Live blog of PMQs: The Prime Minister repeatedly fails to answer questions on the security clearance of 5,000 illegal immigrants

Editor's verdict: "Another very poor performance from Mr Brown.  He dodged the questions of both David Cameron and Vince Cable.  I wonder if the Labour MPs are beginning to miss Tony Blair?!  Gordon Brown's stumbling performances do illustrate how good Mr Blair was at this."

Highlights, not verbatim:

12.27pm: Dennis Skinner makes a long statement about miners, Michael Heseltine and Black Wednesday.  The Speaker doesn't require him to ask a question.

12.23pm: Peter Luff asks what exactly has Lord Malloch Brown done to deserve his grace and favour residence?  The Prime Minister responds by saying that the former UN bureaucrat is doing a great job.

12.12pm: Vince Cable asks the Prime Minister to confirm that the taxpayer is lending Northern Rock £24bn - twice the amount Britain spends on primary schools every year and four times the international development expenditure.  Brown responds by saying that much of the relationship is confidential.  He then fails to answer Mr Cable's second question concerning whether all of the lending will be repaid - in full - by the end of this Parliament.

12.09pm: Does the Prime Minister want to know about a major security breach in our country?  Why won't he answer a simple question?  People will conclude that he is not delivering the candour, honesty and openness that he promised.  Brown fails to answer for a third time - to Tory chants of 'When? When?' - and says that what the Government did about the security breaches was what mattered.

12.08pm: Cameron tries again: When was the Prime Minister told?  Brown fails to answer again.

12.06pm: When was Gordon Brown told about this problem, David Cameron asks? Gordon Brown doesn't answer the question.

12.03pm: David Cameron asks about the Home Secretary's failure to reveal the fact that illegal immigrants were cleared for security work. The Government has been caught red-handed putting spin before public safety. Gordon Brown responds by saying that procedures have now been put in place to stop the problem happening again. 

Starts here at noon.  Watch it live via Sky.

Comments

[activist]

Brown just rubbish, doging 'when did you know', Cameron pressed him on it and didn't let him retreat into tractor production figures.

Brown really is awful at this, as the press reaction to the last PMQs said.

[Letters From A Tory]

Cameron just trounched him. Brown didn't have an answer to anything, literally. PMQs is so one-sided these days and I think the public can see that. Keep going Mr Cameron, you have many months of this to come!

[Geoff]

It's a shame that more members of the public don't watch PMQ's because Brown was absolutely awful.

Remember that this is the man who 'represents' this country at international summits. It's a scary thought.

[chrisblore]

Just listening to the security statement. David Cameron began his reply with something along the lines of: "Unlike the Prime Minister I do occasionally allow other members of the front bench to announce policies!"

I agree that it's a great shame that more of the public don't have the opportunity to watch these debates.

[Mike]

Brown is truly awful. A new low.
Yes few people watch it nor care about how bad Brown is and in the past Hague very frequently bested Blair and look where that got us but....
Hague had no chance as the Conservatives were out for the duration. Labour could have put up a donkey to PMQs and would still have won the 2001 election.
PMQs sets the political weather and frequent poor performances are corrosive to Browns standing in Parliament, his political authority (look how credible Camerons opinions and announcements are taken), commentator and media narrative and to the morale of his troops.
He has to get better, as this is truly embarrasing.
Great stuff! Keep it up DC!

[anyone but brown]

Brown is clearly riddled with nerves and anxiety when it comes to PMQs and his dismal performances suggest that he is probably going to get worse. He is a thin-skinned, paranoid, and neurotic character and these weekly onslaughts must be gradually grinding him down.

With the coming deterioration in the economy, Labour's standing in the polls will recede further putting added pressure on Brown, not least from his own party. Being someone with a well-deserved reputation for cowardice and who has always run away from a straight fight Brown will dread going into an election where he is in grave danger of defeat with a backdrop of sniping from his own benches.

I therefore fully expect him to find some excuse within the next 1 to 2 years to resign (probably "ill health)

[Curly]

It ought to be required viewing every Wednesday on the BBC...............but

[fr]

"Cameron just trounched him". Is this being trounced with a truncheon ? Sounds painful.

[mike clarke]

Cameron might well have trounced Brown at PMQs, but the BBC didn't report it on the One O'Clock News. No surprise there really, I suppose!

[Steve Green]

The one thing that has really wound me up while watching PMQs recently is the need for Labour ministers to sit on the front bench, smirking while the are being exposed as incompetent. What the hell has Jacqui Smith got to smile about?

[Paul]

Brown is all at sea when he asked about topics other than the economy and as said previously it does make one appreciate how good Blair was. Has anyone else noticed the increase in the number of times members use the second rather than the third person when addressing the House. David Cameron does it every so often before correcting himself, although the Speaker is quite lenient on members who do it.

[Bill Brinsmead]

DC was fine but yet more predictable and easily answered questions from our unimaginative backbenchers. Witness today’s PMQs from Peter Luff and Simon Burns. The latter simply repeated an earlier PMQ from Cameron. Should do better.

[fr]

Sky cut away from Brown's speech to go to adverts. It was that interesting.

[Deputy Editor]

Brown seems to talk to his colleagues whilst being asked questions more than Blair did. The way he invariably grins as he does so shows he does it to show how above it all he is.

[Tony Makara]

Gordon Brown lacks Blair's swagger, which is needed in an atmosphere as hostile as PMQs. The more I see of Brown the more he looks the archetypal politburo politican. Very good at delivering a speech from a platform to a captive but completely hopeless when it comes to the cut and thrust of quickfire debate. Gordon Brown sounds as if he doesn't even believe in what he is saying, perhaps therein lies his problem?

[michael mcgough]

Who will expose the illegal immigrant mafias operating as London traffic wardens.Council's ecade their responsibilities by outsourcing.

[Nick]

We are all agreed that Brown is truly awful at this. The concern is that amongst people that are not overtly interested in politics he will just turn them off even more. I think we need to continue the attack on his integrity, and his ability to be straight with the electorate and tell the truth. All those years while in Number 11 he was festering in self pity about his situation. This has damaged him permanently. Now he has finally got the job, his "control freakery" prevents him from being a true leader able to delegate and take difficult decisions for the right reasons. Bottling the election will be a decision he will live to regret. Whatever the result, if held last week, he is doomed to see a worse result in 2009/10. Keep it up DC, if this continues week on week, any remaining credibility within the country will erode further.

[christina]

anyone-but-brown @1335. "I therefore fully expect him to find some excuse within the next 1 to 2 years to resign (probably "ill health)"

That's all very well but no wonder the Home Secretary gave her full backing to the incompetent Sir Ian Blair! But if all the ministers who have been proved to be incompetent were to resign there'd be nobody left to do the job.

In an idle moment [I do have 'em] I wondered just which of the big beasts in the government would take over in the event of the prime minister unexpectedly snuffing it. "Big Beasts" ??? Foreign Secretary Miliband? (don't make me laugh); Chancellor Darling? (Brown's poodle and Northern Rock impresario) ; Home Secretary Smith? (see spin over immigrants); Justice Minister Straw? (well he's done almost all the other jobs) ; Browne - Defence disaster and Scottish Secretaryu?; Benn of foot & mouth fame? Harman? Jowell? And Brown claims it is a ministry of "all the talents"

They all need to learn again the saying that "The Buck stops here". But who WOULD succeed Brown

[Irish Observer]

I think a number of posters have been watching PMQs through rose-tinted spectacles. Cameron was fixated on one issue, Brown batted the accusations away to an appreciable extent and no headline-grabbing hits/gaffes were made. If anything, Brown's criticism of Tory over-emphasis on press releases hit home hard. Cameron kept bleating on about trust issues. Even when he errs (an he often does), Brown's presbyterian countenance will always give him a veneer of trustworthiness.

[Paul]

Jack Straw. He is about the only competent Minister of the Crown there is, although I do not agree with much of the stuff they seem to e doing at the Justice Deapartment. He should still be Foreign Secretary, Milliband is poor. Another decent minister is John Denham - at least he had the guts to resign in the lead up to the Iraq war.

[James Sproule]

We know who is going to succeed Brown, Cameroon.

