There are many annoying things about the celebrity chef Jamie Oliver, but none of them grates my gears as much as the media’s obsequiousness towards him. I suspect that his political campaigning is largely a self-serving gimmick to keep the Jamie Oliver brand in the public eye, but that is besides the point. The point is that he would be the first to describe himself an activist and yet he is never asked the questions that activists, let alone politicians, are asked. He gets the celebrity interview when he should be getting the political interview. He has never been hauled up on the facts. He has never been given a grilling. Hardened journalists become starstruck in the presence of a man who, in media circles if not in the country at large, is regarded as a national treasure.

Oliver has had such an easy ride from the BBC over the years that it was not much of a stretch to make him guest editor of the Today programme on Tuesday. The servility was no different from usual, it was just more concentrated. Three long hours of unfiltered Jamie Oliver lightened only by occasional stories about Covid-19 in China and snowstorms in the USA. For the duration, Radio 4’s news bulletins carried no fewer than three Oliver-related news items. Jamie Oliver wants free school meals extended! A pressure group wants mandatory limits on the sugar content of baby food! George Osborne wishes the government would hurry up and ban adverts for ‘junk food’! It was like normal episode of the Today programme but more so.

We were treated to a spokesman for Jamie Oliver’s pressure group Biteback 2030 asking teenage members of Biteback 2030 what they thought of the food environment. Not unsurprisingly, the ‘Bitebackers’ said that unhealthy food was too cheap, too available and too widely advertised. We heard from a local director of public health who agreed with all of this and wanted to ban ‘junk food’ adverts at bus stops. Yesterday’s men Tony Blair, George Osborne and Mark Carney also broadly agreed. Osborne was particularly enthusiastic, saying that he wished he had extended his sugar levy to ‘non-sugary products’. With the possible exception of an American pastor who, during Thought For The Day, mentioned the importance of ‘personal agency’ and explained how members of his community had lost weight without any government coercion, not a single person in 180 minutes of broadcasting disagreed with Oliver’s prescription of more taxes, subsidies and regulation to tackle obesity.

My contempt for the guest editor notwithstanding, it made for an unsatisfying and rather tedious listening experience. I have no strong feelings about Oliver’s latest campaign to extend free school dinners to any child whose parents receive Universal Credit, but I would like to hear the case against it. Isn’t Universal Credit set at a level that allows parents to feed their children? If not, why not? George Osborne raised the question of how much the policy would cost and how it would be paid for, but no answer was given.

My contempt for the guest editor notwithstanding, it made for an unsatisfying and rather tedious listening experience

In the absence of opposing viewpoints, it was up to the presenters to probe and scrutinise. They could have asked whether the sugar levy led to any reduction in obesity, for instance. They could have asked whether Oliver’s successful crusade for school dinner reform fifteen years ago has led to any measurable improvement in children’s health. They could have asked him to define ‘junk food’. They could have asked George Osborne whether his sudden decision to introduce a sugar tax in the 2016 Budget was driven by his concerns about children’s health, as he now claims, or was a dead cat to distract the media from the government missing all its economic targets, as was widely believed at the time. If they had felt mischievous, they could have asked Oliver whether the total collapse of his restaurant empire in 2018 was a public verdict on him and his cooking.

There was none of that. Even the most blatantly false claims went unchallenged. It is not true, for example, that baby food is ‘totally unregulated’. Nor is it true that the sugar tax ‘created more choice’. At one point, Oliver even asserted – without rebuke – that the £300 million a year cost of the sugar tax is ‘not passed onto consumers’. By the end of the show, he was wibbling about some sort of conspiracy involving ‘Big Food Inc.’ who supposedly silence all their critics.

Two minor moments stuck out, both of which told us something about the man himself. The first was when he briefly interviewed a musician and deftly swung the conversation around to his fabulous success as an author of cookbooks. The second was when he visited a school in Westminster and, having asked one of the children which was her favourite day for school dinners, ended up applauding the kind of food he has spent half his life campaigning against.

Girl: ‘It depends on the dessert but if I had to choose instead of dessert it would be Friday.’

Oliver: ‘What happens on a Friday?’

Girl: ‘Friday is my favourite. Fish fingers, chips and sometimes ketchup if they can.’

Oliver: ‘Yum!’

Girl: ‘And some baked beans. Delicious!’

Oliver: ‘Lovely.’

Girl: ‘And sometimes they do some cookies or maybe chocolate cake with custard.’

Oliver: ‘Yeah, old school. I love that!’

There is no point in complaining about the Today programme being biased in these strange, nameless days between Christmas and New Year. The whole point of having guest editors is to hear a particular point of view. If someone like me had been asked to do the job, they would have spent three hours interviewing people who think coercive paternalism is immoral, raging against Big Government Inc. and calling for Jamie Oliver to be deported. But people like me are never asked, are we?