A Tory MP has called Keir Starmer a 'smarty pants' for reading government guidelines during PMQs

Keir Starmer's performances in PMQs have so far been a series of 'gotcha' moments with the government scrambling to come up with answers as to some of his tougher questions.

On Wednesday's edition of PMQs the Labour leader cited a retracted piece of government advice which stated that it is "very unlikely that people receiving care in care homes will become infected [with coronavirus]."

Boris Johnson replied by stating that it wasn't true, which then lead to Starmer writing to the prime minister asking for the records to be corrected, which Downing Street then claimed that he had 'inaccurately' quoted the document.

This whole argument over something that is very serious perhaps reached peak ridiculousness on BBC Newsnight when a Tory MP called Starmer a 'smarty pants' for his recent performances in the Commons.

Newsnight's political editor, Nicholas Watt, said he had spoken to an unnamed senior Tory on the issue who said:

Maybe the prime minister needs to take the Labour leader a bit more seriously and needs to be complete across his brief.

Watt added that the MP said:

Keir Starmer is coming across as a bit of a 'smarty pants' and maybe that's not the appropriate tone when the country actually wants all the political leaders to come together on coronavirus.

This comment from the Tory MP isn't exactly the most scathing thing we've ever heard in British politics and people were asking if that was the best that they have got?

Deaths in care homes since the coronavirus pandemic began are reportedly more than 9,000 but it has also been said that some of 10,000 'unexplained' care home deaths could have been caused by Covid-19.