Another Burnham bungle: Out of depth PM refuses to answer Qs at PMQs

0:02The Telegraph.

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1:08A very slow car crash at PMQs, but our windbag Andy Burnham let slip that he will not be cutting welfare to spend more on defence. Can me babe not called him continuity kia, but we think he's much worse than Starmer. Welcome to The Daily Tea with me, Tim Stanley. And me, Camilla Tomini. You've just announced that you're ring-fencing housing. Everyone will infer from it when you say social security is just as important as national security, that you're ring-fencing all welfare spending. You're basically saying I am not going to cut welfare for warfare. And Labour's whole approach to welfare is we can spend our way out of the overspending problem.

1:52Yes, that's right. By spending more money on interviews and training and sitting down with people and holding their hand and asking them, do you feel anxious, love? By spending billions and billions of pounds on that in about a hundred years time. I'm sorry, I'm getting worked up about this. I know, keep calm. In about a hundred years, I'll learn it, in about a hundred years time. Yes. We might save five quid a year. Camilla, I think I just tore a strip off the new owner for trying to use my private toilet Yes, I know We do have to block out the toilets here because sometimes we need to use them before we record They're dressing rooms It's where I put on my corset and inject my Botox But there was a lady trying to get into them and I said, you can't use it, madam It's for us And it now occurs to me she may well own it She may well own the newspaper I wouldn't know because I never see the owners They're like Wizard of Oz to me There's someone behind a curtain, I'm sure you Okay, let me know if you see one around the office.

2:45I'll let you know. And say that person employs you. Usually looking for you, actually. I wouldn't entirely object right now to being sacked. I think I might enjoy a good sacking. Yeah. If it means I don't have to sit through another Andy Burnham Prime Minister's questions. Well, hang on a minute, because I appreciate it. I've made the point that PMQs appears to be on Mogadon today. My God, I was like, what's happening here? But it's like a car crash unfolding. It's irresistible. You have to watch it. You have to analyse it. you have to come to some conclusions about just why Andy Burnham is so bad at this.

3:17Yes, I think it's more like being stuck next to a boar on a plane. Right. I don't find it as thrilling to watch, I have to confess. Boar or massive fat person? In fact, what's worse? Okay, all right. A quite good looking boar on a plane. I will give him that, all right? Now, there are several things he does which really seriously lead to the sharp, sudden decline of PMQs. One is this utterly disingenuous thing of saying, I think what people want is they want problem solving and not point scoring. He did say that three times. Let's listen to it. Mr Speaker, I have to say to the right honour lady, she does have to do better than that.

3:55I mean, they are the worst kind of points to be scoring when the country is watching. That would send the strongest possible message to our armed forces. This is an area for problem solving rather than point scoring. We should do more problem solving than point scoring. Having said people want problem solving, not point scoring, what he then does is score points by accusing the opposition of not problem solving. That's right. So the answer to questions, basically, Kemi Badenoch asked him a series of questions and he basically seems to be justifying his refusal to answer them by saying, I don't want to point score, by then launching into whataboutery about other issues that have nothing to do with the original question.

4:48So what he's doing, and everything R. Andy does is a daft person's idea of a clever strategy. So what he's doing is he's saying, when someone says, why don't we do X? He's replying with, well, why wouldn't you sit down with me and talk about Y? So the big debate, which Kemi tried to kick off, was how are we going to finance the 3 % commitment on defence spending. And she said, we have a plan for cuts and we put it to you. Our Andy keeps saying, let's talk, let's have a conversation, let's talk about it. So she's saying, here you are, I'm talking to you right now. And his reply upon seeing her programme is, that's just point scoring.

5:30We've taken the strongest possible stance in supporting President Zelensky and Ukraine. We are playing our role around the world and we will continue to do so. Mr Speaker, she mentions the plan that she has set out. And this is why I say we should have an honest conversation across this dispatch box, because I looked at it and I don't think myself that taking£4 billion out of housing benefit is going to get the right consensus around this issue, because that would create levels of homelessness in this country, Mr Speaker, that we wouldn't have seen before hundreds of thousands of children in temporary accommodation.

