Boris Johnson had barely begun speaking when the Opposition benches began bobbing up and down, shrieking and squawking like an aviary of demented cockatoos. ‘Will he give way? Will he give way? Will he give way?’ The Prime Minister was presenting his Internal Market Bill and for a moment it was as though we were … Read more
The morning after Boris Johnson announced he was clawing back another raft of civil liberties, a vapour trail of anarchy hung over Westminster. In Parliament Square, where Extinction Rebellion has been camped out for the past ten days, female protesters removed their brassieres and chained themselves to the New Palace Yard railings. Those of a … Read more
The three Amigos are chillier these days – like a rock band in separate limos: HENRY DEEDES watches the return of the Downing Street coronavirus press conference By Henry Deedes for the Daily Mail Published: 22:01 BST, 9 September 2020 | Updated: 23:56 BST, 9 September 2020 A nyone seen the Prime Minister? There are … Read more
Head boy Matt Hancock’s touch of Apocalypse Now… for the freshers: HENRY DEEDES watches the Health Secretary announcing the Bolton lockdown By Henry Deedes for the Daily Mail Published: 22:34 BST, 8 September 2020 | Updated: 23:00 BST, 8 September 2020 Fans of classic Vietnam war epic Apocalypse Now will doubtless recall Colonel Kilgore – … Read more
Whenever there’s a session of International Trade questions, the chamber takes on a whisky sour flavour. Getting through the whole hour usually requires popping a couple of antacids down the gullet. The reasons for this bitter atmosphere are twofold. The first is that opposition MPs spend most of their time goading the Government’s post-Brexit trade … Read more
First PMQs of the new term and Boris Johnson was, I’m sorry to say, poor. Provocatively poor. It wasn’t just that he hadn’t bothered with any of the necessary holiday reading – it was clear he’d barely glanced at the back covers. After such a political hotchpotch of a summer, this was a showdown the … Read more
Rambling. Wildly incoherent. Those beardy weirdies from Extinction Rebellion were out in Parliament Square again yesterday, subjecting all of us to hours of indecipherable gibberish. Despite being supposedly educated, they’re a decidedly inarticulate rabble. Their speakers were about as stirring as the cider-fuelled Morris dancers at my local summer fete. Mind you, things were no … Read more
The Prime Minister raised a chubby paw aloft like an overzealous lollipop lady and announced in that peculiarly elastic voice he was calling things to a halt. His easing of lockdown, which he’d moved along at a lickety-split pace these past few weeks, was being stopped dead in its tracks. ‘We should squeeze that brake … Read more
No red carpet for Boris Johnson in Orkney. No welcoming waves nor friendly hurrahs. There was barely so much as a cheery ‘och aye!’ The greeting he received, in fact, as his Presidential-style motorcade zoomed through the southern west town of Stromness, was as chilly as the sea breeze and twice as salty. PG Wodehouse … Read more
This time last year, Boris Johnson marched into the summer recess with the lumbering swagger of an all-conquering prizefighter. In his first appearance in the Commons as Prime Minister, he pummelled Jeremy Corbyn through the ropes. Battered. Banjaxed. Jezza looked so punch drunk it’s a mercy he didn’t require smelling salts. Boris rarely emerges quite … Read more