The verdict
Today’s PMQs was a game of two halves. A fresh-looking Ed Miliband, having recently had his hair cut, decided to do the same thing to his allotted six questions. What finished a score draw started well, with Ed Miliband forcing Cameron to at least feign regret over the fact that both inflation and youth unemployment are on the up. The mantra of blaming the last Labour government is sounding ever more pathetic every time it is rolled out as an excuse for Tory economic cock-ups, as are over-dramatic references to Greece and Ireland. However, Cameron did hit back well and it was perhaps a mistake for Ed to allow him finish on a high after just three questions rather than pursuing him further on the economic issues. Forestry, although very important, was the wrong issue to raise. Cameron appeared strong, reasserting the right of the public to access Britain’s forests. Cameron managed to get away with laughing off Ed’s last question and having used all six up, Ed didn’t have a chance to really force the prime minister into a corner.
Best backbencher
It really is a shame that Ben Bradshaw falls into this category; Labour’s frontbench would be stronger with him on it. However, his question to Cameron over whether or not the NHS reforms were causing NHS waiting times to rise or fall made the prime minister flounder. Failing to answer the question, Cameron only drew attention to the looming problems which patients will face when his draconian NHS ‘reforms’ come into force.
Best comment or joke
Today’s PMQs isn’t winning any comedy awards, although Ed’s quip about the Conservative tree and selling off forests got a chuckle. Both sides of the house also enjoyed Nick Raynsford’s suggestion that Ken Livingstone would be the mayor of London come the Olympics. We’ll see which Tories still find it funny when Ken is back in City Hall.
Elsewhere, the first question of the day from John Mann really did bring home the very real and personal nature of the coalition’s cuts. The issue of nursing home fees I hope made the whole chamber think, at least for a moment, about who this government will hit hardest.
For more on PMQs, read Tom Bage‘s excellent sketch of yesterday’s PMQs – who was missing the wood for the trees? and Rayhan Haque‘s detective work into Cameron’s misleading figures on the Flexible New Deal
Well if you saw a score draw! do not do the pools mate, both were poor but Miliband was a loser. The sad fact we all new the Tories were going to go back on the forest sale, but Labour thought it has won points, children playing silly games for the camera while the country is sinking. grown men playing for the camera’s
Was the answer to the forests question the first one that Cameron has ever answered since becoming PM? Perhaps he couldn’t think of a time when forests and trees were worse off under Labour over the past fourteen years. Soon he will, no doubt, insist that youth unemployment, like the poor, are always with us. How did we end up with this lot? Who voted for them? Where the media clamoured for an Election because nobody voted for Brown as PM who voted for Cameron?