Red and redder

I haven’t done a review of Prime Minister’s Questions for a while. Other people, such as Dan Hodges and Lloyd Evans, do them better; they are not the most important parliamentary occasions; and the point-scoring “who won?” mentality that surrounds the event is a bit puerile. None of that would stop me, but I have a self-denying ordinance in respect of commenting on Ed Miliband until 2014.

Still, someone asked me what I thought of the Leader of the Opposition’s “performance”, so I told him:

Hopeless, really. Two hours later and I can’t remember much about it, except that EM made personal and silly remarks about David Cameron’s complexion and temper. “The Government’s in a mess, isn’t it?” was the substance.

The whole thing is opposition for opposition’s sake. The opportunistic positioning on Lords reform, on which I thought Cameron was quite right to say that Labour’s position was to “vote yes and then vote no”. The clever quotation followed by the mock innocent, “What went wrong?” The description of a few tense words with Jesse Norman, the Tory rebel, last night as “fisticuffs”. None of it has got anything to do with how an alternative government would run the country.

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• FergalFury

  We saw how ZaNuLabour would run the government. Miliband singly failed to put clear blue water between himself and Blair/Brown. 3500+ new “laws”, criminalizing protest, a supine attitude to police pay and powers. It is called a police state Giovanni. We tend to abhor such things.

• http://twitter.com/francessmith frances smith

  got out of bed the wrong side this morning, john?

• porkfright

  “How an alternative government would run the country ?” Same way as the last two collections of neocons.

• mark_76

  What a poor comment on PMQ’s. I thought Quentin Letts beggared belief with his commentary of proceedings at parliment. He of course works for the that bastion of liberal thought the Daily Mail. Where as you work for the Independent! Anyway having a go at Ed Miliband who 8 months ago was being written off by your good self. He took Cameron apart today. Even Camerons come back that he is for workers not shirkers is utter guff. Wages are down in real terms and he has increased VAT. All this whilst giving the parasitic rich a tax cut.
  You might have missed Miliband asking about the double dip recession. He blames Labour for this but that tired old pony wont wash with the public anymore. The private sector was supposed to fill the gap left by the public. That has proved wrong on so many levels.
  This is the begining of the end I feel for this coalition. You expect HM loyal opposition not to takes its opportunity to increase the pain and help bring down a incompetent government.

• http://twitter.com/Alex_Ross_Shaw Alex Ross-Shaw

  I always like reading your opinion John but what I would like to see when you write posts like this is your opinion on what Blair would have done. Personally it was a good knockabout and although I didn’t watch it the whole aim is to get the lead quotes into the News at Ten.

  I agree Miliband wasn’t quite as good as some people made out (though he still ‘won’ for whatever that is worth) but I don’t think it’s the purpose of PMQs for the leader of the opposition to set out his alternative government (though some indication helps strengthen your position and points) and that’s why I wonder what Blair would be saying in these circumstances. Surely he’d be going for the jugular too?

• Pacificweather

  Tell me which Opposition in the last 200 years did not oppose for opposition sake? Or perhaps you think that because the Opposition (unusually) is supported by a minority of the votes cast that it should provide more rigorous opposition than when (more usually) it is supported by a majority of the votes cast.

• Kugelschreiber

  I don’t always have the time to watch Parliament, but a few incidents stand out in my mind: For example,

  1) When the Health bill was passed, against the will of almost the entire country, the TORY MP’S responded by BANGING ON THE TABLE. I found this quite repulsive. It reminded me of a tv programme I’d once seen , showing PUBLIC SCHOOL 6TH FORMERS doing something very similar, BANGING on their dining room table.

  2) When a Labour politician (I forget which one, it may have been Ed Balls) CHALLENGED those right wing politicians who like to DENIGRATE our existing GCSE qualifications by most amusingly bringing in an ACTUAL MATHS EXAM PAPER into Parliament & reading some of the (difficult) questions out loud!

  I know how HARD the Maths GCSE is because my own son had to do it a couple of years ago.