6:14Can I say to the right Honourable Lady, yes, we do everything to support our national security, but it can't come at the expense of social security. Having strong national security also depends upon having resilience in our communities. this side of the house will not be forced to choose between the two and we will set out a plan to get to 3.5 % by 2035 at the spending review. Two huge revelations from that exchange, Tim. I think entirely unforced and probably unexpected. John Healy wasn't sitting next to him, he was standing up and Healy is very good at having a poker face. I think probably his wedding photos have a poker face.

7:02Well, he does bear this uncanny resemblance to Dobby from the Harry Potter films. So that's just strange in itself. But you can imagine running through his head, remember, this is the Chancellor who quit as Defence Secretary because Keir Starmer wouldn't spend enough money on defence. You can just imagine him thinking, not only are you refusing to commit to the 3 % that I resigned over, but you've just announced that you're ring-fencing housing and everyone will infer from it when you say Social Security is just as important as national security, that you're ring-fencing all welfare spending. You're basically saying, I am not going to cut welfare for warfare.

7:40And you're further indicating that you're not really going to be willing to cut spending at all, which is critical. And Burnham's whole argument is that we can save money on welfare spending in the long run by building council houses in the short run. Now again, an airhead's idea of a clever strategy It doesn't seem to have occurred to him That building those houses will itself cost money Yes, it does cost money That's the thing about houses They're expensive to build and to buy, Tim And Labour's whole approach to welfare is We can spend our way out of the overspending problem Yes, that's right By spending more money on interviews and training And sitting down with people and holding their hand And asking them Do you feel anxious, love, by spending billions and billions of pounds on that?

8:30In about 100 years' time, I'm sorry, I'm getting worked up about this. I know, keep calm, Tim Shelley. In about 100 years' time, we might save five quid a year, right? I love the idea, by the way, that you think that benefits claimants are persuaded back into work by somebody holding their hand. If only they get an online interview at best and they're told to check back in in three years' time. Quick flashback to the conversation we were having a couple of days about immigration. Yes. It's the same with Labour's approach on interviewing asylum seekers. Just speed up the interviewing process. Yeah, but once you've done that and you've rejected them, they just stay in the country.

9:05And also asylum seekers as benefits claimants, they are both being influenced by people on social media telling them how to game the system. I am not saying by implication that everybody on benefits is gaming the system. I'm merely saying that there are some who are on benefits as a result of watching videos on TikTok. Yes. The other thing, by the way, social security. This guy literally is living in the 1980s. He's hankering after the 1970s when literally Britain was on its economic knees. The rich were leaving the country in their droves. Well, as they still are, it was referenced that the third biggest taxpayer in this country has moved to Greece.

9:45Chris Rockos. To avoid paying tax. A comprehensive boy done good because he got a scholarship to Eton out of state school and then ended up running one of the most lucrative companies in the country. And by the way, he's taking 350 million quid in taxes with him to Greece. Thank you very much, Labour, the so-called party of business and the workers, which is an oxymoron in itself. And by the way, I was speaking to somebody who let's describe them as high net worth and in the same circles as this billionaire who is saying that one of the reasons we've seen a very recent flurry of extremely loaded people going to other parts of Europe is I think they're fearing an exit tax might be slapped on millionaires and billionaires in the next budget.

10:27Now, the FT put that to the Treasury and they denied it. But we've seen that before, haven't we? So let's just be aware that we have now a prime minister confirming at PMQs that he isn't willing to cut spending on benefits or indeed spending at all. We've got guilt yields. I know we're going on about them, but they're still at that historic 19 year high, much higher than under Liz Truss. and we've got John Healy in a lacklustre speech that we nearly fell asleep through on Monday refusing to rule out tax rises even though that would mean crossing red lines that were laid down by the manifesto. So we've got a perfect storm of basically Labour and its leader in denial of the current dire straits we're facing seemingly unable to do anything about it going on about spreading good vibes and having, you know, kumbaya sessions across party lines.

