Everyone in the chamber seemed to miss the joke but inside the Prime Minister must have been laughing.
In what is becoming a signature haplessness in his performances in Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs), the Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer asked Rishi Sunak what his Government was doing for families while his party tore itself apart.
“He may have noticed we have a record number of families…” the Prime Minister noted wryly.
It was an obvious reference to the “five families” of Tory groups on the right – the European Research Group, Common Sense Group, New Conservatives, Northern Research Group and Conservative Growth Group [deep breath!] – who were yesterday threatening to in effect tear down his government.
Nobody laughed and the joke either went over their heads or was just ignored but it showed a bit of steel and fight in a Prime Minister who has been staring at the political abyss now for several weeks. Secretly he may have agreed with Starmer’s assessment that the “five families” were more akin to mafia groups.
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But as Starmer laboured on the Opposition leader seemed to be set on proving that the one thing to unite a warring Tory party behind its beleaguered leader was to talk about their internal strife.
Sunak probably has not enjoyed such loud cheers at any point in his Premiership as the Conservative MPs roared their support with cries of “more!” as he landed his verbal blows on Starmer.
The highlight came when Starmer read out a tragic letter to Santa from a little boy in a homeless family asking for “a forever home” and his toys out of storage.
Normally such interventions put Prime Ministers on the back foot but not Sunak.
He came back with genuine fury over the Labour leader “saying one thing to the TV cameras and doing another” when he came into vote and help block 100,000 new homes by getting rid of “outdated EU rules”.
Starmer at one point rather brutally read out the off-the-record comments from Conservative MPs about Sunak calling out members on the opposite benches to own them publicly.
“Who said ‘he must go’?'” he demanded.
But the ever-prepared Sunak hut back quickly: “He should hear what they say about him!”
Cue more cheering.
It may be that the relief of surviving the Rwanda vote yesterday perked the Prime Minister up or it could be that the fact it was the last PMQs before MPs go for their winter break.
But certainly, Sunak could see the Christmas lights at the end of a very long dark tunnel.
The only issue for him is whether those same Tory MPs are cheering for him or jeering at him when he returns.
