The takeaway moment from today’s PMQs came not in the main exchanges between Boris Johnson and Sir Keir Starmer but later in the session. Labour MP Fabian Hamilton asked about a just-published photo of the Prime Minister with an open bottle of prosecco alongside staff wearing tinsel at a Downing Street Christmas quiz. At the time, social gatherings were banned under lockdown restrictions. One of the many holding lines of days past about this particular event was that it couldn’t be a party because there was no alcohol. This changed that.
Hamilton demanded that Johnson refer the party — which is not currently the subject of a police investigation — to the Metropolitan Police. Johnson told him that he was ‘completely in error’. But it changed the Prime Minister’s demeanour and the dynamic in the chamber. Johnson became more irritable, while Labour MPs opposite him theatrically handed around their phones to colleagues so they could see the picture (there is a less dramatic reason for this too, which is that like much of parliament, the reception and wifi in the chamber are barely functioning). He soon found himself being questioned again about the lockdown parties, this time from a member of his own side. Mark Harper demanded that Johnson promise to publish the full report from Sue Gray when it is ready, saying he was asking the same question for a second week because the PM hadn’t answered him properly before. This time, Johnson made the commitment.
Starmer’s attacks won’t have moved the dial much — but they do fit in with a long-term strategy of his
He then had to answer another awkward Labour backbench question on his own behaviour. This time, the PM was asked about the way anti-vaxxers who mobbed Starmer and David Lammy on Monday had picked up on his Jimmy Savile slur against the Labour leader. Once again, Johnson dismissed the premise of the question, saying it was important not to let the ‘thugs and yobs’ off the hook for their behaviour. Though this does still concede that the PM has been saying things that said thugs and yobs like to say too.
As for Starmer’s offering, the Labour leader is trying to widen his appeal from man-who-criticises-chaotic-party-prone-government to other topics that voters care about and on which Labour has been rather weak. Today he chose to attack the government over Covid loans fraud after Kwasi Kwarteng said fraud does not affect people in their everyday lives. He then moved on to the loan that is being handed out to consumers to cut their energy bills, saying people were having the loan forced on them and that it was ‘a con buy now, pay later scheme — a dodgy loan not a plan’. Interestingly he also chose to attack Rishi Sunak, calling him the ‘loan shark chancellor and his unwitting sidekick’.
There are lots of qualms about the energy bill loan, but it is still a bit of a stretch to call Sunak a ‘loan shark’. Either way, Starmer’s attacks won’t have moved the dial much — but they do fit in with a long-term strategy of his, which has been to prosecute issues that aren’t yet the major story so that he can hold the Prime Minister to his claims later. And judging by the overall tone of today’s session and the mood in the Conservative party, there will be a fair bit of ‘later’ to come: a week ago, there was such chaos in Downing Street that it looked as though the Prime Minister would be facing an imminent vote of no confidence. Now, he looks set for a quieter recess — even if there is still little long-term hope for him.
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