But he will not resign, remember this is a man who is convinced he is an economic genius, with delusions like that, he probably thinks he is doing alright at PMQ’s!

[James Sproule]

We know who is going to succeed Brown, Cameroon.

But he will not resign, remember this is a man who is convinced he is an economic genius, with delusions like that, he probably thinks he is doing alright at PMQ’s!

[Northernhousewife]

Christina,
Harriet would want it. Has there been a job she hasn't wanted? Her platform would rest on the fact she is a woman [and also on her hubbies union mates]
Jack would get it. Almost everyone else has been castrated but he is wise enough to keep his hidden from those who would mug him of them.

[Simon Robinson]

I think Irish Observer makes a valuable observation. No-one (except Labour die-hards) would see this as a triumph for Gordon Brown, but his soggy persistance in refusing to answer the questions put to him should not be construed as a collapse. A casual observer might even think that Brown did equally well.

Cameron needs to do better. He is not Paxman; he has limited questions, and once he knows an answer will not be forthcoming, he needs to move on. He must concentrate on seizing and holding the moral high ground, and conveying disgust, disbelief, and even pity. Gordon the son of the manse cannot bear being preached to. Vince Cable does it very well, and DC needs to watch him. When Cable called Brown a 'sad spectacle' or something similar after the Queen's speech it was pure dynamite.

[Vernon]

Is no-one else concerned about Cameron's cavalier attitude to Parliamentary conventions?

He repeatedly addresses the Prime Minister directly as "you", rather than in the third person. I notice that he does it so often, and quickly corrects himself, that it MUST be deliberate.

Why is he doing it? Not only is it disrepectful to the House and political tradition, it undermines his attempt to gain in gravitas by making him come across as a student debater who hasn't learnt the rules of the chamber. Someone should prevail upon him to stop it immediately.

[Matt Wright]

Interesting....its looking worse and worse for Labour. Brown isn't up to this but isn't likely to realise or go. As others say there's not really anyone else in his party up to it in the near future. The Govt looks very much like its in its dying days in terms of a political cycle. Cameron does want the job, has got fresh ideas and conservatives are getting the platoons together. Coherence and momentum is the key now,

Matt

[James Maskell]

Brown is fumbling again. The attempts to dodge the bullet over the illegal immigrants was a fudge. With several months to think up answers, I could think up a better strategy, not that Im angling for a job of course...

Refusing to give a straight answer to a straight question when asked more than once is a certain refusal to admit they have been caught with their hadn in the cookie jar as it were. Brown and Smith got busted badly by this and the best thing to do is to just come clean, otherwise it looks like they wont even admit when they ballsed it all up. By all means say that you are now dealing with it, but refusing to say when they knew is a strange situation indeed.

[John]

Brown looks so nervous at pmq's always playing with his cuffs or playing with his papers. I dread to see him on any state visit abroad. I also give him about a year before he quits over ill heath, as he behaves like a nervous kitten. Come election time, Dave will be in no.10

[Adam in London]

Heirs to Brown?

Alan Johnson, Jack Straw or David Miliband

[Simon]

I agree with you Vernon, it is irritating as hell. I've always assumed he's doing it to try and go over the heads of politicos and apeal to those that might be watching who don't know, understand, or care about parliamentary conventions. Waste of time if you ask me.

[Paul]

Simon it is a waste of time and very annoying. The speaker should pull him up on it especially as he has been in the House for a number of years now. In the past the speaker would gently remind new members of the conventions of the House and rebuke more experienced members. It is not a surprise though as this speaker must be one of the worst in the history of the Commons, how much better would it be if Sir Alan Haselhurst was Speaker? I am sure he would don the wig as well!

[John]

What ever happened to the "CLUNKING FIST" more like a frightened rabbit, watch Brown fiddling with his cuffs or playing with papers is a dead givaway.

[Patriot]

Many of the reader's comments about government policy and incompetence to be found at the address below are very relevent to this thread.

""Why are so many Britons emigrating?""

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=EPW4D52FXJQ3DQFIQMGSFFWAVCBQWIV0?view=BLOGDETAIL&grid=F11&blog=yourview&xml=/news/2007/11/15/view15.xml