Prime Minister's Question Time

[Belly]

Does the PM have prior knowledge of the questions to be asked on Prime Minister's Question Time?

I assume he/she wouldn't have prior knowledge of the Leader of The Opposition's six questions but would have knowledge of questions from MPs ie, mutual backslappers in his own party?

I'm always sceptical because whenever the PM stands at the despatch box he/she has a folder presumably with all the answers.

Private Eye is suggesting that Bojo wants to loosen the social distancing rules in parliament so that his parliamentary private secretaries can sit behind him to pass prompting notes to help him evade increasingly awkward questions from Sir Keir Starmer.

 

[Uther]

https://www.politics.co.uk/reference/house-of-commons-guide-prime-minister-s-questions-politics-c

 

[mmj_uk]

Hillary Clinton was fed the questions to at least one of the 2016 US Presidential debates beforehand, so I guess it depends on how many cronies/moles you have on your team who are willing to bend the rules.

 

[ahar]

Nope, but he does have the list of people asking the questions and the team doing the prep make a good guess what a lot of these will be about. The call goes out around Whitehall departments around 10am on Tuesday from No10 asking for specific input on topics they think will come up. Each dept then flows down the request to the right teams in each department, which are collated and sent back.

Was a civil servant for a while and on the receiving end of the odd request for PMQ information on a Tuesday.

 

[peterwalkley]

They are usually forewarned of questions from their own side or when the MP asking the question wants a sensible answer instead of the usual mix of bluster, point scoring and bull poop, but otherwise no.

 

[jsmoke]

Prep, prep, prep. They know what will come up, it's pretty obvious.

It must be a tough gig , I remember TB saying it was the toughest thing he had to do as PM.

 

[StriderX]

Hillary Clinton was fed the questions to at least one of the 2016 US Presidential debates beforehand, so I guess it depends on how many cronies/moles you have on your team who are willing to bend the rules.

Impressive.

 

[R.P.L]

They are usually forewarned of questions from their own side or when the MP asking the question wants a sensible answer instead of the usual mix of bluster, point scoring and bull poop, but otherwise no.

Surely you wouldn't get into politics if you wanted something other than that...?

 

[ahar]

They are usually forewarned of questions from their own side .

I hate those Qs - "would the prime minister agree with me that he's done some amazing things, and the sun shines from within his arse?"

 

[Pawnless Endgame]

It doesn't matter what the questions are. All they should know is that the answer is 42. That's the answer for everything.

 

[hood1971]

It doesn't matter what the questions are. All they should know is that the answer is 42. That's the answer for everything.

Which is a more informative answer than Boris gives.
Paraphrase from yesterday
Question: why are ppl asked to go 100 miles for test?
Answer: you did not say anything when anarchists were stopping free press

 

[peterwalkley]

I hate those Qs - "would the prime minister agree with me that he's done some amazing things, and the sun shines from within his arse?"

It saves the bulimics from sticking their fingers down their throats Never let a good grovel go to waste.

 

[Diddums]

Hillary Clinton was fed the questions to at least one of the 2016 US Presidential debates beforehand, so I guess it depends on how many cronies/moles you have on your team who are willing to bend the rules.

Does this come with any sauce?

 

[jsmoke]

You could make a good comedy sketch from a PM who didn't have a clue, fumbling through papers trying to come up with an answer.

 

[Puzzled]

I hate those Qs - "would the prime minister agree with me that he's done some amazing things, and the sun shines from within his arse?"

Would be amazing if a prime minister disagreed and told them to stop being a suck up

 

[Dis86]

Does this come with any sauce?

Or any point for that matter?

 

[visibleman]

You could make a good comedy sketch from a PM who didn't have a clue, fumbling through papers trying to come up with an answer.

The Thick of It?

 

[Pipe & Slippers]

Sort of related - in a past life I had to attend our FTSE 100 AGM's. The Board would be at the Top Table and me and my boss would be in the front row with stacks of lever arch files overflowing the floor and the chairs next to us, so when an analyst/retired accountant asked some daft question "Can you tell me what the growth in sales of your widgets were in Obscure Province during the year and how that compared to the overall Obscure Province market?", the response of the CEO, if he hadn't got the answer to hand (most of the time he had), would be to nod at us, and we'd scramble though the files trying to find the data, pull out the relevant sheet and slide it over the Top Table to him.
The previous week he would have spent most afternoons being grilled by all manner of people in the company (some quite junior), to hone his skills and bring him up to speed - we were rarely called upon
After that it would be downstairs to a meeting room for telephone, and sometimes radio interviews with the media, where we performed the same task but basically took over the entire table, making the rest of the Board take their tea and biscuits on their laps, to make room for our files so we could have them all open and ready given the short time available esp on radio

He hadn't come from a Finance background, so always wanted the reassurance of some bean counters nearby

Having seen that in action, I do have some admiration for PM's. I'm guessing that they are so immersed in the politics of their position and policies, they automatically start with plenty of knowledge, and that's always getting refreshed
However they are going to get caught flat-footed once in a while, and I guess that's when they resort to flannel/bluster/misdirection/not answering the question

One of TB's favorite tactics was to respond by saying something like "The Public don't want to hear about that! They want to hear about all the new hospitals we've just built" Great tactic, especially when you have your side rooting for you

Really don't know how they do it every week though - must be exhausting. It was bad enough for our CEO once a year (+ an interim)

 

[ahar]

You know when a minister is stumped when they say something lie "I'll take no lessons from the party / minister / other that has done XYZ". That line (or something like it) is always at the bottom of every briefing