11:20I want to throw one thing in here, which is this morning I had a conversation with an estate agent. Oh, did you? Are you moving, Tim Stanley? No, no, no. We're facing that moment when maybe an older person in the family wants to downsize. Got it. And she was explaining why the market is stuck and why people aren't buying and why house prices are falling. and it's in part because it's a ladder that people are meant to go up and down over the course of their life as you as you make more money you go up it and then later when you want to realize those assets or you're just overwhelmed by the size of the house you go down but people at the top are not going down no and the reason they're doing is a combination of policy as it currently is stamp duty so people are just not willing to to sacrifice the house to have to pay a vast amount of money in order to move somewhere smaller.

12:07What's the point? Kind of for nothing, by the way. That money is for nothing. You're like, what is this? I'm just being slapped with a bill. But something she said that I hadn't considered was actually not policy itself, but the rumours of policy. Yes. That she said when Labour was elected, that immediately had an effect upon the market, not because of anything it did, but what it was talking about what it might do. Because housing is such a huge speculation. You're looking to part with millions. So you don't do it if there's any risk that a new policy will come in that's going to hit you. So in other words, everything just stopped.

12:41And finally, people got over the fear of Rachel. And then Iran happened. Yes. And now everyone's thinking, but prices are going to go up. Interest rates may well go up. It's not worth moving again. No, that's right. The issue is not people's willingness to move. The issue is the market isn't moving because the houses are not moving because people are not, at the top end, are not downsizing. This is ironic, isn't it? Because it's the reverse de-ream effect. It's this notion that people fear things can only get worse. So it doesn't make a difference if you change the Chancellor. And as Kemi Badenok points out, and let's listen to, I think, probably the best blow she landed at PMQs.

13:21Mr Speaker, the Prime Minister seems to think that the last government was a Conservative government. The last government was a Labour government. And it failed, which is why Keir Starmer resigned. He keeps talking about their record as if it was fantastic. If it was, then why is Keir Starmer not sitting there? Where Britain needs leadership, what we have at the moment is just vibes. He said he appointed the Chancellor because he cares about defence, but he won't fund it. Other countries are making claims over our sovereign territory. They smell weakness. He's pretending that he's the change candidate, but the fact is he's still failing to cut welfare, he's still paying to hand over a sovereign territory, he is still not funding defence.

14:04So on the issues that really matter, isn't he just continuity care? An astonishingly weak performance from Burnham at PMQs today, totally exposed, lightweight and absolutely mauled by KB. You almost feel sorry for him. resembled a youth club leader doing political cosplay. And I actually thought, that's right. So this tedious exchange with MPs, by the way, about their constituencies, because of his own obsession with geography and this north-south divide that's now been created by the man who apparently wants to level up. And I appreciate MPs are there to say, on behalf of, you know, Morton in the Marsh, I would just like to point out to the Prime Minister.

14:47But it's getting ridiculous, Tim. Oh, one MP said, I'm from Gravesend. do you like the South? And then there was a big, there was a hilarious, again, an airhead's idea of humour back and forth about, well, I don't quite like the country, what you might have heard, I don't quite know the South. Oh, it's so boring. But on your point about the statesmanship, I mean, we were always complaining that Keir was never in the country. But by contrast, when Burnham came to defend the decision on the settler sanctions, he couldn't really do it. And you could tell that he hadn't really thought much about it before.

15:23This is Ed Miliband's policy. It's being timed. It has to be timed in part to do with the election. I know it's because the settlement decision was coming up before the Israeli general election, but there is also an election coming up in Holborn and Pancras. And I was just really struck by how poor his defence of the sanctions was. Let's listen to that. Mr Speaker, she mentions leadership. Let me tell her and the whole House where Britain is showing leadership. There have been conservative politicians at this dispatch box, Labour politicians too, for decades, who've talked about the importance of the two-state solution between Israel and Palestine.

16:13words from any politician about a two-state solution will be only words if it's not backed with action and leadership is about taking action where there is injustice where we need to correct unfairness people being driven out of their homes losing their homes being intimidated in their daily lives. I credit the father of the House, who yesterday applauded the action that this government is taking. In this difficult and dangerous world, Britain has to stand for something. Britain has to show leadership. Britain has to stand for fairness, against injustice. Where people are being bullied out of their homes, intimidated, we will always stand with the underdog and take what action we can to support them.

