Droning on

Tuesday started with the latest iteration of the Labour government trying to understand agriculture. The new helpful suggestion from ministers is that farmers should simply try earning more money. Pressed at the Environment Committee about how they should do this, a civil servant suggested they try branching out: “If you’re producing potatoes, you’re then able to turn it into crisps, or you could be producing flavoured gin or whatever.”

Later that day in the chamber, we spotted a middle-aged figure in glasses who looked distinctly familiar. Dark hair turning grey, blue tie, neat suit he might have been a bank manager or the headmaster of a minor public school. As he was sitting on the opposition front bench and nobody was trying to remove him, we decided he was probably a Conservative MP. But what was his name? 

On a not-entirely-unrelated note, here’s a quick quiz question: name the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer. You know, the Tory party’s second-most senior figure. The heartbeat of its campaign to win back power. The intellectual heft of its economic policy. Don’t worry, we’ll come back to the question. 

Rachel Reeves had arrived to tell us about her recent trip to China. Newspaper front pages had announced that morning that she was hanging onto her job by a thread. But for someone marching to the gallows, she looked remarkably confident. Was she whistling in the face of danger, or was she simply unaware that she was about to be hit by the rhetorical hurricane that was her Conservative shadow, whatever his or her name might be?

There are kids in the Dales who have only ever seen tower blocks on the telly

Her statement was the usual stuff, talk of important points raised and deals announced. She sat down, and we waited for the Speaker to call the shadow chancellor. If they were even in the building. “Mel Stride!” Lindsay Hoyle shouted, and suddenly we realised who that chap on the front bench was. Stride (for it was he), rose to his feet. We braced ourselves to hear this latter-day Cicero eviscerate Reeves, as promised by the papers. 

There was the charge sheet: growth “stone dead”; inflation “rising”; government borrowing costs “at a 27-year high”; the pound “hit a 14-month low”. Reeves, he said, should not be surprised “that international markets are uneasy”. Uneasy, eh? Wowser. And the pound back where it was when Stride was, if Wikipedia is correct, Work and Pensions Secretary? We began to sense that possibly Stride was not going to be speaking for England. 

There is a case to be made against Reeves’ economic policy, an argument that loading taxes and increased costs onto businesses was bound to dent confidence. But it was not a case that Stride successfully made. He revealed he was against cutting winter fuel payments, but also against raising taxes. He accused her of “scampering halfway round the world with a begging bowl” but also complained that she hadn’t brought very much back. By the time he started to wind up, Labour MPs were laughing at him, “We on this side know how this sorry story ends,” he said, and they all cackled and pointed at the Tory benches. 

He had a final line. “This whole sorry tale is nothing short of a Shakespearean tragedy playing out before our eyes,” he said. “This is the Hamlet of our time. To go or not to go, that is the question.” 

In his head, this must have sounded devastating, but in the chamber, it sounded ridiculous. If there is a besetting sin on the Tory front bench, it’s laziness. Stride has never been in opposition before. He’s used to being on the side of the chamber that wins the votes whatever the minister says, and frankly it shows. This is the second time he’s quoted Hamlet in a month. Perhaps he did it for O Level. 

Daisy Cooper, for the Lib Dems, did a better job of challenging Reeves on the economy. Iain Duncan Smith did better on the moral compromises of dealing with China. And then there were the subjects not even raised. One of Reeves’ ministers, Tulip Siddiq, was in deep trouble and notably absent, but neither Stride nor anyone else thought to ask about it. She resigned later anyway, a scandal proceeding to its conclusion with barely the slightest intervention from anyone on the Conservative benches. This is opposition as homeopathy. 

Earlier, Robert Jenrick had at least had a stab at opposing, asking about drones, which are apparently carrying contraband into prisons with an efficiency that Amazon should study. 

Replying was Nic Dakin. There are different kinds of prisons ministers, just as fans of Porridge will be aware that there are different kinds of prison officers. Dakin, a tall, kindly soul, is in the mould of Mr Barrowclough, keen to avoid confrontation and worried about the welfare of his charges. “An A4 sheet of paper laced with drugs can be worth £1,000,” he said, sadly. Up in the gallery, we considered that this made it significantly more valuable than an A4 sheet of paper laced with satire. It can only be a matter of time before a DEFRA civil servant explains to us that we need to become more profitable by diversifying into drug smuggling.

But there are other business crossovers available. For years farmers have lured city dwellers out to the countryside to shoot birds. But as Labour ministers are discovering, the countryside is cold and muddy and not on the Underground. Farmers should fill Land Rovers with shotguns, drive into town, and invite would-be urban sportsmen to patrol the parks near our high security prisons, taking shots at drones. As well as tackling the blight of jail smuggling, it would be a chance for untroubled rural youth to experience a different way of life: there are kids in the Dales who have only ever seen tower blocks on the telly. It’s a public service, it doesn’t hurt animals, and it will help parts of our divided nation to heal. Field sports for the 21st Century.