Home › Clacton Decides! › The candidates
THE CANDIDATES
Two podiums. One leisure centre. A crowd who would rather be at the bingo and are not afraid to say so.
COUNT BINFACE · Count Binface Party · YOU PLAY AS HIM
Intergalactic space warrior, leader of the Recyclons of Sigma IX, allegedly 5,900 years old, and the only candidate on the ballot who has never resigned from anything in Clacton. His second in command is called General Waste. His slogan is Make Your Vote Count.
Binface is a real satirical candidate created by comedian Jon Harvey, and he has spent years standing in British elections with a manifesto of gloriously small, gloriously specific promises. The game draws his answers from that genuine campaign material, because it is funnier than anything invented from scratch.
Actual pledges you will find in his answer hands:
- Build at least one affordable house
- Cap the price of a 99 Flake at 99p
- Bring back Ceefax
- Move the hand dryer in the pub gents to a more sensible position
- Tie ministers' pay to nurses' pay for one hundred years
- Invite the nations of Europe to join the UK, solving immigration by making everyone local
- A voting age minimum of 16 and a maximum of 80
- Nationalise Adele
How he wins: specificity. The smaller and more concrete the promise, the harder this crowd cheers. His weakest moments are when he drifts off into galactic abstraction, or when he is accidentally a bit posh about the price of cod.
N. PORRAGE · Proper Britain Party · FICTIONAL
A blazer with a man inside it. Porrage has held five jobs, attended none of them, and returns to the constituency roughly twice a year, usually with a camera crew. He is a fictional caricature: a composite of a familiar type in British public life rather than any one person, and a vehicle for jokes about ego, expenses and the strange political power of a pint held at chest height.
His crowd-pleasers, which genuinely land in the hall: bring back the proper lunch, defend the 2p machines, scrap the licence fees, fill the potholes with British concrete poured by British men called Dave, and tell the sea firmly that it has been warned.
His unforced errors, which even his own supporters flinch at: cigars back indoors in hospitals and nurseries, PorrageCoin, selling the pier to his friend Tarquin, arresting a seagull for being French, and mentioning that he will be in Washington from Tuesday.
How he wins: conviction. His bingo answers are the ones delivered with total certainty and no evidence whatsoever. The moment he starts talking about his own portfolio, the room turns.
Occupational hazard: a banana milkshake, arriving at speed, from off stage.
THE SUPPORTING CAST
Terry Tombola
Your host. Blazer of his own, but a friendlier one. Has been presenting things in this leisure centre since 1994 and will make a remark about the scores on the doors whether or not one is warranted.
Doreen, 81, front row
Wants to know how her Brian is getting home from the bingo now the buses stop at six. Will not be fobbed off. Represents roughly nine million people.
Big Gary
Runs The Moon & Winkle. Asks the pub question. Knows exactly what he wants to hear and it involves twelve beers.
A seagull
Translated, imperfectly, by Terry. Raises the matter of chip theft enforcement. Arguably the most consistent voice in the room.
On the parody. Count Binface is a real satirical character, referenced with affection in the tradition of political cartooning. N. Porrage and every other character here are entirely fictional caricatures written for comedy. Nothing on this page is a statement of fact about any real person, and this game is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by anyone depicted.