After last week’s mauling, Ed Miliband arrived well-armed at today’s PMQs. He swiftly challenged David Cameron to say whether he would accept his proposal of a £5,000 cap on all party donations (as revealed on The Staggers this morning) and of new limits on MPs’ outside earnings. Cameron responded by rejecting a £5,000 cap on the grounds that it would imply “a massive amount of taxpayer support”, a challenge Miliband will have to confront (some will argue that parties should simply cut their costs), but his answer on second jobs was far weaker.
In a proposal not included in his speech yesterday (he wisely held some ammunition back), Miliband asked the PM whether he agreed that “MPs should not be able to take on new paid directorships and consultancies”. Cameron responded with a tokenistic attack on the unions that looked like a fairly obvious attempt to change the subject. Miliband had the confidence of a man certain that, on this issue, the public are on his side. It was only later in the session, in response to a question from Labour MP Phil Wilson, that Cameron offered a principled defence on second jobs, arguing that parliament benefits from figures such as Jack Straw and David Blunkett who have such interests.
After Miliband’s speech yesterday, his claim that the Labour leader “doesn’t want to talk about the trade unions stitching up Parliamentary selections” no longer rings true. Miliband also made it clear that he will use the Tories’ opposition to a cap on donatiosn to frame them as the party of “big money”, pointing out that the Conservatives had received £25m in funding from hedge funds who in turn received a tax cut of £145m in the Budget.
As an aside, it is worth noting a furore at the start of the session when Cameron wrongly described Andy Murray as the “first British player” to win Wimbledon for 77 years (forgetting Virginia Wade). With Labour MPs crying Wade’s name, Miliband smartly took the opportunity to correct his error as soon as he stood up.
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