ENOUGH. It’s time to end this charade. Prime Minister’s Questions is a slap in the face to every person in the UK, a complete mockery of democracy and an enormous waste of time. It does not provide us with any useful information, and the notion that it allows Boris Johnson to be held to account is laughable.
There’s no point in me telling you what the Prime Minister said this week in response to questions on a range of topics from the downfall of Matt Hancock to the EU settlement scheme and the prospect of extending furlough. Browse through his back catalogue of stock answers and you’ll be able to guess. These questions are nothing but a minor irritation, a fly buzzing around the open sewer of Westminster that can be swatted away with a rolled-up copy of The Daily Telegraph.
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Not once did the Speaker intervene this week to tell the Prime Minister he needed to actually answer any of Keir Starmer’s six questions about why he failed to sack disgraced Health Secretary Matt Hancock, why he said last Friday he considered the matter closed, and why he now has the absolute audacity to take credit for a resignation he said he was sorry to receive. The PM was permitted to simply spout whatever bullshit he fancied, regardless of whether it had any relation to the questions.
“In a minute he'll be telling us he scored the winner last night,” said Starmer in response to him shamelessly and nonsensically bragging about the efficiency of Hancock’s departure – a departure he quite clearly thought was both unnecessary and regrettable. “Let me tell the Prime Minister why this matters”, he said, raising the case of a young man from Essex who died of leukaemia on May 5, the day before the grainy footage of Hancock and Coladangelo was captured. Ollie Bibby was desperate to see family and friends in the seven weeks leading up to his death, but was allowed just one visitor. His family followed the rules, and his mother is livid. So how could he possibly have said the matter was closed on Friday morning?
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Johnson’s response is to repeat his latest concoction of alternative facts and then start jabbing his finger and bellowing about how these questions relate to the “Westminster bubble”. A bubble? It’s more like a Teflon-coated bomb shelter. Starmer asks him to withdraw the comment – some chance of that.
Soon it was Ian Blackford’s turn to speak, and if he wanted to refute Michael Gove’s suggestion that he enjoys being in Westminster too much to push for a referendum then he went the wrong way about it, starting off with jokes and jibes about football. Who does he imagine enjoys this? The Yes supporters who are desperate for the SNP to stop messing about and set an indyref2 date, or the undecided voters who aren’t sure about independence but enjoying sticking it to the English when it comes to sport. It’s petty, pathetic and completely irrelevant but hey, as long as someone is laughing and having fun, who cares about that sewer of corruption! Why not just ask a silly question – (will the Prime Minister scrap the settled status deadline?) – to which you’ll receive a predictable answer (No)?
READ MORE: PMQs: Ian Blackford trolls Boris Johnson with jibe about England
The SNP MPs must realise there’s absolutely no point in repeatedly asking questions along the lines of “Don’t you agree you have made a huge mistake?” and “Are you going to perform a highly implausible U-turn?” The answer will be no. They may think they are making important points but in the process they are making themselves look weak and irrelevant.
If Johnson won’t answer Starmer’s deadly serious questions about the Hancock affair – and I don’t mean the romance, I mean the corruption, the lies, and the private emails – then they should be asked again and again. If he won’t answer, don’t just accept it. Don’t give tacit approval to this ludicrous Trumpian behaviour, don’t start joking about trivial matters, don’t be cowed by a previous telling-off for calling a liar a liar. Put him on the spot. Make him sweat. If he won’t answer, and the Speaker won’t act, just get up and leave.
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