PMQs 01nov2006 Blair, Cameron & Mr. Speaker

[kammail2002]

blair is slightly better than cameron, experience matters I guess and cameron is a bit below the belt at times.

I will miss blair.

[masterchief2122]

Order...order

[PsychoticNeurotic]

commons makes me SICK. Just a bunch of juvenile, overgrown schoolboys shouting at each other and thinking its ok to make fun of each other rather than deal with real-life, serious problems just because they sat smoking pot at Eton for years. Disgraceful. Grow up.

[olliea12]

tony blair was a great pm

gordon brown sucks

[Hattie15]

blair did win that aurgument. I'VE BEEN THERE!!! I'VE TOUCHED THE BOXES!!!!

[MiK3i]

oh and my favorite question time conflict between blair and cameron has to be when cameron was questioning blair about the economy and blair replied with ''whats he done for the economy other than a big part in black wednesday!'' an excellent reply from blair there! :):):)

[MiK3i]

this question time was great, i remember watching it like it was yesterday, looking at it now i sure miss our old PM but like our new one..

[tomsega]

Worried about cuts, Mr Cameron?!

[jonno2019]

man camerons arse got battered with some labour intensive words.

[manmhk]

The greatest Punch and Judy Politics of Cameron vs. Blair

[chilled99]

The classic manouvre when cornered by a questiojn you can't answer is to quote numbers and attack the credibility of the other side. PMQs is pure performance and Cameron can't compete with Blair. Shame nothing actually happens during these sessions though - just a load of rich-boys engaging in playground banter

[capofamiglia187]

I'm a fan on Cameron but Blair eats him up alive

[TomGreenUK]

No, he doesen't. If you actually listen, Blair is evasive as fuck on the questions being asked. Blair is simply referring to the events of ten years ago and ignoring his own legacy.

[MelissaTheuriau]

Ministre. - Dernier terme de la gloire humaine.

[rickmanlaura]

WHOOP FOR DAVID CAMERON!! how much does he rock??!! VERY MUCH! haha,i bet blair and brown wish they could be as much of a great politician and leader as him! everybody VOTE CONSERVATIVE!

[StephenKuma]

Cameron is a PM in waiting

[o2addict]

Order!!

[mico2020]

they are very similar blair and cameron lol ... both clowns and entertainers with no substance. It's nice that one of them is out, and the other will soon follow :D after being crushed in another brown landslide

[green0000]

What are those red flower pins they are wearing?

[BiasedBBC]

Read the other comments before asking the same question please!

[pooty1984]

a why do ppl stand up when tony blair stands up and that other guy stands up and what is the labour party

[leftbank13]

a) they're trying to get the speaker's attention so they can be called later on

b) The Labour Party is the governing party in Britain, based on the centre-left and in favour of higher taxes and state control

[Redcarpet01]

In the sense the Tory Party isn't statist?

[Mattywoo2]

look up "The British Legion" and "The Poppy Appeal"

[garethbutler]

poppies

[firebreathone]

There used to be a bloke called chanuchan on Youtube who would post these videos on a weekly basis.

Then he removed all of them and stopped posting them.

Can anyone post these PMQs on a weekly basis again?

[leftbank13]

go to the BBC website to watch them

[crholgate]

Go David. Blair u are a liar with your War. your spin. NHS was better under the Conservatives

[MagusStryfeZ]

Spin yes - better NHS under tory rule!? Not a chance!

[01zaporozhets]

the most interesting thing is that, as ever, these debates are completely pointless. they both avoid answering each other's questions and get nowhere - but hey, that's politics.

[mico2020]

true, They are mainly for political consumption. They take so much away from debating issues in favour of personal sparring between the two leaders. It is always said that airing PMQ live on TV has made british politics more about spin and less about substance and ideas :(

[CaptainHeskett]

is there an archive of these, I saw one about 2 3 years ago that I would like to see again

[BiasedBBC]

You'll be able to read the text of every PMQs going back to when time began - they'll all be in Hansard (the daily record of parliamentary proceedings - Google should help you track it down. PMQs are on Wednesdays nowadays. Pre-Blair they were on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

[BiasedBBC]

I think the BBC news site has a clip of each one, but I don't know when they started doing this or whether they publish an index of them to help find them (i.e. I have a feeling they only list the current week's PMQ session, but the URL remains functional IF you happen to have a note of it). Hope this helps.

