PMQs: Rayner taunts jittery Raab over bullying allegations in clash of deputies

Today is Betty Boothroyd’s funeral, and with both Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer attending, Prime Minister’s Questions was a showdown between deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab, and deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner. Alluding to Raab’s ongoing and numerous bullying complaints in a question nominally about the government’s antisocial behaviour strategy, Rayner joked: “I’ll give him some credit, the deputy Prime Minister knows first hand the misery caused by thugs and their intimidating behaviour, lurking with menace, exploding in fits of rage, creating a culture of fear and maybe even – I don’t know – throwing things.” Raab limply responded by saying: “I have never called anyone scum.”

The substance of today’s session focused on criminal justice, with Rayner arguing that the Conservatives are “missing in action in the fight against crime” and that “women feel unsafe on Britain’s streets”.  Raab countered that it was Rayner and Labour who are soft on crime, having voted against the government’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act. He called on the opposition to support the government’s victims and prisoners bill, which was presented to MPs this afternoon.

Highlighting the very low prosecution rate for rape and large court backlogs, Rayner said only “1.6% of rapists face being charged for their crime”, telling MPs: “Over 98% of rapists will never see the inside of a court room, let alone a prison.” She called for Raab to apologise to victims for his record as Justice Secretary, saying he had “no sense of responsibility and not a shred of shame”.

Raab gave a deeply unconvincing performance at the dispatch box, complete with stumbles, pauses and a look of low level vacant fear throughout. Raab is not a spectacular Commons performer, but he can usually at least muster a kind of belligerent confidence while the veins in his forehead throb threateningly, as you imagine they might have done when he allegedly yelled at civil servants in a meeting. Today, however, he looked more like someone about to cry than someone about to yell.

Rayner’s performance was solid – confident and energetic, hitting talking points on Conservative criminal justice failures – but far from exceptional. It really didn’t have to be, however, to come out on top against the nervy Raab. She rounded out the session by again highlighting the 24 formal bullying complaints against Raab from civil servants, suggesting that “if reports are to be believed” it could be his last PMQs and asking: “Will he walk before he’s pushed?” Raab accused Rayner of “bluster and political opportunism” while wiping his mouth.