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Image: Photo by Cathal McNaughton – WPA Pool/Getty Images Andy Burnham began his first Prime Minister’s Questions today by thanking the Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, for his assistance with (or tolerance of) his marathon 125-question Q&A yesterday , which lasted for almost three and a half hours. The Commons has seen longer sessions (Disraeli famously devoted five hours to a Budget speech, while suffering from the flu), but not for a while. The two men shared a meaningful look and a chuckle; perhaps the Speaker had been forced to remind the PM that his chair, while richly ornamented, is not fitted with a flush.
Burnham seemed determined to press on with today’s PMQs, which ran on beyond the usual half-hour slot, and Hoyle asked him at one point to give snappier answers in order to fit in more questions from backbenchers. Burnham is not a thunderer at the despatch box or a lofty statesman-orator. At times he looks slightly embarrassed.
He seemed to blush when Kemi Badenoch congratulated him on his stamina, and a couple of the more puerile members of the house chortled. Subscribe to the New Statesman this summer - 2 months for only £2 Related
Source: New Statesman
