How refreshing it would be if the BBC broadcast a comedy show that poked fun at the twisted Left-wing mentality that now dominates British public life.

It would be spoilt for choice in the breadth of targets – from the absurdity of our border forces ­acting as a glorified ferry service for illegal cross-Channel migrants, ministers secretly accepting freebie donations from millionaires for new clothes, or Ed Miliband's Net Zero agenda which could mean the import of solar panels from China made by Uyghur forced labour and leaving British families to pay rocketing energy bills for the privilege.

However, such fun is absent from the airwaves.

Instead, too many so-called ­comedians act like the guardians of the progressive orthodoxy and ­endlessly take pathetic potshots at the Conservatives as if they were still in government.

Nothing more graphically highlights this than BBC One's Have I Got News For You. Now in its 34th year, what was once a sharp, acidic programme is dated and predictable. The flamethrower of savage wit has been replaced by the loudspeaker of political partisanship.

After 14 years vilifying the 'cruel and wicked' Tories, the producers and performers seem unable to change direction.

Last Friday's offering was typical. Everyone knows that Labour's first 100 days have been beset by ­scandals – even Sir Keir Starmer was forced to admit they'd been 'choppy'. Yet this rich store of material barely featured.

Instead, one of the guest panellists, former Tory MP Dame Andrea ­Jenkyns, was subjected to a barrage of character denigration that reduced her to near silence.

Leading the charge was Ian ­Hislop, who, with increasingly puritanical smugness, has set himself up as one of the nation's chief ­moralisers. Yet he's part of Britain's privileged elite, upholding the gospel of political correctness while pocketing a reported £20,000 per show. He has a seemingly neurotic obsession with Boris Johnson –someone who last occupied No 10 three prime ministers ago.

When Dame Andrea defended her former boss against Hislop calling him a 'liar', the studio audience loudly groaned, prompting her, understandably, to tell Hislop that the BBC had 'selected' the audience it wanted.

Indeed, they constantly whooped and cheered at every Left-wing platitude uttered.

Conversely, of course, today's 'comedians', marinated in their anti-Conservative prejudices, cannot abide attacks on the Left.

During a previous episode of Have I Got News For You, Hislop addressed sleaze and the Starmer Government in his most schoolmastery terms by merely declaring: 'It's very disappointing.' The only audience reaction was awkward fidgeting in their seats.

That show also featured two Left-wingers as panellists, journalist Helen Lewis and comic Chloe Petts, whose predictable opinions were an argument for axing the compulsory BBC licence fee.

Elsewhere, social justice activists purporting to be 'comedians' abound. BBC Radio Four's News Quiz is another trusty vehicle of anti-Conservative hostility while Channel Four's The Last Leg often degenerates into a Left-wing hatefest.

But the issue is especially serious on Have I Got News For You because of its high profile and wide reach, with about 4.5million viewers (compared with the 60,000 people who buy copies of the Left's house journal, the Guardian, on weekdays).

The truth is that the health of the nation's political debate is best served when its premier satire show freely lampoons the ­Government of the day without fear or favour, exposes hypocrisy in MPs of all stripes and punctures every modish ideology.

Instead, the British public are served a show seemingly hideously tongue-tied by its own bias.