Cameron outfoxed in PMQs

Alive or dead? At PMQs today we discovered whether Dr Fox is still an active toxin within Cameron’s government. Ed Miliband, using that special quiet voice he likes to try when he’s got a deadly question, described the affair as ‘deeply worrying’, and asked how on earth the prime minister could have let it all happen. Cameron, evidently relieved that Fox is already a stuffed and mounted exhibit in the Museum of Former Big Beasts, pointed out that his minister had resigned. ‘Not something that always happened under Labour.’ 

It turned very tetchy all of a sudden. Miliband, apparently miffed, struck out with this hoity-toity harangue. ‘Some advice for the Prime Minister,’ he said. ‘In this week of all weeks. Show a bit of humility, eh?’ It was the ‘eh?’ that did it. Sometimes Miliband appears to be angling for the ‘self-righteous prig’ vote. And Cameron came back strongly. He jeered that the Fox issue was finished, and he reeled off a checklist of Labour scandals.