It was the final PMQs before the sun-stroke season begins. Usually these are high-spirited Derby Day affairs and Ed Miliband came to the house knowing things could hardly be easier. A political grenade has just been lobbed into the prime minister’s bunker – by the prime minister himself.
He’s sacked two of his closest allies (and Ken Clarke). He’s fatally weakened himself in Europe by sending Lord Nobody to Brussels. And he’s surrendered to hypocritical calculation by stuffing his cabinet with skirt. Cameron the radical feminist? The silliest pose he’s ever adopted.
Miliband began by striking a note that he does particularly well: low-key, gloating irony. He congratulated the prime minister, along with ‘thousands of parents’, for junking Michael Gove. He quoted Cameron’s recent praise of Gove and asked, why sack him if he was such a success?
Cameron patted this aside and demanded to know why Miliband hadn’t mentioned today’s record employment figures.
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