Starmer's Army doesn't like it up 'em from Kemi Badenoch – another PMQs bloodbath

“Don’t panic, don’t panic”, it’s just Kemi Badenoch tearing the Labour party to shreds yet again. The larruping she gives Sir Keir Starmer and his comrades each week from the Tory leader is genuinely wince-inducing, certainly not for the faint-hearted.

He must surely be looking forward to the moment he no longer has to do Prime Minister’s Questions ever again. Not long to wait now, Sir Keir, you’ve probably only got two more to do and then you’re outta here. His likely replacement in the torture chamber, Andy Burnham, didn’t bother to turn up to the first PMQs since his Parliament comeback.

Perhaps wisely given the mood Mrs B was in. You could tell from the moment she strode into the Commons chamber in a striking turquoise dress there were going to be fireworks.

First came the waspish wit, congratulating the Labour leader on his party’s by-election win in Makerfield, before joking she suspected he would be less happy with his newest MP than she was with hers, Douglas Lumsden.

Sir Keir, wearing a look of post-resignation relief, said he was “very pleased with our new member of parliament” before claiming it would take the Tories 500 years to get back into power at their current rate of progress. That lit the turquoise touch paper, sending Kemi into full badass mode.

She said Labour MPs have "abandoned" Sir Keir for a "pair of eyelashes and a black T-shirt" – a reference to leadership frontrunner Burnham – torched glum Rachel Reeves as a failed Chancellor and savaged Red-Ed Miliband about pretty much everything she could think of.

She said Labour MPs were cheering on the lame duck PM despite there being "400 knives stuck in his back", suggesting many were "traitors and deserters" and that they “don’t like it up 'em”.

All this before she branded Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson a "spiteful class warrior".

It was all too much for Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle, who looked like he’d swallowed one of his favourite Chorley cakes whole, before spluttering that he wanted a "little bit more decorum and respect". It was brilliant stuff, far more entertaining than England’s frustrating 0-0 draw with Ghana in the World Cup.

TV presenter, Lorraine Kelly – watching from the Press Gallery – certainly appeared to be enjoying it. As the smoke settled the rest of PMQs passed without too much drama until the Speaker blew the final whistle.

But the animosity spilled over off the pitch with Badonoch and Phillipson reportedly clashing in the wood panelled division lobbies afterwards. The Conservative leader supposedly said to the Education Secretary: "You are spiteful, I'm never going to stop talking about how spiteful you are."

Phillipson is said to have replied: "The public are going to find out who you really are." It's not clear what specific language led to Sir Lindsay's intervention although sources claim he was unhappy about the "don't like it up ‘em" quip, a reference to the sitcom Dad's Army.

If Mrs B carries on like this then Labour MPs must be thinking of another famous catchphrase from the legendary sitcom, Private Frazer’s "We're doomed!"