Jeremy corbyn

It was better from Theresa May today. She was combative, prickly and forceful at PMQs. The ship is moving on a steadier course. And two toxic enemies have returned to the fold. In the days following the election, both Anna Soubry and Nicky Morgan were ‘helpfully’ suggesting a possible timetable for Mrs May’s departure. Today they both asked supportive questions. And Mrs May read out the answers, tight-lipped. Only those within a yard of her could hear her molars grinding. The Labour leader got a rather glum cheer from his party. He suggested that the PM should fund a pay-rise for nurses because ‘she seems to have found a billion pounds to save her own job.’ As usual, he had a missive of woe to delight us with.

Although attributed to Milton Friedman, the assertion that 'there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch' had been around long before he took it for the title of an economics book in 1975. It has been used since by many who have never given monetarism a second’s thought. Physicists say the universe is a closed system. No magic source can give it free energy or indeed calories. Mathematicians and computer technicians are as adamant that something cannot come from nothing. Everyone agrees the lunch bill must be paid. Everyone, that is, except British politicians and the voters who endorse them in their millions.

‘The unexpected appeal of Jeremy Corbyn’s manifesto has thrown the Tories into panic’, says the Sun. With Damian Green suggesting a ‘debate’ may be needed over tuition fees and other ministers ‘piling in every day with demands for more spending’, the Conservative party seems to be making the assumption that the best way to tackle the threat of Corbyn is to copy him. This is ‘suicidal’, says the Sun, which argues that not only would it be wrong to try and take on the ‘hard left’ on their own terms, it would also be dangerous for the economy.

Oh dear. After Jeremy Corbyn led Labour to a better than expected general election result, the various party factions have done their best to put their differences to one side and come together. The Labour leader's decision to invite his former leadership rival Owen Smith back into the shadow cabinet was seen by many as a unity gesture. But will Corbyn regret the move? Mr S only asked after witnessing Smith's interview with Sky's Sophy Ridge. Asked how he would have fared in the election had Smith been leader, the Labour MP muses that he might have gone one further than Corbyn and 'got us to win': SR: If you had won that leadership election, do you think you'd have done as well as Jeremy Corbyn did? OS: I don't know. I hope so. I hope I might have even got us to win.

Jeremy Corbyn is 'almost a proper chap', says Nigel Farage, lauding the Labour leader for sacking frontbenchers who voted for a Commons motion seeking to keep Britain in the Single Market. That's a policy that, one suspects, quite a few recent middle-class metropolitan converts to Corbynism would agree with. Perhaps Mr Farage's praise will help them see that JC isn't quite the prophet of pro-European liberalism some of his admirers have somehow managed to imagine him as.  The Farage praise will doubtless appall many Corbynistas, who see him as the antichrist, the nasty, xenophobic antithesis of their cuddly, inclusive and not-at-all anti-Semitic messiah. It shouldn't, though, since Jeremy and Nigel have always had a lot in common.

This PMQs was always going to be a very different affair for Theresa May. Post-election, her aura has gone and, for the first time, Jeremy Corbyn now has his benches behind him. Given the circumstances, Theresa May turned in one of her best PMQs performances. She has never been a natural at the despatch box, but she was solid today. Her performance will have reassured Tory MPs that she is able to keep going. Jeremy Corbyn began on the Grenfell fire. At first, his questions were detailed and precise. He got May to admit that her understanding is that the cladding on Grenfell tower was not compliant with building regulations. But then Corbyn went uber-partisan, blaming Grenfell on austerity and ‘disregard for working class communities’.