SKETCH MARTYN BROWN

ORDER! Order! Business has thankfully returned to normal in the House of Commons.

After the shameless and chaotic scenes of last week’s Gaza vote, Prime Minister’s Questions was back on familiar territory.

Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer slagged each other off a lot, Tory MPs were loud, very loud and Ed Davey was nowhere to be seen.

PMQs was, in fact, more about politicians who weren’t in the chamber than those who were. Liz Truss, Nigel Farage, Jeremy Corbyn and George Galloway all got a mention.

Sir Lindsay Hoyle must have been pleased as he was largely redundant as Speaker.

Redundant is something the 91 MPs who have signed a motion calling for him to quit would like to make a permanent feature.

Labour’s leader grilled Mr Sunak on ex-PM Liz Truss’s US appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference, accusing her of “slagging off and undermining Britain at every opportunity” to sell her new book.

At that moment someone pressed the smile button somewhere in Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ back. The rictus grin lasted for three seconds before her leader ranted that Ms Truss stayed silent as the “Right-wing thug” Tommy Robinson was described as a “hero”.

Mr Sunak ripped back: “If he wants to talk about former leaders and predecessors, the whole country knows his record! He sat there while antisemitism ran rife in his party. And not once but not twice backed a man [Jeremy Corbyn] who called Hamas friends.”

It was like a game of whose predecessor was worse. Starmer kept coming for more and the PM kept returning with venom, branding him “spineless, hopeless and utterly shameless”.

Suspended Lee Anderson – sat among Conservative friends – seemed to rather enjoy it. So did the rest of the Tory backbenchers who bayed for “more”.

After the two leaders had finished their vitriolic mudslinging, everyone appeared to be on best behaviour.

Roll on next week when a new MP, most likely George Galloway, will be in the chamber.

That should quieten things down a bit...