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Politics is a brutal business but Kemi Badenoch baiting a visibly upset Rachel Reeves at PMQs is just yet another example of the dehumanisation of people in public life
PMQs: Rachel Reeves appears to be emotional
There is banter and there is bullying. And at Prime Ministers’ Questions, the Leader of the Opposition, Kemi Badenoch crossed the line.
Seeing a Parliamentary colleague – albeit from the Opposition, but a colleague nonetheless – struggling to hold back tears, Mrs Badenoch pointed her out. “She looks absolutely miserable,” she jeered at Rachel Reeves. “She looks absolutely miserable.”
She drove home her point, saying the Chancellor was “toast” and a “human shield” for the Prime Minister’s incompetence. Then she challenged Keir Starmer on whether Reeves will still be in post until the next election. “Will she really?” she laughed.
Moments later, the Chancellor, who had been clearly struggling to manage her emotions, wiped tears from her face. But Mrs Badenoch still came back for more. “How awful for the Chancellor that he couldn’t confirm that she will stay in place,” she said. Even after leaving the chamber, she tweeted about Reeves’ “humiliation”.
Politics is a brutal business. Just ask Kemi’s predecessor Theresa May, whose own eyes filled with tears as she left Downing Street, her voice breaking on the phrase “the country I love”. But the dehumanisation of our politicians and the toxification of our politics is a problem for all of us – whether online or in the chamber of the House of Commons.
We can vehemently disagree with the Treasury’s wrong-headed disability cuts fiasco, and Theresa May’s Home Office’s vile ‘Go Home’ vans, and still understand that people are human beings. We can feel appalled by political decisions while still finding the jeering politics of our elected chamber shaming.
Since the murder of Jo Cox, the Jo Cox Foundation and Compassion in Politics have urged politicians to take a civility pledge. Their research has shown that showing civility to one another, virtually and in real life, could have a profound effect on our politics.
Instead of which, behaviour that would not be tolerated in a primary school classroom, is there every week on television in the apparent cradle of democracy. Incivility creeps in from how people behave on social media, and washes back out again. But the pomposity and rudeness has been shaped by generations of over-privileged MPs dragging their public school pasts into our politics.
Having sat through a fair few PMQs, it’s even worse in the chamber itself. Like watching the parents shout at the referee during a kids’ football match, it is excruciatingly embarrassing, and an appalling example with which to lead by.
In her recent book, ‘A Different Kind of Power’, the former Prime Minister of New Zealand, Jacinda Ardern calls for the “re-humanisation of people in public life”. This is not just about how the public see politicians – distance and dehumanisation breeds hate – but about how politicians treat each other.
Reeves’ team have said she was affected by a personal matter. If Badenoch had stopped jeering for a moment, she might have considered what personal crisis her political opponent might be going through. But to do that she would have had to think and act like – as well as consider her opponent – a human being.
In stark contrast, Stephen Flynn, the SNP’s leader in Westminster, wrote on social media: “Like almost all MPs I don’t know why the Chancellor was upset in the Chamber today, but I do hope she is okay and back to her duties this afternoon. Seeing another person in distress is always very difficult, and we are wishing her well.”
When the day comes, likely quite soon, for Kemi Badenoch to pack her bags and leave her role as leader of the opposition, or a personal matter causes the kind of catch in the throat we all sometimes experience, I hope her colleagues from all sides show her some compassion.