Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

PMQs Sketch: Cameron was both the fibber and the whistle-blower

Is Corbo working for the Tories? The Labour leader was such a pushover today that Cameron turned what should have been a televised monstering into a party political broadcast on behalf of left-wing Conservatism. Corbyn raised tax-avoidance, the minimum wage, and short-term contracts — three of Cameron’s strongest issues.

The PM boasted that prosecutions of minimum wage defaulters have leaped fifteen-fold since 2010. On tax evasion, he trilled, ‘I made it the centrepiece of my G8’. And on short-term contracts he reminded the droopy-shouldered Mr Corbyn that exclusivity clauses had been outlawed under the Coalition. Is Corbyn seriously trying to ambush the PM with arguments that were settled a parliament-and-a-half ago? And he shows no sign of honing his prose into sharp, stinging queries. He prefers to twaddle away in long rambling sub-clauses like a waffling loyalist engaged in a parliamentary filibuster. When he loses the next election he deserves to be given a grace-and-favour shag-pad at Hatfield House, courtesy of Lord Salisbury, to honour his tireless efforts in the Tory cause.

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