Speaker denies ‘braying’ slur

DURING a critical Parliamentary debate on Brexit it might have been thought MPs and the speaker of the house may have had enough to occupy them.

But one West politician and Speaker John Bercow took the time to settle a score with Cheltenham MP Alex Chalk’s local newspaper’s website.

Mr Chalk complained that Gloucestershire Live had reported an earlier ticking-off of his from Mr Bercow for heckling as ‘braying’.

Mr Bercow replied: “In all my experience of the honourable gentleman, which is now quite considerable, I think I can say authoritatively that the honourable gentleman and ‘braying’ are complete strangers.

“His behaviour is ordinarily not in any way unseemly so he can tell his local newspaper to put that in their pipe if they still have one and smoke it.”