Key points
Jeremy Corbyn used five of his six questions to press the prime minister on the government’s housing record and the last on the closure of women’s refuges. Corbyn accused Theresa May of failing to properly regulate unscrupulous private landlords. May responded by accusing Corbyn of being against the private rental market on principle. On Twitter there was speculation that May had employed a new joke writer with two memorable lines from the PM.
Snap verdict
An unedifying draw. May sounded confident, but her pre-scripted anti-Corbyn jibes (in response to questions two and three) came over as unprovoked, gratuitous and consequently rather cheap. It was reminiscent of David Cameron’s Bullingdon aggro, but Cameron found a way of at least making his attacks sound relevant. Corbyn ignored the obvious topics (grammar schools or Brexit) and he asked solid, serious questions about one of the most pressing social questions of our time. But, as ever, he did not really use follow-up questions to drive home his points and so he did not succeed in causing her discomfort. May was relatively weak on detail, but she did try to turn the argument into a wide one about values, and about home ownership, and on these points Corbyn’s responses were thin.
Most memorable lines
May to Corbyn:
The train’s left the station, the seats are all empty, the leader’s on the floor, even on rolling stock they are a laughing stock.
After Corbyn used his familiar tactic of quoting a voter’s question – this time from Jenny on housing – May had another joke in her back pocket. After Corbyn appealed on Twitter for contributing questions, May quoted one response he received suggesting a question for her:
Does she know that in a recent poll on who would make the better prime minister ‘don’t know’ scored higher than Jeremy Corbyn?
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