The Pagefield PMQs panel could not avoid agreeing that this week’s debate left us all wanting more…
Tom Bage
Party funding is an issue that is as thorny as it is perennial. Neither party enjoys talking about where they get their money from, and neither party has a brilliant recent record on wealthy donors – but talking about “hedge fund millionaires” or “trade union barons” is at least a sure-fire way to provoke a full-throated and supportive roar from the backbenches. And in an election campaign that seems to get narrower by the day, both leaders will take that and move on.
Miliband really should have made this count more, but didn’t. Only five more of these to go.
Lucy Holbrook
As noted by many on the Labour benches today the Prime Minister demonstrated that he is certainly skilled at question avoidance when it comes to tax avoidance. As a result we were subjected to a tiresome exchange in which the PM refused to state if he had discussed tax avoidance with Tory Peer Lord Green, the former chairman and chief executive of HSBC and other Tory donors involved in the scandal.
It’s a shame that Ed couldn’t land a knockout blow on these issues – or know when to change tack when it was clear that his approach wasn’t working. Either way both performances in tit for tat were enough to switch off viewers which doesn’t bode well as politicians look to engage the electorate in the lead up to 7th May.
Poppy Rosenberg
PMQs? PM-Snooze might be a more accurate title as today saw another stream of economic and employment statistics from David Cameron, accusations passed between the benches and a distinct absence of meaningful answers from either side that is becoming characteristic of PMQs.
Several issues have been raised in the last few weeks that, when reported, have clearly needed response to. Alas we instead got the same vitriolic rhetoric over tax, past governments and economic stats.
Perhaps the most notable avoidance today was that of David Cameron from the HSBC scandal. Rather than engaging in discussion of what is clearly a major issue for voters and politicians alike, David Cameron somehow managed to avoid giving any answers or explanations. As Paul Waugh tweeted just minutes afterwards “Cameron refusing to answer whether he and Lord Green ever discussed #hsbc and tax in 3 years. Not a good look.”
The second was the fleeting reference to Labour’s pink woman-to-woman bus. Pagefield engaged in some heated discussion in our offices last night about the sexist and patronising implications of the ‘barbie bus’, and as such I found it frustrating to see that this issue was dismissed in a fleeting slight from Cameron. Clearly there are problems here that need to be addressed, and I would have liked to see both the PM and Miliband personally engage in these issues more, now should have been a time to do that.
Joshua Lambkin
Tim Yeo kicked off this week with self-congratulatory “question” about economic growth under the Tories. Once the routine jeering had abated, Ed Miliband got stuck in to David Cameron over links between Tory Party donors and the HSBC scandal. With most of the work already done for him by the BBC/Guardian investigation, it wouldn’t have taken much for Miliband to really pin Cameron on this issue but he struggled to get through Cameron’s defences.
The reality is that both parties use donations from individuals with HSBC accounts in Switzerland; a point which Cameron was all too ready to press home. One consolation for Miliband might be that Cameron did eventually appear to answer the question he had been asked 6 times the week before about hedge funds; even if it was only to assert that the tax laws in question were, in fact, implemented by the previous Labour government.
The exchange wound down with a couple scornful remarks about the “Pink Bus” (Labour’s new strategy to engage women in politics) and Tristram Hunt’s discordant remarks about the role of Nuns in education. It is difficult to say who came out on top on this one but I think Miliband’s failure to press the advantage on the HSBC saga is significant.
