Calm, reasonable Starmer gives Raab a run for his money at PMQS

There are many differences between Sir Keir Starmer and Jeremy Corbyn. One of them is this. You can tell Sir Keir is listening. In the days when Mr Corbyn did PMQS, I wasn’t always sure he was paying attention to the answers he was given. At times, he seemed simply to read out the next question on his list, irrespective of what the Prime Minister had said in reply to the previous one. I occasionally suspected that if Boris Johnson had announced his intention to launch an immediate nuclear attack against the Moon, Mr Corbyn would have shuffled to his feet, peered down at his notes and plodded obliviously on with his next question about bus timetables.

His successor as Labour leader appears somewhat more engaged – as he showed again yesterday, during his second appearance at PMQS. A former lawyer, Sir Keir seems perpetually on the alert for the slip that might give the accused away. And, while his manner is calm and reasonable (no spluttery grandstanding for the sake of a Momentum Facebook clip), his questions are forbiddingly detailed, and dense with quotes and statistics.

As a result, they also tend to be rather long. His six questions yesterday lasted an average of two minutes each. Perhaps this was why Dominic Raab, his opponent, didn’t always seem to have understood them.

In one question, Sir Keir noted that, according to a survey by the Royal College of Physicians, one in four hospital doctors still didn’t have enough protective equipment. He then quoted the RCP’S president, who’d said: “It’s truly terrible that supply has worsened over the past three weeks, rather than improved.”

Mr Raab apparently took these to be Sir Keir’s own words. “I take exception,” he retorted, “with him suggesting that it’s getting worse, not better!”

“I was quoting the Royal College of Physicians,” explained Sir Keir gently.

“It’s not my view. It’s their view.” This wasn’t the only time Mr Raab seemed to misunderstand him. He appeared to think Sir Keir had “criticised” the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser (he hadn’t; he’d merely quoted him). Mr Raab also accused Sir Keir of “thinking he knows better” than the country’s top scientists (Sir Keir had merely asked when the Government planned to publish its exit strategy).

Then again, this was the second consecutive PMQS in which Mr Raab had accused Sir Keir of “thinking he knows better”. So perhaps this is the Government’s planned line of attack against him. Portray Sir Keir as an arrogant know-all – and spin any criticism of the Government as a criticism of scientists.

Present in the chamber, incidentally, was Jeremy Corbyn. Despite being in the most vulnerable age group, he’s still travelling to Parliament rather than watching at home.

When he had to be at PMQS, he looked as if he’d rather be somewhere else. Yet when he actually should be somewhere else, he comes in.