THE Prime Minister’s performance in the House of Commons in the midst of ‘Flatgate’ - and the ongoing row over the redecoration payments -dominated the comment sections of the newspapers.

The Daily Mail

Henry Deedes said Wednesday’s Prime Minister’s Questions was the most explosive, gladiatorial in years.

“The Prime Ministerial lid eventually popped. Boris was boiling. Steaming. Raging,” he said. “Up he leapt, jabbing a podgy digit across the despatch box, shouting about how his government had delivered on the vaccine rollout and putting more bobbies on the beat, while all Labour had done was ‘twist and turn in the wind’.”

He said a high noon atmosphere stalked the chamber before the session even began.

“With only Boris’ eyes visible through his mask, he reminded me of a confused cow being loaded on to a lorry to the slaughterhouse,” he said. “Sir Keir Starmer accused the Government of doling out ‘dodgy contracts and jobs for their mates’,” he said. “’And who is at the heart of it?’ he honked. ‘The Prime Minister. Major Sleaze, sitting there.’ Things were so heated by the end of Boris’s subsequent tirade, his PPS, Alex Burghart, had to defog his spectacles.”

The Daily Express

Leo McKinstry said Sir Keir was expected to put the Prime Minister on the floor during PMQs.

“But it hardly worked out like that,” he said. “In fact, the Prime Minister gave a bravura performance, full of heavy counter-punches against the Labour lightweight. Remarkably, by the end of the fight, Boris was on the offensive as he launched a pulverising attack on the shaken opposition.”

He said Boris was so ferocious the Speaker had to tell him to calm down.

“What made the Prime Minister’s counter-assault all the more powerful was that he concentrated on the big issues that will really decide the future of our country, like the economy, Brexit and the pandemic.

“In contrast, Sir Keir indulged in gossip followed by a lecture on accounting.”

The Guardian

Aditya Chakrabortty asked how one described the actions of a prime minister who, amid a deadly pandemic, ‘plots with advisers and public officials on how to drum up a reported £200,000 to redecorate his temporary home in Downing Street?’

“ This isn’t some fever dream about soft furnishings; it is about who advanced money to our prime minister, and what they may have expected in return, which is why it is now under investigation by the Electoral Commission,” he said.

“From Jennifer Arcuri to a £15,000 winter break in Mustique, every decision smacks of a knowing recklessness and an assurance that the tab will always be picked up by someone else.”