Watch: Hoyle hits out at John Bercow’s ‘retrograde’ Trump ban

Since becoming the new Speaker of the Commons, the softly-spoken Lancastrian Lindsay Hoyle has sought to distance himself from the tenure of John Bercow. While the latter spent his days constructing long monologues and pontificating from the Speaker’s chair, Hoyle has instead focused on limiting his own contributions in the Chamber and attempting to be an impartial arbiter of Commons debates.

Despite this change in approach (and the fact that he ran for Speaker as the anti-Bercow candidate) Hoyle has generally avoided criticising his predecessor directly. Mr S wonders though if that now might be about to change.

This week, Hoyle was interviewed by chief executive of the rugby league team, the Warrington Wolves. The Speaker may be from Chorley, but he’s been a supporter of the club since childhood, and his father was a chairman of the team.

In a remarkably candid conversation, Hoyle discussed missing his own knighthood so he could chair PMQs, BBC presenter Nick Robinson’s desire to watch a rugby league game, and how his own job was similar to that of a super league referee.

Remarkably though, Hoyle did not pull his punches when it came to Bercow’s tenure as Speaker. Asked what he thought about Bercow’s decision in 2017 to ban Donald Trump from speaking in Parliament, Hoyle said that it was a ‘retrograde step’ and  that it was not ‘just John Bercow’s decision’ to make. Instead, MPs should have been asked whether they wanted Trump to visit.

Hoyle said that he hopes the next President will be able to visit Parliament, and stressed the importance of dialogue with statesmen around the world.

But Mr S was perhaps most taken aback by the Speaker’s comedy bits. After discussing Boris Johnson’s ‘frustration’ at PMQs last week that only a limited number of MPs were in Parliament, Hoyle was asked how Boris reacted when told numbers would stay the same for the time being. At which point the Speaker launched into an impromptu impression of the Prime Minster.

Watch here:

Mr S wonders if Hoyle should stick with the day job for the time being…