PMQs: Rishi prepares for opposition

The tectonic plates were shifting at PMQs. Sir Keir Starmer asked Rishi Sunak if the total NHS waiting list of 7.2 million had risen or fallen during his nine months in office. Rishi said the number was up because striking medics are denying treatment to the people whose taxes pay for it. He suggested that Sir Keir should get work-shy doctors to accept the pay increase recommended by an independent review.

They tussled over the funding of a new NHS staffing policy. Sir Keir claimed that scrapping tax exemptions for non-doms will cover the cost but Rishi had heard it all before. ‘The same policy has paid for five different things. Everyone knows I’m keen on doing maths to 18. He makes a strong case for doing maths all the way to 61.’

Inaccuracy ruined that gag. ‘If he was any good at maths,’ said Sir Keir, ‘he’d know I’m 60.’ He accused the PM of making unfunded pledges and Rishi replied by welcoming Labour’s conversion to ‘fiscal responsibility.’

That was a subtle dig at Sir Keir for adopting the Tories’ two-child cap on family benefits. Sir Keir’s U-turn on state benefits has caused unbridled delight in the ranks of the SNP. At last, they have proof that the Labour leader is the same as the Conservative leader but with a knighthood. However the SNP can’t show delight in public – party policy forbids any display of cheerfulness or amusement – so they convert their joy into emotions that come more readily: disgust, outrage and revulsion.

Pete Wishart, a sanctimonious former pop star, frothed and carped about Labour’s conversion to conservatism and he said the chamber should be rebuilt with a single bench to be shared by Labour and Conservative MPs whose ideology is now identical. SNP leader Stephen Flynn put a question to Rishi which was merely an attempt to bash Sir Keir’s benefit cap U-turn. He accused the Conservatives of leaving a ‘heinous legacy’ by forcing a quarter of a million Scottish kids ‘into poverty.’ Rishi’s answer was peculiar: ‘What I’d say to him, and to Labour’s front bench, is that they needn’t worry. He’s never actually kept a promise.’

Unwise of Rishi to comfort Labour’s left wing and to assure them that Sir Keir will change course yet again and give extra handouts to parents who have more children than they can afford. The PM had publicly demoted himself to Sir Keir’s chief policy adviser.

Jet-setting crosspatch Caroline Lucas, who once confessed that she flew transatlantic to visit family members, scolded Rishi for moving too slowly on net zero. She got hugely and visibly worked up about this and began ranting at the PM like a furious motorist interrupting a Just Stop Oil protest. Her charmless outrage shouldn’t surprise anyone. As governments rush to embrace deranged eco-policies, the Greens themselves become shriller and noisier because they can see their political significance dwindling. Their true goal is not to minimise CO2 but to maximise the viewership of their tantrums.

Lee Anderson, attempting to be helpful, managed to underline the PM’s new role as a Labour strategist. He asked Rishi to assess when Sir Keir ‘will jump off the band-waggon and tell us what he stands for.’

Rishi replied smoothly, ‘I don’t think anyone actually believes he believes in it himself.’ He was cut dead by the Speaker who snapped at Rishi: ‘You’ve no responsibility for opposition policies.’

No. But he will after the next election.