A shadow cabinet spat over Eastenders

Jeremy Hunt and Tim Loughton have been engaging in debate over whether Eastenders is the sort of television the BBC should be making, or whether it fails to 'portray real life'.

The shadow culture secretary and the shadow children's secretary have been discussing the issue,the later fresh from taking part in the current Channel 4 series, Tower Block of Commons.

He writes that

the influence of television and soaps and so-called ‘reality TV’ in particular, is huge, especially on young people. The truth is that in the Christmas Day TV ratings more people tuned into the Queen Vic to witness the gory murder of Archie Mitchell than to Queen Liz talking about the ultimate sacrifices made by our servicemen in combat zones.

Whilst the Shadow culture secretary reacts to Mark Lawson's Guardian piece by saying that far from being hated by the Tory front bench he praises it for

have consistently tackled difficult social issues, and crucially reached large audiences in doing so, ever since. So happy 25th Birthday

Incidently the show celebrates its 25th anniversary with a live show on Friday