VERDICT: Ed Miliband repeated the same tactic as last week, concentrating on a specific policy area to test Cameron’s command of the details — and again it had the desired effect, although not quite so tellingly as before. The Prime Minister floundered and generalised on the issue of rape arrests, but managed to turn some of his discomfort back on the Labour leader, and ended their exchange sounding more confident than perhaps he was. He was then consideraby more surefooted throughout the backbench questions, particularly when it came to public sector pensions and to attacking Labour’s unfunded VAT cut. But, on the whole, this was another session to relieve the pressure on Miliband.
1235: And so another session of PMQs ends. My brief verdict coming up shortly.
1233: A well-briefed answer from Cameron, in response to Labour’s Luciana Berger. “Can the Prime Minister promise that his MEPs will support the 30 per cent target [for carbon
reduction]?” she urges. To which Cameron replies that “I’ll work on my MEPs, if you work on yours,” before listing some of the measures that Labour MEPs have voted for and against
— including, for an increase in the EU bugdet, and against a proposal to end first-class flights to MEPs.
1232: Answering a question about co-operative in Rochdale, Cameron suggests that he would like to visit the area, “but I’m aware of what can happen to Prime Ministers in
Rochale.” A nice reference to Brown’s grim encounter with Gillian Duffy.
1229: Cameron declines — laughing as he does so — to sack Cheryl Gillan at Labour’s insistence.
1227: The Prime Minister takes the opportunity, again, to pin blame for our involement in EuroBailouts on to Labour. He says that the coalition government has “fought” to ensure that we’re not wrapped up in the European Financial Stability Mechanism after 2013. Question is, how much money will we need to dish out, through that mechanism, before then?
1226: If Cameron has succeeded on anything today, it is in explaining the government’s pension proposals calmly and reasonably. “It is right that taxpayers contribute to public sector pensions,” he says, “but we’ve got to make sure that it is affordable.” He adds that John Hutton’s report into the matter is “good”.
1223: “We will not lose them,” says Cameron of the Elgin marbles.
1222: “And I bet that’s another detail that the Labour leader didn’t know.” Cameron subverts the argument that he himself isn’t good on details.
1221: And there’s another reference to Labour’s “unfunded VAT cut” by Cameron.
1220: As the exchange between the leaders finishes, it becomes clear that the Tories are eager to attack Labour over its proposed VAT cut. Cameron suggests that Miliband didn’t
even know about Balls’s policy. And then a Tory backbencher implies that all Labour want to do is load debt on future generations with their “unsolicited, unfunded” policies.
1218: Proceedings have become heated. Miliband offers to give Cameron “a lesson” on his crime policy. Cameron returns that Miliband’s questions are “partial” and
“uninformed”. The Prime Minister slaps down his opponent’s questions on the conviction of rapists by pointing out that police can apply to retain DNA records in certain cases.
1216: Cameron grins that, in contrast to the Blair and Brown years, his minister “actually talk to each other”.
1214: Miliband’s back now, asking whether the Prime Minister will reverse his proposal to delete the DNA records of those “arrested but not charged with rape”. Some of those people go on to offend, he says, in a clear attempt to seize some of tough-on-crime ground. Cameron says that the government inherited a broken DNA system, and it’s done a good deal to fix it.
1213: Cameron wags his finger as he repeats his Fathers’ Day message from the weekend: “People who leave their children and don’t pay their way, that should be happening in Britain today.”
1210: Miliband returns to his seat for now, with more questions to come. A Labour backbencher is shouted down as she rattles through an extensive list of the coalition’s u-turns, before finally reaching a question about women’s pensions. Cameron emphasises that the government needs to contain pension costs, and that it will do so with sensitivity to certain concerns. He sounds firm but concilatory on this.
1209: Oohs, as Miliband says that he wants to raise a point “in all sincerity”. And the point is this: wasn’t it “crass and high-handed” of the Prime Minister to say of the generals that they should “do the fighting, I’ll do the talking.”
1206: Miliband says that he “completely agrees” with Cameron that we ought to keep up the pressure on Gaddafi. But he repeats the sentiment uttered by many of those outspoken generals: that we need to rethink the Strategic Defence Review. The original, he stresses, didn’t account for the events in Northern Africa. Cameron says that, to the contrary, flexibilty was encoded into the original review. “I find it strange,” he laughs, “that Labour didn’t have a review for ten years, but now want two in a row.”
1205: Ah, there we go, Ed Miliband leads on the cost of the conflict in Libya. Cameron stresses that the funds our coming out of the special reserve budget, and that time is on our side. not Gaddafi’s.
1204: Cameron repeats his message on the eurozone: he wants no more British involvement in any bailouts (beyond our IMF obligations, natch).
1201: The first question from Labour’s Kerry McCarthy, who congratulates the Speaker on the second anniversary of his election. Cameron says that he was unaware of the anniversary,
but adds his congratulations. The question itself is about children in poverty, with McCarthy recommending — somewhat viciously — that Cameron watch a documentary to “see how the
other half lives”. The PM says that the government is having to deal with the mess that Labour left behind, but that it is doing so in way that protects families.
1145: Stay tuned for live coverage from 1200.
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