Bad Press Awards

Mic Wright

Recognising the Worst of the Worst of British Journalism

The Lead-Plated Lint Ball
for Ludicrous Arguments

We’re in the midst of a poly crisis – a series of overlapping global disasters – so there are many things to worry about and plenty of reasons for slipping into panic or paranoia. But who could predict that the humble tumble dryer would be anywhere near the top of that list of pressing concerns?

You might if you read the Daily Telegraph, where a minor change in the rules surrounding white goods is the excuse for the most unhinged moral panic that our most unhinged newspaper has indulged in since the days of claiming that the EU wanted to outlaw bendy bananas.

It’s a cheap joke to say the issue has got the newspaper in a spin, but expensive jokes are wasted on the Telegraph.

When the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero recently published documents indicating it will phase out sales of traditional condenser tumble dryers in favour of newer models that use heat pumps, it offered the chance to open a new front in the publication’s war on Ed Miliband and the causes of Ed Miliband.