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Wednesday 03 June 2015 7:57 am
The economy took center stage during David Cameron’s first Prime Minister’s questions in this parliament – but if the electorate were looking for a particular commitment to something, they would have been frustrated.
Several new MPs were welcomed to the weekly fray, but the rhetoric on both sides was business as usual.
Harriet Harman, the Labor leader, tried to send Cameron with some questions about the ownership of the house. Although he admitted it was “challenging”, he said almost 100,000 people had been helped onto the housing ladder through Right to Buy and Help to Buy.
“As always, the enemies of aspiration in the Labor party will not support it,” he said of the schemes.
He later went even further, saying: “The opposition party, after the most catastrophic electoral defeat in years, can’t even spell ‘aspiration’.”
Harman tried to argue that the Tories could not blame Labor for unpopular decisions during this parliament, but Cameron responded. “We’re still clearing up the mess that his government has left,” he said to much derision (directed at Labour).
And when new Labor MP Cat Smith ventured a question about the UK’s credit rating, Cameron suggested she was more on the ball than her colleagues.
Noting that his question was “in terms of responsibility and fiscal responsibility”, the Prime Minister said: “I take this as a sign of progress.
“There is a leadership election, I threw your hat in the ring. In that question it made more sense than all the others put together, go for it.
In fact, Cameron spent much of PMQ taking a dig at Labour, noting in one of his responses that there had been a number of results in Yorkshire that he had taken “a particular interest in and was pleased to see happen”.
Former shadow chancellor Ed Balls was ousted from his West Yorkshire seat of Morley and Outwood in the election.
Of the two Ed, Cameron added: “It is extraordinary, the two responsible for this great policy of theirs, one lost the election, the other lost his seat. The messengers have gone, but the message is still the same.”
But the Commons weren’t all the usual dad jokes. After the grilling, several MPs offered heartfelt words about former Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy, who died this week.
Cameron said:
Charles Kennedy will be remembered for his success, for his principle and intellect and above all for his incredible warmth and good humor.
Harman agreed:
He had a deep seriousness of purpose and a great intellect but he carried it lightly. She could be the smartest person in the room, but also be warm, funny and generous. It showed that you can be in deep disagreement… while still respecting the good faith of those who take a different view.
He stood tall among a generation of Scots who were head and shoulders above their peers. I remember when he first came to this house. The golden boy of the Highlands, shone in this room. He was elected so young and it is a tragedy that he died so young.
Speaker John Bercow added:
He was a good speaker, but an even better listener, especially and perhaps most surprisingly, Charles had the rare ability to reach millions of people of all political persuasions and none, across the country who were untouchable and in many almost actively. hostile to politics.
Charles was the boy next door to British public life. We salute him, honor his memory and send our sincere, heartfelt and deepest condolences today to his family and friends.
And speaking from the back benches, Nick Clegg said:
When people think of him, they smile, he saw good in people, even his staunchest political enemies and he always brought out the best in people in return. He was the polar opposite of a cardboard dot-point party politician – brave but vulnerable, brilliant but flawed.
As he often said of the people he most admired, he was a fully committed member of the human race.
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