Queen’s Speech: programme for government or election manifesto launch?

All the pomp and pageantry you’d expect was rolled out this morning for the Queen’s Speech, intended to set out the government’s plans for the coming session.

But what coming session? The government doesn’t have a majority, is desperate for a general election and thinks parliament is dead. The speech itself might well be voted down.

So Jeremy Corbyn dismissed it as a “farcical propaganda exercise”.

And on the key issue of Brexit, the Queen did not say the UK would be leaving the EU on October 31st.