PMQs or Mudslinging?
A couple of weeks ago, I was watching Question Time, and Shirley Williams said something about PMQs which has become evidently true. She said that PMQs had become “Mudslinging”. I thought David Cameron said that he wanted an end to the Punch and Judy Show? Bruising encounters once in a while are not a bad thing, especially if the government has done something embarrassing, but when it’s close to an election, people expect answers to their questions.
I have to say that in the last few weeks PMQs has become very tiring. The format is becoming almost identical every week:
- Intro
- David Cameron attempts to ask a question/attack the Government
- Gordon sweeps the question away by attacking previous Conservative administrations/making reference to the current party
- Cameron attempts a comeback by attacking the PM
- …and so on.
This is not what people expect from PMQs and it fares badly for the fragile state of UK politics. It makes the leaders look even worse because we do not have confidence that they will give us a decent answer without referring us to the answer they gave to a previous question (a standard way of deflecting a question in Parliament).
Close to an election I want to hear what the parties views are about taking the country out of this deep, dark hole of deficit; not about the looming shadows of Peter Mandelson and Kenneth Clarke. I am not suggesting that there shouldn’t be any bruising encounters in PMQs, just a restraint on the amount of mudslinging. Hopefully PMQs will again one day be a time to ask the PM questions and actually get a decent answer.
Niall is currently the leading political voice for Royal Holloway's Student Radio Station, Insanity (www.insanityradio.com)
(picture courtesy of Flickr)
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