A confident Theresa May echoed Margaret Thatcher in her first Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday afternoon, accusing Jeremy Corbyn of pressing for over-spending.
Responding to the Labour leader calling for an end to austerity, she snapped: “He calls it austerity — I call it living within our means.”
May also mocked Labour’s record on women.
“In my years here in this house I’ve long heard the Labour Party asking what the Conservative Party does for women, well it just keeps making us prime minister!,” she said, as her husband Philip looked on from the public gallery.
“The Labour Party may be about to spend several months fighting and tearing itself apart. The Conservative Party will be spending those months bringing this country back together.”
Labour MPs looked solemn as May was widely deemed the victor in her first outing in the weekly clash.
Tory MPs roared approval as she mocked Labour’s leadership turmoil, calling Corbyn “a boss who doesn’t listen to his workers, a boss who exploits the rules”.
Leaning forward, she teased: “Remind him of anyone?”
Observers said that line was delivered in a style uncannily reminiscent of Thatcher, who governed from 1979 until 1990.
Corbyn hit back with a jibe about austerity, telling MPs: “I know this is very funny for Conservative members, but I don’t suppose many Conservative MPs have to go to food banks.”
The brief exchange saw May set out her battle lines against Labour on spending and home ownership. Corbyn attacked the £450,000 limit for starter homes set out in government policies, saying that it was too high.
But May pointed out that it reflected everyday life for people in his Islington constituency.
Often the only taste of parliamentary business that members of the public regularly get, the box-office drama known colloquially as PMQs is seen as a barometer of how well party leaders are doing and they spend hours preparing for it.
May, who after six years as interior minister is no stranger to tough questions in parliament, occasionally referred to a file of notes as she was grilled on topics ranging from education to the Nice attacks.
“It is the single most nerve-wracking thing you’ll ever do in your life,” former Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith told ITV.
“It is like driving a car down a narrow road at 100-miles-an-hour whilst having to look in your rear-view mirror to see what is going on behind you, and if anybody is there trying to smash your car up from behind. It is just impossible.”
Having navigated the session with no major stumbles, May’s final question was from an old political rival.
Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron, whose party spent five years in coalition with the Conservatives before losing almost all its lawmakers at last year’s election, recalled running against May for a parliamentary seat in 1992.
“She has come a long way since we were on the hustings together in north west Durham,” he said.
May responded: “Little did the voters of north west Durham know that the two unsuccessful candidates in that election would become leaders of two of this country’s political parties.”
“Although I would point out...my party is a little bit bigger than his.”
May, who styles herself as a serious, down-to-earth and unflashy leader.
In this video grab taken from footage broadcast by the UK Parliamentary Recording Unit (PRU) via the Parliament TV website on July 20, 2016 shows British Prime Minister Theresa May speaking during Prime Ministers Questions at the House of Commons in London.
