Ahead of the summer recess, both David Cameron and Ed Miliband needed a win at today’s PMQs to send their troops away happy and it was Cameron who rose to the occasion, delivering his strongest performance for months. The longer the session went on, the more confident he seemed to grow, quipping that he longer needed Lynton Crosby’s advice to “defeat a divided and useless Labour Party” and advising Miliband to “move the two people next to you [Ed Balls and Andy Burnham] and…do it fast.”
Miliband had begun by challenging Cameron on NHS staffing levels in response to yesterday’s Keogh report but a well-briefed Cameron pointed out that eight of the 11 hospitals placed in special measures now had more nurses than in 2010 and that 10 had more clinical staff. A somewhat deflated Miliband then questioned Cameron over Lynton Crosby and plan cigarette packaging but, once again, the PM had come well-armed. Declaring that the decision was made by him and Jeremy Hunt alone, he noted that the last Labour government had taken the same view and produced a letter from Andy Burnham to Tessa Jowell noting that “no studies have shown that introducing plain packaging would cut the number of young people smoking”.
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