve always felt it’s best not to force them on to other people. As you’ll see in watching the show, others take a much harder approach or seem willing to engage in allegiances for a short time only to break them when they are no longer of use.

Indeed, filming the show led me to reflect how much of our politics is intrinsically designed to promote conflict. In its very essence, it is a tribal fight for power in which differences are exaggerated and victory at the ballot box is seen as an end rather than a means (and one that can be justified by lies, slander, and abuse). 

Lost in the midst of that is our shared humanity, common fates, and collective aspirations for security, opportunity, health, and happiness. Can’t we find a better system to serve and represent us?

That is why, in making my pitch to viewers on the opening night of the show, I said my main ambition as PM would be not to achieve one specific policy change, but instead to do something I believe is more foundational: to bring compassion into politics. If we can do that, all else will follow.

What does that mean in practice?

Firstly, compassion requires honesty and mutual respect and there are a number of changes that we need to make to embed those principles at the centre of our politics. 

In marketing, healthcare, and teaching – professions where the public interest is clearly at stake – we have established a legal framework that requires honesty. Politicians, too, need a duty of candour. 

There are inevitably going to be debates about how best to enforce and oversee such a duty but we can agree on one thing at least: the era in which rogue politicians can lie with impunity has to end.

A process must be created in which individuals who knowingly and repeatedly lie can be held to account and, if necessary, face legal consequences.

Secondly, I’d bring greater professionalism into parliamentary life. At home and work, people are expected to cooperate and treat one another with respect.

Turn on the evening news, however, and you will see politicians shout, holler, boo, and jeer at one another. To call the Commons a bear pit would be an insult to our mammalian cousins. 

Research by Compassion in Politics has shown that the way politicians address one another is off-putting to the public and I can’t imagine that such conditions are in any way conducive to the formation of good policy.

Politicians need to appreciate that what happens at Westminster is just one small percentage of the ‘politics’ that takes place in our country (Picture: PA)

I would, as PM, ban the practice of booing and shouting in Parliament and establish a commission for the promotion and establishment of cross-party collaboration on major issues of common concern, such as climate breakdown, foreign conflict, and the cost-of-living crisis. 

To facilitate that process, I’d also work to achieve cross-party agreement on a set of very basic principles. Not that this is original.

After the Second World War, a consensus emerged amongst all parties that the role of government should be, first and foremost, to invest in communities, rebuild a damaged nation, and provide help and support to those who needed it.

From that we gained the welfare state, the NHS, and a national system of education. These are the pillars of our nation – but they are being eroded because the values that lay behind them are being forgotten.

I’d bring the government back to those essential values and commit every member of my (albeit fantasy) cabinet to the protection of the vulnerable and the benefit of the common good.

Lastly, I would bring the cleansing light of public creativity and local decision-making into the fusty halls of our political system. Politicians need to appreciate that what happens at Westminster is just one small percentage of the ‘politics’ that takes place in our country. 

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Every second of every day, people are ‘doing’ politics – whether in their community centre, at home, or at work. A system that fails to respond to people’s needs, represent their ideas, and recognise their energy is a system that is not fit for purpose. 

I would transform political life in Britain by devolving greater power to our councils (with the requisite resources to make that power usable) and by establishing citizens assemblies on a range of issues from climate (as has already been achieved) to democracy. 

Taking part in Make Me PM makes me appreciate how difficult it can be to stick to such principles in an environment that breeds competition and drives a hunger for power. We simply must change that.

That’s the button I’d push – the one that leads to a cultural transformation of our political life.

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing [email protected]. 

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Jackie Weaver is currently one of 12 hopefuls on Channel 4’s Make Me A Prime Minister.