17:03That, Mr Speaker, is leadership on the world stage. Britain being true to what it's always been about. That is what the British government, British people expect of us. And that is what this government will do. My problem with it, Tim, is that he thinks British leadership is support of Palestine. And while there are some in the country that may well agree with him, there are others that don't. and moreover I would say that the majority wherever they may hail from think that we have got more important issues to solve than an ongoing conflict in the Middle East that let's be perfectly honest most people have had it up to here with it's the timing of it as we discussed yesterday which I think is politically opportunistic by the way I've said that already so we don't need to go over that old ground but you're saying there's a contradiction here isn't there because he's meant to be Mr Britain he's meant to be Mr Manchester He's meant to be the person who cares about the future of this great nation, thinks that all of our ills can be blamed on Thatcher and wants to ride off on a white horse into a brave new future of hope where he devolves to local communities.

18:12And yet he thinks British leadership is what we do about Israel, thousands of miles away. What is it, Andy? Do you want to devolve to Cornwall or do you want to be involving yourself, like Blair before you and others, in a foreign war that doesn't really have all of the decisions you're making and taking and the speech, as compelling as it may have been yesterday in the House from Miliband, and it's obviously divided opinion heavily, it's all well and good. it's not going to make the blindest bit of difference. Unfortunately, the likes of Netanyahu don't really care what Andy Burnham thinks. And that's also a problem.

18:49Imagine, I have to think about this now, Andy Burnham and Donald Trump. I mean, the US president is going to gobble this guy up for lunch along with his Big Mac and his Diet Coke. It's just embarrassing. Yes, yes. I'm not sure Burnham is to his flavour. And again, I'm not sure that the president just particularly cares about Britain at all. I did think it was a good speech by Miliband, I do have to say. I watched it and I thought that was pretty impressive. And it has been pointed out to me that very few Tories turned out to take part in that debate. I know, but then I can't, Miliband was the one who wouldn't do anything about Syria though, wasn't he, Tim?

19:27Miliband is the one who was currying his own favour in his own area because of his own aims. And I do think it's a cogent argument to say that if this is all about human rights, why this now and not an intervention on China? Yeah, but that's an argument for more interventions on China, which the government won't make. But he won't make them because he spent his entire time in the last government tosying up to the Chinese because they're making all of the solar panels and electric vehicle parts and everything else, by the way, brackets, whisper it, probably with slave labour, to promote his net zero zealotry.

20:04Yes, but we haven't done enough, But we do sanction people who are connected to the oppression in Xinjiang. I know, but it's always Israel. And he did that thing. We also have an embargo on certain weapons sales to China as well. So we do have those policies. It's not the same. We do not get protestations from Labour ministers and MPs in the vein of Miliband on any other country but Israel. And, of course, he's got cover because, as you pointed out, he's Jewish. And I counter-argued, yeah, but you can still have Jew-hating Jews. I'm sorry. You can still have – it's great cover. Look at Sapolansky.

20:36Look, he's Jewish and look what he has incubated in his own Green Party, which I'm sorry, has links to grotesque anti-Semitism. His own deputy leader, Mothin Ali, celebrated October the 7th and drove a rabbi out of Leeds. But Ed Miliband doesn't have any links to grotesque anti-Semitism. Well, no, Ed Miliband might not have any links to grotesque anti-Semitism, but it isn't a get out of jail free card to say, oh, well, hang on a minute. There's no cynical timing here. And this is all just about the Middle East simply because he's Jewish. No, but just because it's a cynical policy doesn't mean he hates Jews for doing it.

21:09I'm not suggesting for one minute he hates Jews, and I'm not necessarily suggesting that Zach Polanski quotes hates Jews. But I'm saying that you can incubate a feeling of hostility towards Jews and be Jewish. You can do that with your policymaking, with your protestations. Zach Polanski is Jewish and has suggested that Israel is a genocide state. That's likely to make Jews in this country feel very uncomfortable. Of course, but I don't think Adminabans has done that. Meanwhile, sanctions against Israel, regardless of what people think or like, have been cited by rabbis and anti-Semitism campaign groups and others as making Jews who already feel very uncomfortable in this country even more uncomfortable.

