A speech on leadership, then a fine show of skipping the tough questions

Sadly, Theresa May had finished taking questions by the time Jeremy Corbyn called on her to resign over police cuts, so journalists were unable to ask her for her response. We’ll just have to imagine what it would have been. Perhaps something like this. “Jeremy Corbyn is absolutely right. I hereby resign as Prime Minister with immediate effect. I was hoping to battle on, but now I’ve lost the support of the leader of the Labour Party, it’s clearly impossible for me to continue.

“Some may say it’s somewhat peculiar to demand I resign a mere three days before the electorate decides for itself whether it wants me to remain Prime Minister. But since a Corbyn landslide is inevitable anyway, I might as well step down early.

“To ensure my successor is in place in time for the election, a Conservative leadership contest will be held straight away, and conclude by teatime.”

Yes, I expect she would have said something like that.

Or maybe not. As it happened, Mrs May had just been giving a speech on leadership: the strength of hers, and the weakness of Mr Corbyn’s.

Speaking in Whitehall, she said the election represented a choice between “one leader who has boasted about opposing every single counter-terror law, and one who has been responsible for passing them”.

Mr Corbyn, she added, “has opposed the use of shoot-to-kill, given cover to the IRA when they bombed and shot our citizens – and now wants to do all he can to hide or deny those views.” Less than a week ago, we were told Mrs May had decided to stop attacking Mr Corbyn. I sense there’s been a change of plan.

A strong leader, of course, has no fear of tackling tough questions head-on. Six times journalists asked

We were told Mrs May had decided to stop attacking Mr Corbyn. I sense there has been a change of plan

her about the cuts made to police numbers while she was Home Secretary; each time, she skipped lightly away from the subject, saying budgets had been “protected since 2015” (she started as Home Secretary in 2010).

Four times journalists asked her whether she’d take Donald Trump to task for grievously misrepresenting Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, in the aftermath of the London Bridge attack. The first three times, she said simply that Mr Khan was “doing a good job”, but didn’t criticise Trump.

The fourth time, she still didn’t criticise Trump, but said it would be “wrong” to say Mr Khan was doing a bad job. That, it seemed, was as far as she dared to go.

Afterwards she travelled to Scotland for a rally. Here, a journalist was at last able to ask about Mr Corbyn’s call for her resignation.

“On Thursday, the people of the United Kingdom have a very simple choice,” replied Mrs May.

“It’s about who they believe has the leadership to take this country forward. Who has the leadership, who has the vision, who has the plan? It’s me, and the Conservative Party.”

Well, at least she didn’t take four goes to answer that one.