Category: The Commons Weekly
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It was inevitable that Mrs Badenoch (North-West Essex, Conservative) LoTO would concentrate on the Mandelson Affair at PMQs. She did not disappoint. What transpired, however, was an astonishing demonstration of how isolated from reality the Prime Minister seems to have become: “Sir Olly Robbins… puts to bed all the allegations levelled at me by those opposite…
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Following Tuesday evening’s Edward Heath Lecture in Salisbury by very fed up Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, it was not astonishing that LoTO focused all six of her questions on Defence Spending. Mrs Badenoch rose at 12:03:05 and asked: Mr Speaker intervened in apparent embarrassment to cut off Sir Keir’s third avoidance of these successive…
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It was with the greatest difficulty that I persuaded the Editorial Board (in this massive global organisation of 1) not to make the pic of the PM with his head in his hands at PMQs the photo lead today. It’s an Open Goal Keir! Open Goal. No-one cares. Starmer II: the Caretaker Years has opened…
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The Prime Minister almost succeeded in breaking PMQs on 18th March. Backbencher Andrew Snowden (Fylde, Conservative) summed up the problem: “Every week the Prime Minister comes here and reads out this pre-scripted nonsense that bears no resemblance to the questions he is actually asked. The Leader of the Opposition asked him about Peter Mandelson and…
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PMQs really have become a farce. In other news, we have decided to present The Commons Weekly in reverse date order starting with the most recent news from the cockpit of brilliance and so usually starting with PMQs. At PMQs the Speaker briefly awoke from his slumbers to rebuke the PM for trying to reconfigure…
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Special education: In trying to set out the Government’s proposed changes to SEND policy Bridget Phillipson (Houghton & Sunderland South, Labour) EduSec, outlined how a “new” £4bn will be spent on Individual Support Plans over the rest of this Parliament. SEND certainly needs radical reform, but these changes seem unlikely to either constrain spending, or…
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After last week’s ‘umble addressing and PM-skewering it was perhaps inevitable that the Chamber would be a little less frenetic as it ran down to the Half Term Recess on Thursday 12th February. Although the bulk of the political comedy continued outside the Chamber, there were some opportunities for further PM-baiting and Labour squirming. Jesse…
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What a consequential week it was! Winding down to the weekend (who works Fridays after all?) and with the PM kow-towing having bi-lats with President Xi in Peking Bejing, Pat McFadden made a statement to the House on Thursday 29th January setting out the government’s totally unsurprising decision not to pay the WASPI women compensation…
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Commons Weekly… is going to be a new concise political briefing that breaks down the most important developments in the House of Commons each week. We hope that it will provide readers with an accessible overview of parliamentary debates, party tensions, leadership dynamics and key policy discussions. Each edition will highlight the stories shaping Westminster,…