[puedeser85]

If the US congress and senate were like this people would pay much more attention to politiics and we wouldn't be in the position we currently find ourselves

[mico2020]

I agree, watching prime minister questions is always entertaining.

[NATESOR]

This is awesome. US congress usually has people sleeping when they speak.

[lordinovau]

Originally, there were 2 15 minute question times.

And yes, he knows the questions in advance.

Its all for show.

[paddySc12]

John prescott looks half dead

[alexh2006]

Oh man... I've seen one of those sessions! It's just like that! Great!

[briansle]

this is so cool. i wish we had this in the US.

[daveyboy9]

"secret catholic" "There have even been reports he's been to mass." These comments are annoyingly typical. Similar comments would not have been made if the "reports" were that a catholic PM had been to a Church of England Service. But as usual, it's quite normal to make these comments about catholics. This couldn't happen og course since the reason we have not had a catholic PM is that this country doesn't allow catholic PMs.

[BiasedBBC]

It's untrue to say that catholics are barred from becoming PM. We just haven't had one yet, though we have had a Jewish PM in the past.

[jacobwilliamson1]

does he get a list of the questions that are going to be asked in advance. or some of them at least? and you're right. whatever the question is, along as it's based on Brown or the economy he'll just go on about low inflation unemployment and interest rates every week.

[whltamos]

no we havent,Disraeli was ethnically jewish but he was an anglican convert.

[firebreathone]

catholics are not barred from becoming PM. However, there is still a law in Britain today, forbidding catholic PRIESTS to become MPs. (let alone Prime minister)

[OneBigRetard]

What? I thought Blair was Catholic.

[edwardgbell]

TO be fair this is simply because the Church of England services, by and large, are liturgically identical to the Mass of the Catholic Church, but without transubstantiation or a priest 'in persona Christi'. To many in this country, transubstantiation is far beyond "armchair" faith. For the record I'm not slagging off either belief, simply pointing out that attending Mass as a 'secret catholic' is a step up, whereas attending Holy Communion as a Catholic is a massive step down.

[WALSHY500]

Blair has a private mass at Downing Street every morning, shall I name the priest?

[whltamos]

i get what your saying.. there may still be slight public antagonism towards the idea of a catholic PM but to be honest so few people in britain are actively religious that it is pretty well irrelevant these days.

in any case it is certainly not against the law for the prime minister to be Catholic.

[leftbank13]

When Catholic Emancipation was passed in the 19th Century, a Catholic becoming PM or Monarch was left out. If we had to face the situation then I'm sure the law would eb changed now we are in more enlightened times

[RoddyYoung]

This is good for You Tube having BBC now on demand. It is wonderful to see a living, working, and viberant democracy in action. I feel that Monachy's have it over republics in that regard.

[stickyrice209]

Cool, they should put Bush on the stand against Jon stewart

[Xicano82]

George Bush wouldn't last 2 minutes in this format agains anyone.

[HKLivingston]

Yes, as soon as

1 America changes into a parliamentary system, and

2 Mr Stewart becomes an MP.

An even better scenario would be Mr Stewart holding public office--

1 it would be dream-come-true for many, and

2 Mr Stewart would be compelled to answer questions and provide alternative solutions, as opposed to wisecracks alone.

[sunnymarky]

martin has never had any control over Labour MPs and his attempts to control their barrcaking. HE WAS ONE OF THEM..He isnt a patch on boothroyd, Weatherill , Thomas and others.

[HKLivingston]

Prior to Mr Martin becoming speaker, wasn't there a tradition of appointing as Speaker a 'former' member of the party presently in Opposition?

[EndangeredSpecies]

sorry... my question will not be about the content but the form of discussion. it's fascinating... is it the way it happens all the time with the PMQ? and why do some people stand up when blair and cameron start talking? sign of respect?

