Who needs satire when we’ve politics?

As if we needed more proof modern politics has gone beyond satire, it was there by the bucket-load this week when the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn held a joint press conference with Midlands reggae band UB40. Or half of them at least. A few years ago, UB40 suffered one of the bitterest splits in music history, an irony clearly lost on the spin doctors, as Labour remains in the throes of something very similar (albeit one based on a clash of leftwing ideologies, rather than the choice of cover versions for the next album).

The irony wasn’t lost on another 1980s pop star, with the Simply Red singer Mick Hucknall reportedly tweeting: ‘Jeremy Corbyn has much in common with UB40. They are currently as divided as his Labour Party.’

As I say, beyond satire.

Celebrity endorsements are nothing new in politics, of course – as much as we’d like to, who could forget Noel Gallagher schmoozing with Tony Blair or Jim Davidson at the Conservative party conference – but this one seems more bizarre than most.

Corbyn is often said to have a wide appeal among younger people, so perhaps the endorsement by UB40 – who scored their first hit 37 years ago – is a canny attempt to reach out to an older demographic.

Otherwise, it would have been a bit like Neil Kinnock trying to increase his voter appeal in the 1980s by wheeling out Lonnie Donegan or Perry Como (I’m guessing there weren’t many too many Midlands-based reggae bands around in the early 1950s).

In one of many strange sequences from the press conference, UB40 found themselves having to field questions about grammar schools, the hot political topic of the day.

A far cry from being asked your favourite colour by a caller on Mike Read’s Saturday Superstore, I would imagine.