The Speaker of the House is being begged to "intervene." Pundits are clutching their pearls because Keir Starmer isn’t giving "straight answers" at Prime Minister’s Questions. They want Sir Lindsay Hoyle to act as a headmaster, rapping the PM on the knuckles until he says exactly what the opposition wants to hear.
They are wrong. They are fundamentally misunderstanding the mechanics of power.
PMQs was never designed to be a truth commission. It is a theater of dominance. When you demand that the Speaker "force" an answer, you aren’t asking for better governance; you’re asking for a scripted drama where the ending is already written. The current outcry isn't about transparency. It’s about the frustration of an opposition that hasn't learned how to corner a prosecutor.
The Myth of the Straight Answer
The "lazy consensus" suggests that if a politician doesn't give a "yes" or "no" to a complex fiscal question, the system is broken. This is a primary school view of constitutional law. In reality, the Prime Minister’s job at the dispatch box isn't to provide a briefing note for the press gallery. It is to maintain the confidence of the House.
If Starmer avoids a question about tax thresholds or departmental spending, he isn't "breaking" PMQs. He is playing the game by the rules established over centuries. The Speaker’s role is to manage the procedure, not the content. As soon as a Speaker starts adjudicating on the quality of an answer, they cease to be an impartial referee and become an editor. Do we really want a non-elected official deciding which political arguments are "sufficiently detailed"?
That is a fast track to a constitutional crisis.
Why the Opposition is Failing (and it's not the Speaker's fault)
The demand for intervention is a white flag. It’s an admission that Rishi Sunak—and now the rotating cast of shadow ministers—cannot craft a question sharp enough to draw blood.
In my years observing the machinery of Whitehall, I’ve seen this cycle repeat. When the opposition is weak, they blame the ref. When they are strong, they don't need the ref. Tony Blair didn't need the Speaker to help him dismantle William Hague. Margaret Thatcher didn't need a procedural helping hand to dominate the room.
The "straight answer" is a trap. If a Prime Minister gives you one, it’s because they’ve already won the argument. If they are dodging, the opposition’s job is to make that dodge look so cowardly, so transparently evasive, that the public feels the sting. If you need the Speaker to point out the evasion, you’ve already lost the room.
The Mathematics of Evasion
Consider the verbal physics of the dispatch box. A question has a certain "mass"—the factual weight of the inquiry.
$$Force = Mass \times Acceleration$$
If the opposition asks a low-mass question (vague, grandstanding, or overly broad), the PM can deflect it with zero effort. To get a result, you need a high-mass question delivered with high velocity.
- Weak Question: "Will the PM admit his policies are failing the working class?" (Zero mass, pure opinion).
- Strong Question: "On page 42 of the Treasury's own impact assessment, it says X. Why did the PM tell this House Y?" (High mass, factual contradiction).
Starmer is a former Director of Public Prosecutions. He spent a career watching people try to wiggle out of tight spots. He knows exactly where the exits are. To catch him, you don't need a more aggressive Speaker; you need a more competent cross-examiner.
The Transparency Trap
Everyone claims they want "more transparency." They’re lying.
If PMQs turned into a dry, factual exchange of data points, viewership would drop to zero. The "theatricality" that critics moan about is the only thing keeping the public remotely engaged with the legislative process.
The danger of "forcing" answers is that it creates a feedback loop of prepared scripts. If the Speaker mandates a specific response, the Civil Service will simply produce 500-page binders of "standardized truths" that say everything and nothing at the same time. You’ll get more words, but less meaning.
We are currently seeing a push for "Select Committee style" questioning in the main chamber. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of why these bodies exist.
- Select Committees are for forensic, long-form discovery.
- The Chamber is for political accountability and testing the "weather" of the government.
Mixing the two ruins both. You don't bring a scalpel to a sword fight, and you don't bring a broadsword to a surgery.
The Speaker as a Scapegoat
Sir Lindsay Hoyle is being used as a human shield for parliamentary incompetence. By calling on him to "stop Starmer avoiding questions," MPs are trying to outsource their primary job: holding the executive to account.
I have sat in rooms where policy is hammered out under the threat of a "bad" PMQs session. The fear isn't that the Speaker will be mean. The fear is that the clip of the evasion will go viral and make the Minister look incompetent.
If the current clips aren't landing, it’s because the questions are dull, not because the Speaker is silent.
Stop Asking the Wrong Questions
People often ask: "How can we make PMQs more informative?"
This is the wrong question. The right question is: "Why are we relying on a 30-minute weekly circus to be our primary source of government accountability?"
If you want the truth about the NHS, look at the quarterly performance data. If you want the truth about the economy, read the OBR reports. If you go to PMQs looking for a "straight answer" on fiscal policy, you’re looking for a steak at a vegan convention. You are fundamentally in the wrong place.
The "controversial truth" is that PMQs is working exactly as intended. It is exposing the fact that the current opposition doesn't know how to pin down a technocratic Prime Minister. Starmer’s "evasiveness" is actually a masterclass in defensive political rhetoric. He isn't breaking the system; he's winning the game.
The Actionable Reality for the Opposition
If the benches opposite Starmer want to actually "disrupt" his flow, they need to stop looking at the Speaker’s chair and start looking at their own research briefs.
- Stop the "Punchy" One-Liners: They are designed for Twitter, not for the House. Starmer eats them for breakfast.
- Use the "Closed Loop" Method: Ask questions that require a numerical value. "How many?" "What date?" "Which department?"
- Embrace the Silence: When he dodges, don't jeer. Sit in silence. Let the vacuum of the non-answer fill the room. That is far more damaging than a noisy intervention from the Speaker.
The Cost of "Fixing" the System
There is a downside to my stance. If we allow PMQs to remain a theater of evasion, the public's cynical view of politics deepens. I admit that. It's ugly. It's frustrating. It feels like a waste of taxpayer time.
But the alternative—an interventionist Speaker who dictates the "truthfulness" of political debate—is a nightmare. It turns the House into a courtroom where the judge is also the jury.
The "lazy consensus" wants a shortcut to accountability. They want a "Rule 12" or a "Speaker’s Mandate" to do the hard work for them. There are no shortcuts in high-stakes politics. If you can't make the Prime Minister answer, that’s your failure, not the system’s.
Stop crying for the Speaker. Start asking better questions.
