House of commons

Oh look, there’s water coming through the roof of the House of Commons! What a gift to those starved of metaphors for the mess that has been made of Brexit. The problem is that the water coming through the roof, which the House authorities are insisting is not a sewage leak (in a blow to fans of particularly crap metaphors), is far more than some kind of coincidental symbol of what’s going on. It’s actually just a different manifestation of the same problem afflicting British politics as the one that’s led us into the Brexit crisis. The House of Commons Chamber is the bit of Parliament that the public notice

Today’s Prime Minister’s Questions was a little shorter than usual. This was partly because, as James says, John Bercow spoke rather less. Normally, the Speaker likes to lecture MPs about how their behaviour will appear to the public, even sometimes using the word ‘bullying’. Such lectures will have considerably less force now, given Bercow is one of those criticised by the Dame Laura Cox report for failing to tackle the ‘toxic culture’ of bullying and sexual harassment in the House of Commons. There has, though, been undue focus on Bercow as a result of the way some on both sides have been approaching this matter. Labour’s frontbench line that Brexit

Diet nannies will spend Christmas telling us ‘you are what you eat’ but in the House of Commons ‘you are where you sit’. Are you a Tory Whips’ stooge or a Dominic Grieve groupie aching to block Brexit, a braw new blue Scot or an English provincial plodder without hope of advancement? Parliament-watchers discern plenty about your political leanings from where you park your posterior. Each side of the Commons chamber has five green-leather benches that are divided by a gangway. On the government side of the chamber, all MPs are Conservatives except for a couple who have had the Whip withdrawn. On the opposition side, the lower four benches

The Tory backbencher James Duddridge has formally tabled a motion of no confidence in the Speaker John Bercow. Duddridge’s attempt to remove the Speaker follows Bercow’s outburst against Donald Trump from the chair on Monday, which further called into question his impartiality and his judgement. Duddridge’s motion is unlikely to succeed. The SNP and nearly all Labour MPs will back Bercow while the government has no appetite for getting drawn into this fight. The vote, though, will be an embarrassment to the Speaker. There’ll be a sizeable number of Tories who vote for it, 150 is the number being talked about tonight, and it will show how Bercow has lost

David Cameron chose a rather blustery Oxfordshire afternoon to announce that he was stepping down as MP for Witney with ‘immediate effect’. Cameron had previously suggested that he would stay on in Parliament, telling the BBC it was ‘very much [his] intention’ to continue as an MP. Pundits have linked Cameron’s surprise u-turn to Theresa May’s announcements about grammar schools at the end of last week, which undermined a key feature of Cameron’s social policy. So what should we make of this move? And where does it leave May and the remaining Cameroons in the Commons? In this edition of Coffee House shots, Fraser Nelson tells Isabel Hardman that: ‘I guess

As Tory MPs gathered at St Stephen’s entrance in Parliament to await their new leader on Monday afternoon, a choir in Westminster Hall began to sing. The hosannas spoke to the sense of relief among Tory MPs: they had been spared a long and divisive nine-week leadership contest. A period of political blood-letting brutal even by Tory standards was coming to an end. The United Kingdom would have a new Prime Minister. More than relief, there was hope for the bulk of MPs who had previously not been marked out for advancement. Theresa May’s accession shows that the narrow rules which were thought to govern modern British politics are not

Although Bernard Jenkin tabled an urgent question today, the Conservative politician didn’t seem to feel any sense of urgency when it came to arriving in time to read it. As John Bercow called Jenkin’s name, the Eurosceptic MP was nowhere to be seen — leading MPs to joke that he was busy in Brussels. ‘I find it very hard to believe that the honourable gentleman is in Brussels,’ Bercow replied. When he did eventually arrive, Bercow launched into a lengthly tirade about Jenkin’s timekeeping skills: ‘It’s a considerable discourtesy when I grant the honourable gentleman’s urgent question application when he’s not here at once, he should be in the Chamber, This must not happen again.

While PMQs took place in the Commons this lunchtime, outside in the Central Lobby a protest could be heard. Disability campaigners  had gathered outside Parliament to protest the benefit cuts in the Budget. Not that the powers that be want you to hear about the protest. The BBC’s Norman Smith was interrupted live on air by a member of Parliament security who told him he was not allowed to film while the protest was taken place: PS: You’re going to have to stop, you can’t film with this going on in the background NS: We’re not allowed to film this? PS: No NS: Why not? PS: Because it’s part of the

This weekend saw a host of EU drama unfold, as a number of Cabinet Ministers rebelled against David Cameron on Saturday — declaring that they would campaign for Brexit. Then came another blow to Number 10 on Sunday as Boris Johnson announced that he, too, would be supporting Out. So, did it all get a bit too much for one Parliamentary worker? Word reaches Steerpike that Moncrieff’s — the Parliamentary press bar — was subject to a break-in last night. It’s thought that someone broke-in in the search for a drink… or five. Police have cordoned off the area: The word in the corridors of power is that wine was the thief’s tipple of choice.