Pmqs

The government must end the curious indifference to survivors of domestic abuse

What happens to a woman who leaves domestic violence? A layman’s impression might be that she gets on with her life and tries to forget what happened to her. But a question today in the House of Commons showed that this is just not the case. The SNP’s Lisa Cameron asked Theresa May about a constituent of hers who had left her violent partner: ‘A constituent of mine has informed me that she was repeatedly raped and beaten by her ex-partner, requiring an injunction. Much to her horror, her bank would not close their joint account unless she attended with the perpetrator. When banks are left to their own discretion,

Lloyd Evans

Hopeless Jeremy Corbyn manages to out-feeble Theresa May yet again

Carillion. It doesn’t help that the name resembles a kiddie’s word, like gazillion, suggesting an astronomical sum of cash. The sudden death of this lumbering giant gave Mr Corbyn an easy route to victory at PMQs. He didn’t take it. Corbyn outlined Carillion’s recent woes: the collapsing share-price, the short positions taken by hedge-funds, the profit warnings.   This seemed to amuse Philip Hammond. ‘Profit warnings?’ he muttered audibly, ‘companies issue profit warnings all the time.’ An odd boast for a chancellor to make. Mr Corbyn’s performance lacked bite and precision. He simply rambled his way through a long description of the government’s conduct. Either, he burbled, the government had awarded contracts to

New Year, same old PMQs

Anyone hoping that 2018 would bring an improvement in the quality of debate between Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn, or a reduction in the length of John Bercow’s interventions, would have been disappointed by today’s session. Corbyn and May traded the usual blows on the NHS. There was little in the exchanges that was enlightening. Jeremy Corbyn listed examples of people being treated in car parks, Theresa May said that the NHS had been better prepared for winter than ever before. She then tried to turn the conversation to the shortcomings of the NHS in Labour-run Wales. The rest of the session wasn’t much more enlightening either. Indeed, Justine Greening’s

Corbyn and May drain the joy from Christmas PMQs

The last PMQs before the Christmas recess often has a rather pantomime atmosphere. Unfortunately, neither Jeremy Corbyn nor Theresa May are anywhere near nimble enough to be able to create anything more than the sort of play that everyone leaves at the interval – and today’s performance wasn’t helped by John Bercow’s decision to extend the previously half an hour session to 53 minutes with no apparent good reason. The Speaker himself contributed to the overrunning PMQs by providing interesting details about MPs’ weddings that he’d been invited to. Jeremy Corbyn had one Christmas pun, which was about there being ‘no room at the A&E’. Quite a difficult pun for

May survives awkward PMQs on homelessness

Both Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May turned up in good form to PMQs today. The Labour leader was unusually nimble with his ripostes, deploying statistics on home ownership straight after the Prime Minister’s mockery of the Labour party’s attitude towards home ownership. But as usual, he didn’t manage to make the homeslessness figures that he made his key theme for his questions into a matter of great discomfort for May. The Prime Minister, for her part, managed to recover from each attack pretty well, arguing that the Conservatives were the party who believed in building more homes so that people could have a roof over their heads. She did, though,

Tory Brexiteers are clearly becoming more concerned

Remarkably, Theresa May made it through PMQs today pretty much unscathed. I cannot, though, report that this was because she launched a brilliant counter-attack or came with a way to break through the current Brexit impasse. Rather it was because Jeremy Corbyn’s questions lacked forensic precision. One suspects that if Robin Cook had been at the other despatch box, May would have had a far tougher time. There was a collective parliamentary failure today because, at the end of the 45 minute session of PMQs, we knew no more about the state of the Brexit negotiations than we did when we went in. When the DUP’s Jim Shannon asked for

Jeremy Corbyn says the B word during PMQs

Jeremy Corbyn rarely talks about Brexit at Prime Minister’s Questions, and it is interesting that he chose today’s session, which will get little attention as a result of the Budget, to probe Theresa May on the matter. The Labour leader did have a good stint, quoting a number of European negotiators, Tory backbenchers and Cabinet Ministers who have made comments to the effect that the British government doesn’t know what it is doing on Brexit. He also accused the Tories of blocking measures protecting workers’ rights and acknowledging that animals are sentient beings. But Theresa May was on good form, too, continuing to appear as though she is regaining her

Did Theresa May really ignore Lisa Nandy’s abuse warnings?

