Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Starmer is yet to learn the art of PMQs

(Photo by Jessica Taylor/UK Parliament)

Where to begin? That was one of most absorbing PMQs of recent times. Three top moments: the Speaker rebuked the PM for improper language. The Labour leader was humiliated by one of his own backbenchers. And Ian Blackford asked a good question. That’s right. It finally happened. The SNP leader in the House of Commons — the great windbag of the Western Isles — made history by raising a sensible point. The Scottish shellfish industry, he said, has been shafted by Brexit. The problem? Red-tape. Last Monday a hapless trawlerman had to watch while his £40,000 haul turned rotten on the dockside as a posse of EU form-fiddlers fretted over their paperwork. Scottish lobstermen now prefer to steam across the North Sea and land their pink crustaceans in Denmark. It’s a shellfish shambles which the government must solve.

Boris replied with his usual accusation that the SNP is desperate to have Scotland gobbled up by the overmighty EU superstate.

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