Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Liz Truss’s first PMQs felt like a dress rehearsal

Was this the easiest opening session ever?

(ParliamentTV)

That felt like a dress rehearsal. Liz Truss sailed through her first PMQs which will probably be her easiest. It may turn out to have been her best. When she arrived, the House burst into ecstasies of joy as if she’d just found the cure for malaria, solved the Jack the Ripper case and liberated Hong Kong.

The questions lobbed at her were as soft as pizza dough, and each was prefixed with a note of congratulation and welcome. The mood was warm enough even to thaw the frost that covers Theresa May. Suspending her sulk for a moment she made an ironic observation. ‘Why does she think it is that all three female prime ministers have been Conservative?’

Her ‘mind-the-gap’ style is not easy to warm to. She emphasises odd words and she uses a halting, barking tone

Liz improvised. ‘There doesn’t seem to be the ability in the Labour party to find a female leader.

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