View all newsletters
Sign up to our newsletters

Support 110 years of independent journalism.

  1. Politics
  2. UK Politics
2 April 2014

PMQs review: Going postal over Royal Mail privatisation

Miliband's focused outrage cuts through Cameron's red mist.

By Rafael Behr

Anger can be a great asset in politics if it is channelled properly. When focused, it enhances performance. As red mist, it is ruinous. In Prime Minister’s question’s today, both Ed Miliband and David Cameron got sincerely angry –  sometimes the outrage is confected – but it was the Labour leader who was made effective. Cameron just got cross. 

Miliband’s questions focused on the privatisation of Royal Mail and, specifically, the charge that a prized asset was sold too cheap, with the result that Britain has been collectively diddled out of millions. (£750m according to a National Audit Office report.) The Prime Minister’s answer was that the sale netted billions for British taxpayers, secured Royal Mail’s commercial future and put shares in the hands of many of the company’s toiling employees.

Miliband was undeterred, querying a “gentleman’s agreement” according to which City investors pledged not to cash in their Royal Mail stakes early in pursuit of a quick windfall. Half had already done just that, according to the opposition leader. At that point the Prime Minister’s nails reached the bottom of his barrel of arguments and out came the sound of scraping: “We know why he’s asking these questions – because he’s paid to by the trade unions.”

When the question was repeated, Cameron veered even further off topic, quoting from a job advertisement for an advisor in Miliband’s office and using it as a pretext to highlight recent reports of division and anxiety in Labour’s upper echelons. That the opposition is not currently singing in immaculate harmony is self-evident but raising it as a desperate non-sequitur didn’t help the Prime Minister. Nor did his efforts to denigrate Miliband’s jdugement by reference to his old proximity to Gordon Brown (another perennial barrel-scraper). The reminder that Labour had once tried and failed to privatise Royal Mail too probed the source of some opposition awkwardness on this issue. The assertion that the party’s 2010 manifesto had included such a plan earned approving jeers from Tory MPs. It was, however, untrue.

Ultimately, Miliband won the exchange because he made a consistent and coherent argument: that the Tories flogged off a prized state asset at “mates rates” for the benefit of their “friends in the City”, while Cameron responded with indiscriminate denigration, slipping at one point into abuse. “Muppet” is not the most elevated jibe to have been recorded in Hansard. (No doubt Tories will be similarly disapproving of Miliband’s reference to the PM as the “The Dunce of Downing Street” but at least that was  part of a compound insult with a flicker of rhetorical imagination – “Not so much the Wolf of Wall Street but …”) Miliband’s friends have told me he knows PMQs is working well when he succeeds in provoking Cameron’s temper, which can be easily measured because the Prime Minister’s face flushes when he is annoyed, as he was today. “As red as a post box,” jeered the Labour leader, a little gratuitously.

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
  • Administration / Office
  • Arts and Culture
  • Board Member
  • Business / Corporate Services
  • Client / Customer Services
  • Communications
  • Construction, Works, Engineering
  • Education, Curriculum and Teaching
  • Environment, Conservation and NRM
  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
  • Infrastructure Management - Transport, Utilities
  • Legal Officers and Practitioners
  • Librarians and Library Management
  • Management
  • Marketing
  • OH&S, Risk Management
  • Operations Management
  • Planning, Policy, Strategy
  • Printing, Design, Publishing, Web
  • Projects, Programs and Advisors
  • Property, Assets and Fleet Management
  • Public Relations and Media
  • Purchasing and Procurement
  • Quality Management
  • Science and Technical Research and Development
  • Security and Law Enforcement
  • Service Delivery
  • Sport and Recreation
  • Travel, Accommodation, Tourism
  • Wellbeing, Community / Social Services
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU

The privatisation of Royal Mail is an issue of limited political benefit to Labour, since the opposition is stuck with the sale as a fait accompli. Re-nationalisation isn’t on the agenda. But Miliband has judged, probably correctly, that the public doesn’t like the smell of the deal and doesn’t trust the Tories to have carried it out with the right motives or with the right people’s interests at heart. It is also something that, judging by today’s performance, provokes real moral outrage in the Labour leader and that can be a good look for him. The same cannot be said of the Prime Minister.

Content from our partners
The promise of prevention
How Labour hopes to make the UK a leader in green energy
Is now the time to rethink health and care for older people? With Age UK

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
  • Administration / Office
  • Arts and Culture
  • Board Member
  • Business / Corporate Services
  • Client / Customer Services
  • Communications
  • Construction, Works, Engineering
  • Education, Curriculum and Teaching
  • Environment, Conservation and NRM
  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
  • Infrastructure Management - Transport, Utilities
  • Legal Officers and Practitioners
  • Librarians and Library Management
  • Management
  • Marketing
  • OH&S, Risk Management
  • Operations Management
  • Planning, Policy, Strategy
  • Printing, Design, Publishing, Web
  • Projects, Programs and Advisors
  • Property, Assets and Fleet Management
  • Public Relations and Media
  • Purchasing and Procurement
  • Quality Management
  • Science and Technical Research and Development
  • Security and Law Enforcement
  • Service Delivery
  • Sport and Recreation
  • Travel, Accommodation, Tourism
  • Wellbeing, Community / Social Services
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU