Hattie's triumph and the Lib Dems clash with the Speaker again

IT was the day when the also rans got up in the Commons to represent their parties. Convention has it that when the Prime Minister is absent, the Conservative and Liberal Democrat leaders don't show up, on the basis I suppose that whoever is the PM's stand in won't be able to compete on level terms.

With Gordon Brown away in Bucharest to mark the 50th anniversary of Nato, it fell to Harriet Harman to answer PMQ's on behalf of the Government. Former Tory leader William Hague, who is now Shadow Foreign Secretary, was at his wise cracking best, but Hattie was no push over.

When Hague gloated over the photos of public school educated Hattie wearing a police stab vest for a tour on foot of her own constituency - "you had to explain yesterday that you dress in accordance with wherever you go, presumably when you go to a Cabinet meeting, you dress as a clown."  Hattie snapped: "If I am looking for advice on what to wear or what not to wear, I think the very last person I would look to for advice is the man in the baseball cap."

Nice one, our Hattie.

But it the Liberal Democrats who once again found themselves on the wrong side of the Speaker Michael Martin when Vince Cable asked a question with a reference in it to the Queen. 

"It was reported this week that Her Majesty the Queen had cancelled her diamond wedding celebrations because it was judged to be inappropriate to engage in extravagance at a time of economic gloom and recession. Do you share my view that this demonstrates Her Majesty's unerring instincts for the public mood, or does the Government think she was overreacting?''

Stop right there. The Speaker got to his feet to rule: "Order! You shouldn't discuss Her Majesty the Queen. Perhaps you can try another question."

Vince then tried to rephrase the question, saying he was very happy for the Labour deputy leader to "return to the issue of economic gloom and recession and whether you share that assessment."

Vince was not best pleased. Outside the Commons he said: "It is absolutely ridiculous that in a supposedly modern democracy Members of Parliament cannot even mention the Head of State in passing without prior permission. This is yet more proof of the major constitutional reform needed to drag Westminster into the 21st  century."

 

Michael Martin may be on borrowed time. He's facing a sleaze inquiry into the number of taxi trips made by his wife at public expense. He's fallen out with David Cameron by refusing to allow him to question Tony Blair's role in the Labour leadership accession and Lib Dems kast month stormed out of the Chamber in a huff when Martin turned down for debate their amendment to the Treaty of Lisbon Bill. 

 

Of course, they may be an element of snobbery. The Speaker is "not one of us" in the traditional sense. He's a son of the Gorbals, a Glaswegian working class lad, who was elected to Parliament and climbed the slippery pole to reach the distinction of becoming Speaker with all the attendant trappings, including an apartment overlooking the Thames.

 

He should be proud of what he has achieved. But now it's time to hand the mace - the symbol of parliamentary - over to someone else. Former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ming Campbell has been mentioned as an alternative to Tory deputy speakers Sir Alan Haselhurst (MP for Saffron Walden) and Sir Michael Lord, who sits for Suffolk Central and Ipswich North.

 

There's also a lobby in favour of the "bicycling baronet" Sir George Young - but would Labour MPs tolerate as Speaker the man who privatised the railways? I think not.