Today’s Prime Minister’s Questions taught us two things. The first was that Keir Starmer has still got a long way to go before he is the one putting Liz Truss on the ropes. The second is that Truss has got a long way to go before she isn’t putting herself on the ropes instead.
It wasn’t a high energy session from either leader: Starmer fell back into his habit of enunciating every syllable in an exasperated tone, whether he was talking about the BUSINESS. SECRETARY. or MORTGAGE. PAYMENTS. In fairness, there is a fair bit to be exasperated about, but Starmer would probably adopt the same tone about his sock drawer. The overall effect was that Truss didn’t really struggle as a result of his questions about her mini-budget and the impact it has had on the economy.
The Prime Minister walked into a trap laid by Starmer
Neither did she flourish, though, refusing to answer questions and provoking laughter from the opposition benches when she claimed that the government was protecting the economy. At one point she retorted to Starmer that she was ‘genuinely unclear’ about what Labour’s policy was. But the manner of her delivery meant MPs on the Labour benches could make enough noise that she had to pause after ‘unclear’.
The Prime Minister also walked into a trap laid by Starmer, who asked her to guarantee that there would be no public spending cuts. Rather than taking the line that Kwasi Kwarteng did at Treasury questions yesterday, and saying she wouldn’t ‘pre-judge’ the fiscal event, Truss replied: ‘Absolutely.’ It’s difficult to see how that won’t come back to bite her. Indeed, she wouldn’t then answer questions about whether she would uprate benefits in line with inflation: if she doesn’t, that’s a real terms cut.
Other answers that Truss gave to backbenchers left her a hostage to fortune on a number of matters. She told Labour’s Graham Stringer that she would ban no-fault evictions, after reports the government was going to drop this long-planned policy. So is this a double U-turn, or the start of a policy spiral in which the PM adopts a range of different positions, leaving her own part spinning with confusion?
Similarly, she suggested to Conservative Guy Opperman that the energy secretary ‘is working on a plan to help companies and individuals use energy more efficiently’, which sounds suspiciously like the public information campaign she blocked only last week on the grounds the government shouldn’t be meddling.
The problem for Starmer is that his questions aren’t difficult enough and his delivery is insufficiently powerful. The problem for Truss is either that she can’t answer those questions anyway, or that the answers she gives only last a few days before she changes her mind.
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