Anyone who criticises ‘the elite’ should be asked if they shop at Lidl – I doubt many would even know what it is

The small army of privately educated Felicities and Hugos calling out the establishment are betraying remarkable doublethink

If you want evidence that Britain has completely lost the plot, look at the sort of people who’ve been railing against the “elite” or the “establishment” over Brexit while claiming to represent “the people” over the past couple of days.

I’m talking about individuals such as Viscount Ridley, the megabucks hereditary peer and climate change denier who served as chair of Northern Rock when it went belly up and started the fashion for multibillion pound taxpayer-funded bailouts that would cover the cost of several years of EU subscriptions and a lot more besides.

He was at it in the House of Lords when peers were debating Yvette Cooper’s bill that attempts to prevent another financial crisis – like the one people like him caused by not doing their jobs properly – by outlawing a no-deal Brexit.

Or how about Charles “man of the people” Moore, the old Etonian former editor of The Daily Telegraph who subbed for Nigel Farage as the obligatory Brexiteer loon on Question Time on Thursday?

Farage, who appears to have a standing invite to appear on the show whenever the private jet is available to ferry him up to the venue, is no less fond of bloviating against devilish “elites” dedicated to doing Britain down.

That terrible trio, and those of their ilk, are the leaders of a small army of privately educated Felicities and Hugos who do miniature versions of the same thing on Twitter. Even Orwell might have been inclined to say “seriously?!” in response to their doublethink.

It’s a profound failing of British journalism, and especially British broadcast journalism, that they are so rarely called out.

It’s not as if it’d be hard. All you’d need to do to show them up would be to ask if they’ve ever shopped at Lidl (although you could probably ask if they’ve ever shopped for themselves full stop).

I imagine some of them would answer “what’s Lidl?”. But the cleverer ones might recognise it as the German discounter that’s taken the high street by storm and say “yes of course I have, how dare you do your job by asking me, it’s anti-Brexit bias” regardless of whether it’s true.

Their telling of porky pies (Lidl’s aren’t bad) like that could, however, easily be exposed through asking what Lidl stocks in the middle aisle. Those of us that have darkened its doors will immediately know the answer. If your house is anything like mine it’s likely stuffed to the gills with junk from it and when you’re not wondering what to do with it you’re probably asking yourself how the hell you ended up buying half of it.

If the question were to start regularly cropping up (I know, I know, some hope) and they’re switched on enough to send one of their people to the place armed with an iPhone to answer the question for them, there are plenty of alternatives that could be called upon. One of the more obvious ones I imagine they’d struggle with is “when did you last eat tea?” or even “when did you last eat dinner?” The elite-hating elite drinks the former and calls the latter luncheon. You could treat the entire population of these islands to several of them on the money we spent bailing out the Viscount’s bank.

How about have you ever driven a Skoda? I know they make good cars these days because I drive one. But Skoda is still VW’s cheaper brand. You wouldn’t expect to see Farage, Moore or Ridley driving around in one of a weekend. The same goes for a Dacia or a Kia for that matter.

You could try: when was the last time you bought a packet of Monster Munch (or Monster Claws at Lidl)? Have you ever eaten a Cadbury’s Curly Wurly and what’s it made out of? What’s the difference between QuickQuid and wonga.com? Or even better, how long would you be allowed to pay for stuff you bought through a Grattan’s catalogue?

I can answer the last of those because that’s where this member of the liberal elite (I must be a member of coz I write for the Indy) used to have his clothes bought while growing up in a council house.

I know, I know, the exposure of these people and their young fogey Twitter wannabes as cynical frauds wouldn’t likely change much.

But if we’re ever going to emerge from the post-truth society, someone working for a broadcaster whose elite bosses aren’t shit scared of being bullied by these elite charlatans needs to make the attempt.