[BiasedBBC]

Yes - it's always like this - 30 minutes of questions every Wednesday when Parliament is sitting. The Leader of the Opposition (Leader of the Conservatives) gets six questions. The leader of the LibDems (our third party) gets two questions each time. The other questions are asked by other MPs one at a time, selected by the speaker - MPs who wish to ask a question have to stand up (in between questions) to indicate that they wish to speak (i.e. to catch Mr. Speaker's eye).

[edwardgbell]

Not true. They stand up to show support for the question being asked, or the answer being given. The lottery has already been drawn by the time PMQ's starts and those speaking are aware that they are to be called.

[HKLivingston]

EdwardGBell is correct--

1 It is customary to briefly rise to signal agreement with a statement just made, as is saying "Yea~~h."

2 Backbench MPs permitted to ask Qs are largely pre-determined.

[BiasedBBC]

./cont: We used to have two 15 minute sessions (on Tuesdays and Thursdays), but cowardly Blair changed it to once a week - so that there is longer to wait between PMQs, so that events will be more likely to have moved along before he *has* to make himself available to be called to account (not that he answers the questions much anyway - he usually rattles out the same tired list of so-called achievements regardless of the question!).

[Gerrard8LFC]

Yeah. It gets very repetitive and boring.

You know that he is rattled when he has to resort to the list of achievements. He has wasted so much PMQ time going on and on through that.

He cannot rely on past successes to justify current problems.

And all too many lengthy enquires about things, and by the time the report is published everything has been forgotten. All this deceit.

[Liface]

Agreed. There should be question time at least two times a week, possibly three. If only for the reason that us Americans love to watch it on CSPAN!

[lolharbandhar]

I hate to say it but the Tories are right on this one. The health service is going to pot and will inevitably be privatised.

[xTunafishx]

Prescott looks like he's going to die of bordom... as usual

[Gerrard8LFC]

Yeah. They always look like they are dying on the Labour front bench. Brown is a key culprit.

[BennyP07]

Martin 'the speaker' joined the labour party at 21.. and is a roman catholic.. he seems to have a lot in common with Tony unbiased?

[JVGazeley]

Tony's not Catholic. Cherie is but not Tony... we still haven't had a Catholic PM.

[cjk91]

He's so obviously a secret catholic. There have even been reports he's been to mass.

[lmweed20]

if he was a catholic he wouldnt hide it, hes not really a true catholic the nis he, if hes like ashamed of his religion or wateva

[Morfee]

I think Tony has been a good prime minister barring the whole Iraq war.

He is very good in public and responds well in PMQs

[cjk91]

Tony Blair's labour government is just like any previous labour government. It messes things up. The only difference being the slightly slower pace at which it had been done by this government.

[EnzoRDS]

Then why is David Cameron trying to be Tony Blair? and why the Conservative party is trying it's best to be Labour? If you can't beat 'em, join em. And the Conservatives are a poor alternative to Labour.

[steilsp]

I live in America, and I must say, I love watching PMQs. I wish here in the states we had something like this, as President Bush would make an ass out of himself at every one.

My question is, what is that they are wearing? I've seen them wear those ribbons in past PMQs.

Could someone from the UK answer? I'm just curious. Thanks.

[BiasedBBC]

I think you mean the poppies the MPs are wearing - they're worn at this time of your up until Remembrance Sunday (next Sunday, the Sunday nearest the 11th day of the 11th month - from the signing of the armistice at the end of the 1st world war). There is also a two-minute silence at 11am on the 11th of the 11th.

[BennyP07]

and to steilsp.. the poppies are a flower and it was a myth that the blood of all the fallen men in flanders field had stained the flower red..

[Gerrard8LFC]

It was hardly a myth.

The fighting turned the soil and the poppy seeds grew.

[fishhead06]

Poppies - we do that in Canada, as well.

[5starsnitskymatch]

Idiot. The MPs don't respect him, he's embarrassed himself many times. It's time for a new speaker.

[Christian222]

Bollocks. This idiot gets a few direct questions a week to the PM and he wastes them talking about crap like that. Serves him right.

[annatoria]

Damn right.

[jg2]

Order! Order! Order! Order!