PMQs today wasn’t the usual bun fight. With Cameron and Clegg away, it was missing its usual bite. Instead, Harman and Hague started off with some very statesman-like comments on Burma. Even when discussion moved to the NHS, things didn’t really heat up. Hague had some good jokes at Ed Balls’s expense but Balls wasn’t there to heckle back.
The laid-back atmosphere got to a couple of the questioners. Simon Hughes, the Lib Dem deputy leader, called Hague the ‘Deputy Prime Minister’ before catching himself. Luciana Berger went one better, addressing Hague as Prime Minister.
One possible moment of tension came when Peter Bone called on Hague to ‘divorce the yellow peril’ and usher in a Tory-minority government (see the video below). Hague defused the situation with a joke and Bone is very much a usual suspect on this front. But there’s no doubt that more and more Tories are beginning to think about the moment at which the two coalition parties go their separate ways.
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