PMQs: "...loving Engels instead"

The Prime Minister entered the Commons chamber at 11:56, with the Chancellor not far behind. The PM brought his glasses along this week. He donned them and started leafing through the file on his knee. Two minutes later, the duel Eds of the Labour front bench arrived and immediately Miliband started gulping down water, as at last week's PMQs, as if it were going out of fashion.

The two front benches faced one another as Northern Ireland questions drew to a conclusion. The moments ticked down to noon. Why does nobody ever speak to George Osborne in these moments? Plenty of Conservative MPs lean over to speak to other members of the government front bench. Never to Osborne.

The first question was on the blacklisting of employees, a practice the PM made clear that he deplored. Then came Ed Miliband's first question, on the recent decision by the government to cap the interest rates charged by pay day lenders. After the government's unwillingness to cap energy prices, Miliband wondered what had brought about this "u-turn" in government policy? Throwing back a line used by the PM, Miliband asked whether he thought the nation was still being dragged towards a "Marxist Universe."

Cameron replied by pointing out that in 13 years of government the Labour Party did nothing to deal with excessive charges by pay day lenders. And having followed closely the Leader of the Opposition's appearance on Desert Island Discs, the PM wondered... oh no... might it be that the leader of the opposition is no longer a follower of Marx... here it comes... but might it be, asked the PM, that "he's loving Engels instead?"

For the uninitiated, this was a reference to the lyrics of a popular song chosen by Miliband on Desert Island Discs. The Tory benches fell about at the reference. The Labour benches were furious. It was a strange moment of dissonance—that such an outrageously appalling quip could lead to such absurdly opposing reactions. The artificiality of the moment and of the situation over all became, for an instant, oppressively apparent.

Ed suggested that the pay day lending decision had been taken because Cameron was worried about losing a vote on it in Parliament. The PM responded by lamenting the lack of a sense of humour being shown on the Labour benches—a line he has used before—and by noting that in three years, the Leader of the Opposition had not once asked a question about pay day lenders, which the Government benches took for a "gocha" moment and MPs shouted "AAAAAAHHAAAAA," at Miliband, sounding almost exactly like a herd of sheep, which was presumably unintended. The PM completed his remark by saying that it is right to intervene in markets when they are not working.

"Can the PM explain," asked Miliband, through the riotous volley of noise coming from his own side, "why intervening to cap the cost of credit is right, but an energy price cap is communism?"

The PM answered: "because we don't have control of the international cost of gas." He then went on to wonder whether the Labour Party had any policies other than to "take money off the Co-Op and don't ask any questions."

Then Ed wheeled out his rhetorical bazooka, describing this pay day lending cap as an "intellectual collapse of their position," and the House bellowed at this line.

The session then descended into a familiar exchange of shouted economic accusations between the two leaders, suggestions of intellectual incoherence, of putting forward policies that were a "con," and at one point a half-heard question from Miliband ended with him shouting the words "green crap," which drew sharp intakes of breath from around the chamber.

Cameron then noted that in the week before the Autumn Statement Miliband had not asked about the economy. The PM then caricatured Ed as sitting in his room "desperate for bad news" to suit his "short term political ends." This intolerable rumpus continued for some time.

The PM has been dragged onto the preferred territory of the Labour leadership. He wants to talk about the economic recovery, but Miliband wants to focus on the unevenness of that recovery. Miliband's position on capping energy prices is a rhetorically strong one and the government's decision to go after pay day lenders is surely an attempt by the PM to shove Miliband off his consumer champion pedestal. So far, so victorious for Ed.

A problem with Miliband's position on energy, however, is that it essentially amounts to a cry of anguish at the forces of globalisation. Because when the PM shouts at him across the chamber that Britain cannot control the price of gas, he is correct. It cannot. And Ed will know this. He will also know that the British left has an unhappy history of trying to push back against the changes brought about by globalised energy markets. Ask the miners.

Rhetorically, Miliband has a strong position. Historically and economically, he does not.