The bizarre Johnny B is impossible to ignore

By QUENTIN LETTS, PARLIAMENTARY SKETCHWRITER
Updated:

Labour MP's were in boisterous mood. They laughed. Jeered. Went ‘whooo!’ in that way which says: ‘Big deal!’ They talked so loudly among themselves that it was  frequently hard to hear what was going on.

The Speaker, far from suppressing this noise, encouraged it. He mocked ministers and made independent-minded Coalition MPs look silly. How the Opposition benches roared. What a great time they were having!
All this while ministers talked about unemployment, small business finance and the regulatory demands made of anyone bold enough to try to hire staff.

Were the Labour lot drunk? I don’t think so. It was a good hour or more until lunch. One or two may have burned the wick a little low on Wednesday night – big Toby Perkins from Chesterfield looked pretty zoned out on the Opposition front bench – but the mood was not of hungover irresponsibility. It was of excitement. They scent a chance. And with Speaker Bercow in the Chair they feel like a football team with 12 men on the field.

John Bercow, Speaker of the House of Commons encouraged Labour ministers' boisterous mood

John Bercow, Speaker of the House of Commons encouraged Labour ministers' boisterous mood

Readers occasionally tell me I am swivel-eyed about the Squeaker but his bizarre behaviour is impossible to ignore. He really does seem intent on turning the Commons into the Johnny B Show. One could no more write truthfully about this House without mentioning him than one could review panto without name-checking Widow Twankey.

Universities Minister David Willetts made a tiny slip about the number of a question on the Order Paper. Bercow, rolling a tongue over his lips and flaring his eyes, put Willetts right. He added: ‘I am reluctant to argue with “Two Brains”.’ Mr Willetts, who dislikes that nickname, winced.

Again, it could be noted that your sketchwriter himself is prone to using rude names. But I tend to do so when hoping to make MPs look prattish. The Speaker of the Commons is generally expected to behave with greater impartiality. Would Bercow ever have dared called John Prescott ‘Two Jags’ to his face?

Trade Questions was under way. The likes of Tristram Hunt (Lab, Stoke Central), Brandon Lewis (Con, Great Yarmouth), Matthew Hancock (Con, W Suffolk) and Esther McVey (Con, Wirral W) asked serious questions about jobs in their constituencies, employment law, etc. Still the Labour chimps cavorted. Mr Bercow gazed on them with indulgence.

Mr Perkins stretched out his legs and chewed a corner of one lip, his eyes shut. George Freeman (Con, Mid Norfolk) had a good sally about graphene, a newly-developed material with the potential to create wealth in Britain. He held up a small example of graphene. You are not meant to use props.

The Speaker, instead of quietly admonishing him, showed off to his little gallery of admirers. He went into some long blether about how it was an unglamorous object and how Mr Freeman should ‘secrete it away’ and ‘return to the tact and discretion with which he was previously known’.

Swank, bluster, bore.

A moment later Mr Bercow was back on his little pins, pinky at an angle, to say that he knew it was possible for something to be both unglamorous and important. With which he called the name of Penny Mordaunt (Con, Portsmouth N), who is distinctly statuesque. The Labour benches gassed themselves with chest-clutching hysterics.

Two Brains: Universities Minister David Willetts made a tiny slip about the number of a question on the Order Paper

Two Brains: Universities Minister David Willetts made a tiny slip about the number of a question on the Order Paper

Mrs Mordaunt did her best not to mind but I would not blame her for feeling stitched up by  the Chair.
Mark Prisk, a minister, was barely able to contain his fury. He tried to reply to Neil Carmichael (Con, Stroud) about a manufacturing promotion in his constituency but the Labour benches were cackling with hilarity.

You really do have to wonder if they are as interested in employment as they claim.

Before closing, I should clarify remarks made by Steve Baker (Con, Wycombe) at PMQs this week. Lots of MPs and journalists thought he urged David Cam- eron to ‘leave’ the European Union. It turns out that he said ‘lead’. Oops!

Ear syringe, nurse, pronto.


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