PMQs as-it-happened
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11:10 – OK, well this is it. Without a doubt, the most important prime minister’s questions since Gordon brown entered Number 10, this session will probably be the most explosive and vicious debate in the chamber for years. It was never going to be easy. After yesterday, Gordon Brown must have known he was in for a kicking here today. But losing four senior government figures in 24 hours is worse than misfortune. It’s the end of you. The consensus is we’re now in the end game. In an hours time we’ll see exactly what end game looks like in Westminster. It’s going to get bloody.
11:47 – The chamber is filling up by the minute. Brown has said he recognises the “outstanding” contribution Hazel Blears has made to the government, but no-one is taking that seriously. Will she even attend the session? Hard to tell.
11:56 – Jacqui Smith has finally been prodded into a round of interviews with Sky News and the BBC, in which she framed the leak of her resignation as an unfortunate leak by God-knows-whom. Peter Mandelson has been put down for after PMQs, indicating there’s a sustained attempt to shore up the PM’s position. It shows there’s no immediate mutiny on the go, but obviously that kind of reaction is also a mark of weakness.
12:00 – The view that this is a conspiracy by Blair’s babes (Caroline Flint is thought to be mulling a resignation) to knife Brown is gathering supporters. The Dizzy Thinks blog just quoted this, rather charmingly: Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned/Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned. Classy. Brown just walked in. We’re off.
12:02 – He begins, as usual, with remembrance for those who have died in Afghanistan, and the rumours of the Brit killed by an Al-Qaeda cell in Mali last night. The Labour frontbenches – usually comatose – are now, as far as I can tell, actually dead.
12:03 – The first question stresses the “Cabinet is reshuffling itself”. When will he accept he has lost all authority? Brown comes out fighting on his record (nationalising banks etc). He sounds angry, angry, angry. He must know his performance here will seal his fate. This is history in the making. A question on renewable energy can barely be heard. Cameron gets up.
12:05 – It’s prom night for the Tories, who appear severe and secretly elated. Theresa May appears to have worn her nicest dress. Cameron recites the list of Cabinet resignations. “His ability to command his Cabinet has simply disappeared”. Brown says the House should recognise the great work they’ve done. “Under the home secretary what we have seen is crime come down…” and on it goes. The Commons rumbles underneath him. “The prime minister is in denial. If these people have done such good work” why are they leaving? Cameron asks. He points to the fact Blears resigned today of all days as proof it’s a direct challenge to his authority.
12:07 – The past few weeks have been difficult for everyone in the House, Brown says. Yes, there are elements of party politics, but on all sides of the House there are issues people want to sort out. Cameron replies that if this was about expenses she would have resigned weeks ago. Huge shouts. Michael Martin orders members not to shout down the leader of the opposition, and warns he’ll shut down PMQs if it continues.
12:09 – Can Brown guarantee there will be no further resignations until after his reshuffle? Of course not. Brown sidesteps the question and tries to praise Blears instead, also ignoring Cameron’s charge that Downing Street spent the last few weeks briefing against her (true, by the way). The PM concentrates on cleaning up the expenses system – a rather pointless thing to say, really – and then attacks Cameron for not asking questions on policy. That’s almost funny. Cameron says the issue is about his leadership. “Let me turn to the issue of the economy,” Cameron says, surprisingly. He focuses on Alistair Darling. The PM only talks about him in the past tense, Cameron says.
12:11 – Brown again attacks him for not talking policy. “This chancellor is leading the rest of the world,” Brown says. Huge support from Labour. Every time he says the Conservatives are doing nothing (on economy etc) the backbenches shout ‘nothing’ with him. He’s never had so much support from behind him. There’s a pun there but this isn’t the place for it. Cameron asks him to guarantee the chancellor’s position. “If the PM isn’t happy with our policies, why doesn’t he call an election?” Why should the public have confidence in the chancellor if the PM doesn’t? Why doesn’t he use the one bit of authority available to him, Cameron asks. “Get down to the Palace,” call for the dissolution of parliament and have a general election? Brown: “It’s words, words, words.”
12:14 – Brown just got through his spar with Cameron about ten times better than I’d have thought he would, partly due to a surprising level of support from the Labour backbenches – who appear suicidaly tied to him, although you should always beware a kiss from a mafia boss. Clegg is up next, knives out, ready to make Brown bleed.
12:15 – “We can now see the government is in total meltdown. The PM is thrashing around fighting for his own political survival.” Does he understand the danger to our democracy when people feel no-one is in charge? Brown says the danger is in not doing things on policy. “He just doesn’t get it,” Clegg says. The government is exhausted after 12 long years. The only choice is now between the Tories and the Lib Dems, Clegg attacks. Brown can barely raise his voice above the cheers.
12:17 – “None of these parties has anything to offer us,” Brown manages. Behind him, it’s fascinating to watch Alan Johnson and Ed Balls as they eye him up. What is going through their heads? Balls, for the record, looks like an overgrown child. Johnson is impossible to read, which will come in useful over the next few weeks. Brown is told he is uniquely unsuited to play the role of a latter-day Thomas Jefferson over expenses, and must dissolve parliament. Brown smiles in an almost genuine way. His reply can be made out above the talking, but only just.
12:20 – Harriet Harman – widely disliked but I’ve always found her charming and intelligent – has that good natured look on her face. Whatever you think of her policies, I’d rather have a pint with her than anyone else on the front bench. The competition, it must be said, is negligible.
12:22 – Darling, next on the chop (we all presume), looks glum in the extreme. Brown’s performance – right now he’s talking about housing – is genuinely impressive. He actually appears authoritative. Not authoritative enough, of course, to save him, but better than I would have presumed. John Mason (SNP) asks how Brown feels about how unequal Britain has become under Labour. Brown says it would have been worse if SNP policies had been followed.
12:25 – An excellent intervention by a Labour backbencher calls on the Tories to give up their second jobs (it’s mostly Tories who have them) and says “we should concentrate on the job we were elected to do”. Brown notes the murmuring on the opposition benches. “Methinks they doth protest too much,” he says. Not like Brown to do wit, and that one didn’t really work. Not for me anyway, but I’m quite simple.
12:27 – Just a few minutes left until the session is over, with backbenchers using up the time on their pet issues. Brown will be grateful for that. He’s survived this one, although one more resignation this week will end him. All the same, this could have been a bloodbath, and it definitely isn’t. Cameron wins, obviously. But he only wins because of the circumstance, not his performance. Given their hugely different situations, it was Brown that pulled the most impressive performance out the bag today.
12:29 – Ladyman – always an easy name to remember – launches a strong defence of Labour’s record on the economy. Brown laps it up. The Tories are the first party to go into an election tomorrow with no policies on the economy, Brown claims. I can’t see Hazel Blears by the way. Jacqui Smith is there, on the front bench, as if nothing has happened. Although, to be fair, the main story of the last half hour is the extent of Labour support. The government benches haven’t been so loud for years.
12:32 – And with that, we’re done. Certainly not the judgement day we were expecting, but that doesn’t necessarily draw a line under it. See you next week. Although God alone knows what the political landscape will look like by then.