21:50And we include the Jews in that that are very uncomfortable with Netanyahu. So I'm saying you can make Jews feel uncomfortable, let's put it that way, even if you yourself are Jewish. Of course you can, but equally... It's like I could be a misogynist and still be a bird. Yeah, well, yeah, I hate men and I'm a man. You know, you could, if you wanted to, be anti-Catholic and be Catholic. Oh my gosh, many of them are. You know what I'm like. Yes, but if some Jewish people do some bad things, indeed some what are regarded globally as criminal things, it's not Jew hatred to target and dislike. No, I'm not trying to conflate Israel governmental behaviour or the settlers, and that's a complex issue.

22:32And that's why the government's sanctions are on the settlers, not on Israel as a whole. I get that. But again, one could revert back to, what was it, Bill Clinton 1992. We did offer Arafat 97 % of this land and he rejected that deal. Yes. But now the settlers are building on what... I know, but you could also say, well, listen, as has happened in Gaza, we hand over this land, it gets taken over by terrorists, humans are used as shields, tunnels are built underneath and then they start killing people on October the 7th. So you could be worried about the stretch of land that represents the West Bank.

23:06Anyway, let's not relitigate that. All right. You liked what Miliband said. I thought it was laced in a degree of hypocrisy because at the end of the day, he didn't stand up for the Syrians, did he?

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25:28Miliband can also speak. He can string words together. And I think another effect of Burnhamism is the injection of long-windedness into parliamentary debate. I don't know how this could happen in just two weeks, but I swear there were at least three MPs who I couldn't understand their contribution. Beginning with the first question from an MP from Kilmarnock, who went on so long and so confusingly that the speaker eventually intervened and said, I mean, generously, I think we get the idea. And she was forced to sit down. And I would swear, I don't know what the point was, but I would swear she hadn't actually got to the question yet.

26:04I couldn't get to the question. I think the speaker said she had asked three questions. I didn't follow any of them. And then do your impression of Lindsay Hoyle at the end of the session. At the very end. Next time we can get the answers and the questions a bit quicker, please. I've got things to do. So it's got places to be. Hopefully, when we do come back after conference recess, we might be able to speed questions and answers up in order to get more people in. Let the front bench change up. So they're becoming more long-winded. They're talking obsessively about their local area, which is all about the devolution thing.

26:35I know MPs have always done that, but now it's getting silly. I want to stand up and welcome the extra powers given to East, West, Southern, Malvern, all this sort of thing. But interestingly, they're not attacking reform. Now, there is an open goal. There's an open goal this week to have a pop at reform over the protests in Dover and in Portsmouth. Yes. And to point out the disagreement between Zia Yusuf and Nigel Farage on whether or not protesters should be regarded as legitimate. Yes. And in the past, Starmer's people always choreographed it so that two or three Labour MPs would stand up and say, I think it's a disgrace.

27:16What reform has said this week? You're saying one or two MPs, and that is basically Angela Rayner, you're chatting. Right. By the way, there's a new photo out of the cabinet, and someone has cruelly pointed out that we're streeting as the same colour as Angela Rayner's hair. I think he went into the tanning salon and he asked for light brown and he came out burnt toast. It's quite something to see. It could happen to the best of us too. But I just think it's interesting that he is dropping attacks upon reform. Of course, had MPs attacked reform, Nigel Farage wouldn't have been there to say anything about it because he's in Washington, D.C.

27:52And the Tories are making hay with that later because I think they're tabling some legislation to stop children being prescribed with puberty blockers and stop trans people from accessing single-sex spaces. So it's absolutely perfect reform territory. and presumably the likes of Sarah Pochin will jump on it but they're wanting to remind everyone that Farage isn't here and by the way, no, he's not in Clacton either. He's actually over in the US. He's always saying there are other things I could be doing and we're starting to notice that he's doing them. Yes, he is. Yeah, he's just hanging out with Donald Trump and things.

