When Daniel Craig was finishing his run as James Bond in 2021, Sir Keir Starmer was asked who was his favourite 007. ‘I don’t have a favourite Bond…’ he replied ‘but I do think it’s time for a female Bond’. This from a man who, at the time, struggled to define what a woman even was and whose party has never elected a female leader. 

It is telling that Starmer couldn’t even name his favourite 007, but still felt the need to opine that the next one should be a woman

It is telling that Starmer couldn’t even name his favourite 007, but still felt the need to opine that the next one should be a woman

But what the future prime minister’s response typified was a certain bien pensant belittling of Bond that goes back decades. Ian Fleming once described his creation as a hero for ‘warm-blooded heterosexuals’. To many on the left that was Bond’s original sin, for which the franchise has never been forgiven.

The calls for a female Bond are as lazy as the calls for a black Bond, and are invariably made by people who don’t personally care about........

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