The first PMQs of the new term opened with Rishi Sunak congratulating the Lionesses on their close-but-no-cigar World Cup run and sending condolences to the family of Sergeant Graham Saville who was hit by a train when saving a man in distress.
The civilities didn’t last long. The tranquillity of recess was instantly forgotten as the Speaker of the House Lindsay Hoyle calmed the crowd: “I understand people are excited to be back at school, but we expect better behaviour.”
Sir Keir Starmer welcomed young Keir Mather, newly elected MP for Selby and Ainsty, to the Commons and got stuck into the government’s failings on the school concrete crisis. Every question he posed the PM exalted the profound prescience of Labour’s school building programme when the party was in office. Starmer said that many schools designated unsafe by Labour had been ignored by the Tories.
Sunak’s unconvincing retort was that Labour’s plan excluded 80 per cent of schools and was scrapped because it was a third more expensive than it needed to be. Then it got personal. Starmer brought up Sunak’s time as Chancellor and his decision to cut in half the funding for rebuilding schools. Starmer pretended to be surprised that no mea culpa was forthcoming from the PM.
The leader of the opposition went a bit Alan Partridge: “Children are cowering under steel supports” while the “the cowboys are running the country!”
As with most PMQs, the session faded into quotidian parochialism after the leaders had clashed – with one exception.
Andrew Bridgen, former Tory turned Reclaim party MP for North West Leicestershire shouted about the disaster of lockdown. He cited the debt that is fuelling inflation, the NHS and mental health crises, and the sinister loss of personal freedom. All valid points, but it really is a shame that such important scrutiny on vital national questions is left to the discredited Bridgen.
Sunak responded that he was proud “the government put its arms around” the British people and protected us from the storm of the pandemic. It made us – the voters – sound like children.
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