What was claimed
An article published in a Papuan newspaper criticises the state of affairs in the UK.
Our verdict
The article is part of a satirical series published on The Secret Tory blog, not a real newspaper article.
Viral ‘Letter from London’ article is part of satirical series
15 August 2022
A viral article claiming to be “from the Papua New Guinea Courier” has been shared on Facebook.
The article, apparently written “from Our Own Correspondent” in London, comments critically on various political and economic issues in the UK, including the Conservative leadership contest, energy bills, inflation and climate change.
The letter is actually part of a series of satirical “Letter from London” articles shared on the subscription platform Patreon by an account called The Secret Tory, whose profile describes their work as “Creating satire for the (w)ages”.
Although there is a genuine newspaper called the Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, the article in question does not appear to have been published there.
The article has been shared widely on social media, including by some who don’t appear to realise that it is satirical.
It’s also been shared by a fake Private Eye account, which wrongly attributed the article to “Papua New Guinea’s daily newspaper - the Post-Courier”.
The original article—which is behind a paywall—was shared to The Secret Tory’s Patreon account on 1 August, and also shared to The Secret Tory Twitter account. Another example of the “PNG Courier” series which is not paywalled is available to read here.
Image courtesy of The Secret Tory
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as satire because the article is part of a satirical series published on The Secret Tory blog.