28:26As well as trying to curry favour with the Prime Minister from a geographical perspective, we've also got quite a nauseating sort of theme going on in the House of people saying, look, I do quite like you. You know, it's like they've been kind of like thrilled by the eyelashes and the mascara. So we heard this from somebody in the SNP, for heaven's sake, Tim. Mr Speaker, the Prime Minister still seems fairly well liked and I'll let you into a wee secret. I quite like the new Prime Minister.

29:00But popularity will not pay the bills during this winter's looming cost of living emergency. So will he stand up now and tell people what is he going to do to help? I will, Mr Speaker. I think the SNP question speaks to two things. One, Burnham is privately, genuinely likeable. Anyone who's ever encountered him says the same. Oh, we say this, we said that about Theresa. She's a very decent person. Yeah. The worst thing she ever did was run through a field of wheat. Is she any good at being prime minister? OK, but I think he is reflecting a feeling in Parliament of, oh, this man seems to genuinely be a human being and quite nice.

29:42Who else are the equivalent? Everyone's acting as if Dennis Nielsen was once prime. Yeah, it's not a mass murderer. The second thing it points to is, so in political terms, how do you work around that? Burnham's polling is quite striking. He's winning on basically every metric of thinks like me, nice bloke, understands the problems facing the country. I know this is honeymoon period and it's not reflected in Labour's actual polling average, where it's still stuck in the early to mid-20s. We've not seen the burn and bounce yet. But opposition parties have got to figure out, how do I argue with someone who comes across as very nice?

30:23You reverse Harry Enfield and you say he's Andy nice but dim. You do do that. That's what I do. But I can afford to do that because I'm a journalist. I don't have to make people like me. I just have to make people click. But if you're a politician, it's a bit different, isn't it? Because it's the problem of kicking a puppy. No one wants to do that. I know, but if you're just a really annoying little dog that keeps barking and not doing much, like if the bark is bigger than the bite and you keep on going, I'm going to do this for Britain and I'm going to bring back hope. And then when you're actually asked straight questions, you can't answer any of them.

30:59That's true. And start waffling on about a load of old nonsense. That's true. People are going to get really sick of the dog, whether it has puppy eyes or not. But Britain's... You're going to just turn into a nation of cat people at this stage. In the same way that Britain likes its weather to be not quite hot, not too cold, it likes its personalities to be like that. Britain is hooked on mediocrity. I don't think it is because I think that both the best leaders in this country have always been quite unlikable. That's true. Thatcher, Blair, to an extent Churchill, you know, wasn't he racist once and didn't he do badly in the First World War?

31:32These are divisive figures. He was widely disliked when he became a leader. Some people viscerally hated this man. That's true. If you're confronted with these figures who are just a bit meh, you're like, why are you running the country? Go and run the local branch of Curry's. Yeah. And I think our Andy would be fantastic on the one show. Yes, he would be. Great presenter of that. And now, coming up next, beach towels. You can just see him doing that. But, and I think you're right, when they go into the ballot box, people do go, okay, I like him, but can he actually lower my bills, which are due to rise over the winter.

32:02But I do think this is still in the short term a problem, for instance, for reform, which after that conference is coming across as distinctly unlikable and which is really betting the House on being unlikable. It wouldn't have hurt Rob Jenrick after that girl was mauled by the mob. I shouldn't laugh. Dragged out by her own hair. She was. I mean, just the image of that old man waving his crotch at her. My goodness. I mean, it wouldn't have. Shouldn't he have said that that shouldn't have happened? Yes. She put herself at risk. She shouldn't have heckled, but I'm not sure she needed to be removed by her hair.

32:36And obviously that's not the kind of party that we are. Instead, the nature of algorithmic politics is you're always trying to stoke online anger and you're always trying to appeal to the fans of purity who want you to go even further. And you're measuring yourself not by, am I attracting the boring, quiet middle? Or am I energising and exciting the angry extreme? And so you come out and say, oh, boo-hoo, who cares? Well, actually, there are lots of mild-mannered, mediocre voters like me who do care. Because I don't want to live in a country where people get beaten up on telly and politicians laugh it off.

