Brown gets through PMQs smiling

After a nifty performance last week, Dave displayed lots of sluggish footwork today. Everyone was desperate for him to nail Brown over his ‘British jobs for British workers’ gaffe but instead Dave opened by asking the PM to condemn international protectionism. An easy shot, safely dealt with by Brown.

What was Dave playing at? The TV news is teeming with ‘winter of discontent’ style images showing crowds of indignant workers braving the blizzards to demonstrate their anger against the PM. And the Tory leader doesn’t mention it? Eventually, on his third question, Dave finally stirred himself to ask Brown to admit that BJ4BW had been a mistake and to apologise. Brown wriggled and squirmed. ‘Can anybody here say they don’t want British workers to get jobs in our country?’ Then he settled back into his comfort-zone rhetoric about the global nature of the crisis and his government’s investment in jobs which the ‘do-nothing’ Tories had opposed.