PMQs: Multimillionaires in a hot museum

A hot day in the house today—and so the subject turned to the banks. Ed Miliband rose from his seat to ask the Prime Minister whether he supported the Parliamentary Commission on Banking's suggestions on bonuses and criminal penalties. The Prime Minister replied: "I say yes."

For Miliband, however, this response reeked of evasion. When it came to criminal penalties, would the government put down amendments to the banking bill, based on the recommendations of the committee? To this the PM answered that there would indeed be strong legislation coming down the pipe.

Changing tack somewhat, though not subject, Miliband reminded the house that although the PM now heaped praise on the doings of this Commission on Banking, that same committee had said last year that high street and "casino" banking should be separated and yet the PM ignored this advice. What of that? "I see he's getting some advice from his part-time Chancellor," added Miliband, noticing that George Osborne was whispering something to the PM.

The PM replied with a long reading from the Ed Balls crime sheet—when he was in the Treasury, said the PM, Balls presided over a system of his own invention that was hobbled by weak regulation and rife with financial mismanagement. He then pointed out that although both Eds on the Labour front bench were in the Treasury for 13 years, in that time they did nothing about any of the problems about which they now so forcefully complain.

Miliband retorted hotly that he was not going to take advice from "a guy," who advised the Treasury during Black Wednesday. (Miliband has a weakness for these casual moments, and they really don't work—same with the glottalising.)

The PM cited Paul Myners, the former City Minister under the previous Labour government, who has said that it was time for Labour to take responsibility for the weak bank regulation it put in place. Ah, said Ed, but the PM is on record as having wanted less regulation, not more during that time. This does not so much exculpate Labour as suggest that "we were all in it together," a novel approach. "The reality is he's dragging his feet on bank reform," Miliband added, to which Cameron replied that the Leader of the Opposition had given "another display of extraordinary weakness."

Edward Leigh then stood. He has just received a knighthood, for which the PM offered him much congratulation. Further questions came on child poverty and Syria, and one from Caroline Lucas on whether the Sun ought not to be available on the Parliamentary estate on account of Page Three. The question certainly got the biggest reaction of the day from the press gallery—and not a pleasant one. The PM disagreed in a much more reasoned manner.

Has Lynton Crosby ever advised the PM on fags or booze? Only on how to destroy the credibility of the Labour party, a job that they ware very good at doing themselves. Boom boom. Dennis Skinner asked about the PM's home and why he had written down his mortgage in Notting Hill rather than his home in his constituency. The suggestion was that in doing so the PM was able to claim more back in expenses than would otherwise be the case, but the House was roaring so loudly from the moment that Skinner stood up that it was hard precisely to track his meaning. The PM's reply, however, mostly concerned the recent donation made to Labour in the form of shares, which called into question the precise motives of the donation and the tax benefits that might have arisen from it.

It was a subdued, hot PMQs. Miliband still looks weak, although he is the louder of the two principals. The abiding memory of the exchange, however, will be of two Oxford-educated multimillionares in a hot museum, shouting at one another about the economy. Such is the way of things nowadays.