33:09I don't think we should be. I don't want mass protesters stalking migrants. No, I know. I do get that. So Andy is speaking to that and the opposition's got to figure out how do we come across as nice but sensible. It's about personnel. I mean, Jenrick stabbed Kemi Badenock in the back. So we know the quality of that man's character when it comes to his own ambition. Similarly, Zia Yusuf, I mean, he's not anybody that anyone would say, oh, you know, the thing about Zia is if you go to him with your problems, you know, that's not going to happen. We're having a party. Wake up Zia. That doesn't happen often.

33:42Get Zia along to start juggling and telling jokes and doing some magic. I mean, it's just not that scene, is it? Shall we end, Tim, because it's always fun with some Telegraph reader comments? David Buick. Frankly, that is the worst PMQ performance from a prime minister I've seen in a very long time. He is a complete dud who was completely wrong-footed by Badenock, etc., etc. Daphne Grattan. There is a reason Burnham failed twice to lead the Labour Party. Daphne, you're right about that. Yes. And it was openly displayed today. He failed miserably answering Badenock's questions and does not have a handle on his brief.

34:18I'll just throw something in here. Burnham has said he will not be talking to the Sun newspaper. Oh, how pathetic. Well, because of Hillsborough, of course. But then again, that suggests that he is once more living in the 1980s. And also, as some have pointed out, is there no end to this man's hypocrisy? In 2010, when he was running for the Labour leadership, in fact, somebody on the comment desk, Raoul, sent me the picture. Here he is. Look, he's posing in a cab emblazoned with the Suns logo. So why was it all right then, but you're seeking to boycott them now? This is the thing. If he lived in North Korea, he'd be comrade number one.

34:57If he lived in Saudi Arabia, he'd be calling people's hands to be cut off. He is whatever he needs to be in the moment to win. Also, does he need to be reminded of how much Tony Blair's administration, in which he served, sucked up to the owner of the Sun, Rupert Murdoch? Why do these people come out with this stuff and think that we've all forgotten? like we're all this is the trouble right stupid people think that people are more stupid than they are and actually they're not and we go hang on mate we've got the receipts here as you manoeuvre yourself around like an opportunist honestly can I just also just share because this is a bit of a 1980s phrase actually and I like it David Will has said Burnham is such a windbag gosh that's a it's true isn't it it's true it's true yeah poor old Burnham this is PMQ's round two score out of five oh I I think I'd almost go negative would you minus minus one and by the way consequently so do we think that Babe Knox going to benefit from any of this no because no one watches prime minister's questions anyway and I think for the moment his niceness is probably the thing that will cut through to the voters but give it time and I think that her hard-as-nails but eminently sensible approach will probably come through instead.

36:15I mean, a lot of people will be listening to this and saying, you're suggesting politics should just be light entertainment. No, we're not. And you're being insubstantial, etc. I don't think he said anything of any substance. Yes. If he had said something of substance, we'd be discussing the substance right now. And we did because the one bit of substance was, I am going to ring fence welfare. I will not cut it in order to increase defence spending. So there you go. There's the one interesting thing of note he said in the whole thing. He is the one who's insubstantial. But I do actually passionately believe that the center of our political life should be the commons.

36:49Yes. And the quality of the commons is a metric by which to judge the quality of our leadership and our public life. And when the commons is full of, I'm sorry, such inadequate people who are unable to communicate things they don't really anyway know, that is, it does cast a damning verdict upon the state of the country. And it matters to me because I want to, I remember growing up, people used to say in America, we watch PMQs every week. And that's when it was like Haig versus Blair. That's when it was serious thinkers. Well, my children look up these old videos on social media and they show me they love the one of Jeremy Corbyn.

37:34And do you know what he said to me? Who are you? They love that one. And they like David Cameron. You know what my mother would have said? Put on a tie. Yes. It's all that kind of bad. And lots of Thatcher's rhetoric was just absolutely a star quality. People have always complained about it and it's been going downhill for a couple of decades. But my goodness, it's starting to feel like a meeting of the parish council in one of these ghastly devolved regions that Andy Burnham's going to force on us all. There is some good news, Tim. You don't have to endure this for the next five weeks because we then go into recess for conference season.

38:10Yes. So that's his last PMQs for a while. He's done a couple. Let's see if he can be any better in six weeks' time. And we're going to be back tomorrow with more fun and frolics, 5pm.

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