Why the Government is keen to get the Commons sitting again

Ministers’ efforts to get schools and businesses to re-open won’t be helped if MPs are visibly unwilling to return to Westminster.

Andrew Gimson’s PMQs sketch: Johnson bids a solemn farewell to Corbyn, and promises action asap

But there were a couple of moments of levity – though both men agreed that this is no time for it.

Andrew Gimson’s PMQs sketch: Johnson steps forward as the leader of a National Government

To the astonishment of those who see him as an incorrigible buffoon, the Prime Minister looked and sounded unremittingly sombre.

WATCH: “Parliament is a better place without John Bercow” – Jenrick

He adds that he wouldn’t offer the former speaker a peerage, as he responds to comments made by Dawn Butler.

Bercow was the rudest Speaker of modern times, yet by the end he had degenerated into an Establishment stooge

The former Speaker’s autobiography is a disappointment. He writes as he talks – and after a time this becomes wearisome.

Election of Speaker, Third Round. Bryant will take the contest all the way to a fourth ballot.

But Laing’s 127 votes have to divide roughly five to one if he is to beat Hoyle – who therefore remains favourite.

Election of Speaker, Second Round. The Deputy has 244 votes. It’s his to lose.

Laing has 122 votes, Bryant 120. Unless the candidates who withdraw transfer disproportionately to one of them, Hoyle seems to be home and dry.

Andrew Gimson’s Commons sketch: The post-Bercow era has dawned

The candidates for the Speakership competed to show how different they will be from the man who has just stepped down.

Andrew Gimson’s PMQs sketch: Positively the final performance of the Westminster pantomime with its present cast

The Speaker is retiring, so is the Father of the House, but the Prime Minister looks confident of getting several encores.

Interview. Leadsom accuses Benn and Letwin of undermining efforts to prepare businesses for Brexit.

The Business Secretary argues that Parliament’s actions are “discouraging businesses from taking the steps they need to take”, and holding up private sector investment.

Iain Dale: Now it’s crunch time – will MPs who say they fear No Deal vote for the obvious solution?

Plus: Sky News troll themselves. How the next Speaker might surprise you. And: Labour moderates are still deluded about their Party’s future.

Interview with Laing, candidate for Speaker: It’s “extraordinary” that whoever holds the office “is totally unaccountable”.

“Dignity, kindness, authority rather than bossiness, and I do believe that those things could be brought to the Chair by a woman.”

The shocking truth about Commons disorder. MPs during Brexit “have been almost shamefully well behaved”

Churchill in his Liberal days wore with pride the scar inflicted on his forehead by the copy of Commons Standing Orders hurled at him by an enraged Tory in 1912.

The next Speaker. Will MPs be guided by party or by prejudice?

If they want a more old-fashioned product, they may go for Lindsay Hoyle. If someone more like the present incumbent, for Harriet Harman.

Bobby Friedman: Enough is enough. The Conservatives must put up a candidate against Bercow in Buckingham.

The reasons not to do so are threadbare. And he has merrily torn up plenty of other conventions in the process of his partisan Speakership.