PMQs was always going to be a more serious affair than usual this week, given the questions about how Westminster and the political parties have handled serious allegations of sexual abuse. Theresa May began the session by saying that she was inviting all party leaders to a meeting to discuss the launch of an independent, grievance procedure. Jeremy Corbyn made clear he would be happy to attend this meeting. But he then proceeded to question Theresa May about a tax loophole involving the Isle of Man. The exchanges were not particularly illuminating. But later on Lisa Nandy stood up and said she had told Theresa May three years ago that

Jeremy Corbyn is getting better at political point-scoring

This week marks two years since Jeremy Corbyn was announced as the Labour leader. When he took over, he promised to shake up the way Prime Minister’s Questions was done, to make it more about the voters and less about the political point-scoring. But interestingly, he has now settled into a rather effective political routine. Corbyn now runs through a series of policy areas on which the Tories look weak, almost regarding Theresa May’s answers as incidental to the process rather than the prompt for him to probe more and point out that she hasn’t answered the question at all. This is probably a wise move, given Theresa May tries

Lloyd Evans

PMQs Sketch: Policy pay, child poverty, and Brexit

The news was bad at PMQs today. Gosh, it was terrible. Layla Moran started by announcing that Brexit would jeopardise thousands of jobs in Abingdon and wreck the local economy. Theresa May told her to stop spooking the voters with imaginary pessimism. ‘It’s what they’re telling me!’ shouted Ms Moran. Daniel Zeichner said the scourge of Brexit had now reached Cambridge. Migrants are fleeing in droves. University kitchens are without staff. Pubs are closing for lack of barmaids. Awful isn’t it? No hot dinners for dons. No tankards of goodly ale foaming in the city’s taverns. Mrs May urged him to ask businesses to train new staff. Mr Corbyn joined

James Forsyth

Yet another no-score draw at PMQs

Jeremy Corbyn has improved at PMQs to the extent that he now touches on the topics that will cause the Prime Minister the most embarrassment. So, today public sector pay and tuition fees both got an outing. But Corbyn isn’t a good enough—or forensic enough—parliamentary performer to really makes these points tell. Theresa May for her part is capable of parrying, but not counter-punching. The result: PMQs is now routinely a no-score draw. Today was no different and with an unexceptional set of backbench questions, the session rather petered out. These no-score draws quite suit both May and Corbyn. As long as May gets through these sessions intact, the morale

May fried over public sector pay at PMQs

Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May spent their lunchtime talking about McDonalds. Unfortunately for the Prime Minister, it was McStrike, rather than a lunchtime order, that dominated her first PMQs since the summer recess. Asked to show support for those workers currently taking industrial action against the fast food giant, May would only say that it was a matter for McDonalds – before going on to attack Labour for not doing more to tackle zero hour contracts when they were in government. This felt evasive and allowed Corbyn to go on and pit her against the side of the workers when he asked about the government’s diluted plans to crackdown on corporate excess. Although Corbyn

Theresa May’s bickering Cabinet united to ambush Corbyn at PMQs

Tories are worried. The holiday season is here. And the last time their leader took a break – in Snowdonia – she came back with a brilliant plan to replace her comfortable majority with a coalition of rudderless squabblers. She seemed aware of this today and her costume exuded Tory vitality. She was power-dressed in a shoulder-padded tunic of eye-dazzling blue. A lightning-bolt of pure Thatcher. She was helped by her cabinet. The message about discipline seems to have got through to the conspirators and they laid on a theatrical ambush for Jeremy Corbyn. As soon as the Labour leader mentioned ‘bickering ministers’ the entire front bench erupted in a

