Key points
Jeremy Corbyn used all six of his questions to the prime minister to press her on plans to expand existing and introduce new selective grammar schools. After May paid tribute to her predecessor, David Cameron, who announced that he was leaving parliament this week, Corbyn congratulated the prime minister for uniting the education establishment against her plans for more grammars, before repeatedly attacking the plans with evidence from across the sector.
Snap verdict
Corbyn’s best PMQs was the one where he attacked David Cameron over plans to force all schools to become academies and this one may well have been his second best.
Again, he challenged the prime minister over the lack of support for a plan and, again, he won the exchange because he had the best arguments. He was not flash (he never is), but his fourth question, in which he spoke passionately about how wrong it was to separate children at 11, was powerful, and it was telling that towards the end, May resorted to changing the subject. Unlike last week, May restricted her jokes to her final answer, but even her payoff soundbite did not quite work. It was premised on the idea that this might be Corbyn’s last PMQs. But, of course, no one believes that ...
Most memorable lines
Corbyn said his policy is not about pulling up ladders.
It is about offering ladders to everyone.
He quotes someone saying there is something hopeless about grammar schools, and the idea that only some pupils can benefit. It was Cameron, he says, who said this.
May finished her answer to Corbyn with a joke about his leadership of the Labour party, referring to the – very slim – possibility that Corbyn may not be leader by next week. She said his leadership had been marked by “coalmines that aren’t mined, submarines that aren’t used and a leader who didn’t lead”.
Whoever is Labour leader after the election, it will be the country that loses.
