Speaker of the House of Representatives of Malaysia, His Excellency Johari Abdul was observing the proceedings of Parliament from the public gallery today.
Apart from the minor issue of speaker Lindsay Hoyle somehow mispronouncing Her Majesty’s name and the name of his country (Hoyle thought he was from Malaya, an entity which had ceased to exist in 1957), his What an opportunity to see Mother Parliament close by! What would they be arguing about? Surely Gaza, Ukraine, important matters of state?
Conservative MP Carl McCartney rose. He told the House and Her Majesty, “The good people of Lincoln, who declare their taxes and pay tax on their profits when selling their second home, overwhelmingly want the Lincoln Christmas Market to be brought back.” “The Labor City Council has refused to do what the people of Lincoln want. “What message will the Deputy Prime Minister send to Lincoln voters ahead of next week’s local elections?”
As McCartney described, Deputy PM Oliver Dowden, in full mock anger, said, “That was the Grinch in action… That Christmas market, in the house of [sic] Magna Carta was a favorite of the local residents!” Alas, it is not recorded how His Majesty responded.
And yes, this was Dowden’s answer, Rishi Sunak belatedly realized that prime ministers should sometimes engage in foreign policy rather than subcontract it entirely to his predecessors-but-three and moved to Berlin. . This meant that Angela Rayner was subbing for Keir Starmer at the dispatch box.
There was a clear elephant in the room here, and Reiner deftly addressed it directly. “I know the opposition is desperate to talk about my living arrangements, but the public want to know what this government is going to do about them,” said Natalie, of Brighton, before telling her story. Before telling the story of Natalie, who was sentenced to expulsion twice for no fault of her own. 18 months’ notice (the Conservatives previously promised to end landlords’ ability to evict tenants without cause in 2019, but this is now an “expectation”).
Rayner’s introduction was designed to heighten Dowden’s criticisms over the ongoing controversy over whether Labour’s deputy leader had falsely filled in a form a decade earlier. But Dowden, who considers himself a stand-up comedian despite all available evidence, had written his joke and was going to use it.
“It is a pleasure to have another exchange with the right honorable lady in this House, our fifth in 12 months. Any more of these and she’ll claim it as her principal residence!”. Reiner LOLed, shaking his head.
But after Westminster had packed his popcorn for Rainer’s turn, it was even more soggy. Rayner stayed on message, Dowden batted straight.
Even with their leaders away, now-standard PMQ tropes were on display – Rayner brought up Liz Truss’s mini-budget, Dowden reminded her that she wanted to keep Jeremy Corbyn in Downing Street. Both would love to compete with each other’s predecessor. Reiner suggested that Dowden was tired, adding: “Maybe it’s the 3 a.m. calls from bad guys that keep him up at night.”
Rayner concluded: “I read with interest that the right honorable gentleman is urging his neighbor in Number 10 to call an election because he is worried that he might be destroyed. Did he finally realize that when he backstabbed Boris Johnson to get his partner into No. 10 he was abandoning his biggest election winner for a tiny loser? Tory backbenchers looked quite sad.
By the way, the session opened with a monologue from the Tories’ bumbling deputy chairman, Jonathan Gullis – to call it a question would be to overstate its coherence. It lasted for one minute and 28 seconds. That’s about a minute and a half more than Jonathan Gullis for anyone.
“I suggest that he move for an adjournment debate,” Hoyle said. Her Majesty would have been forgiven for wandering into the gift shop.