Our post-prorogation Python-ish parliament
Yes, it’s the end-of-the-pier show we’ve all come to know – if not to love. But Boris Johnson missed most of the Commons’ quivering fury...
“This Parliament is a disgrace!”
Hear, hear! Prolonged cheers.
The strange thing was that this was not a member of the opposition speaking, nor a member of the public, but the Attorney General, Geoffrey Cox, he of the booming Brian Blessed-style voice and manner.
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Taunted by the opposition benches, he was stirred to deliver a red-faced oration which could have come from a Shakespearean play. A tragedy, obviously. Or from a Monty Python sketch.
“This Parliament is a dead Parliament! It should no longer sit!”
Hold on, Mr Attorney General, I thought the Supreme Court said...
“It has no moral right to sit on these green benches.”
There was lots of cheering for that. It seemed to come mostly from Labour.
“This Parliament should have the courage to face the electorate... The time is coming when even these turkeys won’t be able to prevent Christmas.”
Well, we should be so clucky. Anyway, his bird recognition was dubious, as at other points he thought they were chickens.
These chickens, or turkeys, or both, contented themselves with goading Mr Cox, but really they were after bigger game.
Where was Boris?
The critics were divided on the Attorney General’s performance.
The Tories cheered enthusiastically. But the Speaker was not a fan of his pirouetting style. Turn and face the audience, he said.
Yes, the Westminster end of the pier show is back, with all the cheering, jeering, sneering, snarling, and in the case of Labour’s Barry Sheerman, apoplectic, selves that we have come to know and love.
Where would we be without them?
Public interest
On the resumption of Commons after the sudden end of the prorogation (which it turns out was all a dream), the Attorney General was the first turn.
He was asked a question about the Supreme Court judgment by the SNP’s Joanna Cherry, who magnanimously said she wasn’t going to call for him to resign, before pausing, and adding “for the moment.”
“I took a close interest in the case,” the Attorney General said to gales of laughter.
Then he moved to his “stuff happens”, all-in-a-day’s-legal-work shoulder-shrugging defence.
“If every time I lost a case I was called upon to resign I would probably never have had a practice.
“It often happens that governments lose cases. I accept we lost.
“We got it wrong, on the judgment of the Supreme Court. It was a respectable view on the law to take.”
In answer to a specific point, he said that convention meant that views of the law officers were not disclosed, but he would consider over coming days whether public interest required greater disclosure.
Joanna Cherry said he was being set up as a fall guy, a scapegoat.
Everybody knew that Mr Cox was only a warm-up act. There weren’t even any serious calls for him to resign. They were waiting for Boris to arrive to do that. Where was Boris?
Michael Gove, giving his Brexit statement, was subject to intense Parliamentary scrutiny, which we were told was the reason why MPs were so keen to get back to Westminster.
He was asked repeatedly when the term “base case” was changed to “worst case” in the Yellowhammer documents. It is one of a characteristics of Mr Gove that he affects to be very pleased to be asked such questions.
“I am so grateful to the Honourable Member for asking me that,” was his standard prefix to all his replies. When it came to the substance of his replies, nobody ended up any the wiser.
Among the more bizarre we’re-going-to-hell-in-a-handcart questions was to ask him whether he would rule out food riots arising from the lack of basics like cheddar cheese.
Where was Boris?
Next up was Dominic Raab, giving a statement on Iran.
This was all going on a very long time. There again, it was giving Boris more time to prepare himself for the ordeal of being placed on the Parliamentary barbecue.
Yep, they’re back, and the heat is on.