Isabel Hardman

Jeremy Corbyn still can’t find Theresa May’s jugular

Given how miserable things are for Theresa May at the moment, with her Cabinet behaving like children, her backbenchers urging her to use the authority she doesn’t have to tell those ministers off, and a policy free-for-all caused by having no majority, today’s final PMQs before the summer should have been extremely painful for the Prime Minister. But while Jeremy Corbyn has arguably been a key factor in this whole miserable situation coming about for May, he is still quite handy when it comes to helping her survive what should be deeply miserable sessions in the Commons. The Labour leader had a good series of questions which linked the Cabinet

Emily Thornberry outshines Damian Green – and Corbyn – at PMQs

Mrs May couldn’t make PMQs today. She was lunching with royalty up at the Palace. The happy atmosphere of the event may have been affected by territorial anxieties. The Queen’s principal guest, King Felipe VI, reigns over important parts of the Spanish mainland but not the pointy little bit down at the bottom which is full of pubs and red phone boxes. MPs were keen to ask the government to re-assert Britain’s possession of Gibraltar. And some believe that this claim should extend to other historically British regions: Malaga, Torremolinos and Ibiza. Mrs May’s place was taken by the recently elevated Damian Green. His personality is like his skull. Smooth,

Isabel Hardman

Emily Thornberry succeeds where Corbyn fails at PMQs

Today’s Prime Minister’s Questions could have been memorable purely for the novelty of Emily Thornberry deploying a tremendous amount of sass in her questions to Damian Green as the pair stood in for Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May. But it was also memorable because as well as leaning across the despatch box and delivering one-liners in comedy voices, the Shadow Foreign Secretary also asked some good, searching questions about the government’s position on Brexit, particularly on what would happen practically if there was no deal. Unlike Corbyn, who has always struggled to ask questions on Brexit at this session because of his own ambivalence about the matter, Thornberry is quick

Theresa May is slowly steadying the Tory ship

It was better from Theresa May today. She was combative, prickly and forceful at PMQs. The ship is moving on a steadier course. And two toxic enemies have returned to the fold. In the days following the election, both Anna Soubry and Nicky Morgan were ‘helpfully’ suggesting a possible timetable for Mrs May’s departure. Today they both asked supportive questions. And Mrs May read out the answers, tight-lipped. Only those within a yard of her could hear her molars grinding. The Labour leader got a rather glum cheer from his party. He suggested that the PM should fund a pay-rise for nurses because ‘she seems to have found a billion

James Forsyth

May turns back the clock to the Cameron and Osborne era at PMQs

During the general election campaign, Theresa May was strikingly reluctant to defend the Tories’ economic record. But today at PMQs, Theresa May sounded like the man she sacked as Chancellor as soon as she became PM. She defended the Tories economic record with vigour, pointing out how much progress the party had made in reducing the deficit it inherited from Labour and even chucking in a reference to Greece for good measure. It was like going back to 2014. The Tory benches lapped up this return to the old religion. May was also helped by the fact that Jeremy Corbyn didn’t make as much of the money that the Tories

Theresa May reassures Tory MPs at PMQs

This PMQs was always going to be a very different affair for Theresa May. Post-election, her aura has gone and, for the first time, Jeremy Corbyn now has his benches behind him. Given the circumstances, Theresa May turned in one of her best PMQs performances. She has never been a natural at the despatch box, but she was solid today. Her performance will have reassured Tory MPs that she is able to keep going. Jeremy Corbyn began on the Grenfell fire. At first, his questions were detailed and precise. He got May to admit that her understanding is that the cladding on Grenfell tower was not compliant with building regulations. But

Isabel Hardman

Theresa May will be feeling the heat at today’s PMQs

What a very different atmosphere the House of Commons Chamber will have today for its first PMQs since the election. In the week before Parliament dissolved, Tory MPs were in a most obsequious mood, reciting the ‘strong and stable’ slogan that Theresa May started her campaign with, and even telling the Prime Minister that ‘I am confident that the country will be safe after the election under strong and stable leadership’ (sadly Peter Lilley, who made this prediction, stood down at the election and so is not in Parliament to offer his insight into how he feels about the state of the country now). It will be interesting to see