The first big subject at Prime Minister’s Questions this week was Europe. Tory MP Andrew Rosindell asked if David Cameron would show “bulldog spirit” at the forthcoming summit. Later, similar points came from various Tory Eurosceptic MPs, including the Father of the House, Sir Peter Tapsell. He is always heard with great respect, despite his long-winded, rather pompous and, in this case, halting mini-speeches which have barely inquisitive constructions stuck on the end of them.

Ed Miliband started on Europe as well, asking if Cameron would fulfil his promise that treaty change might give the opportunity to “repatriate powers”. The Prime Minister responded with carefully crafted concoction of words designed to try to keep his back-benchers happy, while giving himself enough wiggle room to stage a full-scale reconstruction of the Battle of Balaclava.

Miliband’s second batch of questions were about the effect of government policies on the poor. He asked:

Will the Prime Minister confirm that according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, next year the poorest third of families will lose three times as much as the richest third, as a result of his economic policy?

Cameron avoided the question by ignoring the terms of the question and instead talking about the impact of all government policies since 2010.

Ed Miliband was at his most passionate, completely in control of his brief. He mentioned that taxes on private jets were being delayed and ended with the jibe that Cameron is hitting “women and children first” when it comes to cuts.

However, it can’t be ignored that Miliband looks rather strange at the dispatch box. A bit like a penguin trying to stand up on particularly slippery ice. I notice he uses his hands in a rather awkward way. – Palms down, fingers turning up at the end. It’s like Angelos on “Shooting Stars”.

This week Ed Miliband was flanked on each side by a married couple – Ed Balls and Yvette Cooper. In fact, it lent the Labour leadership doughnut the feel of a “menage a trois”. I wonder if a UK PM or Opposition leader as ever been flanked at PMQs by a married couple before. One for only the most devoted anoraks. (Probably someone will say it happened two weeks ago when Balls and Cooper last sat there. OK, yes I know I can be very slow…..)

Ed Balls is determined to have a walk-on part at every PMQs. It’s very tiresome. This time he was constantly trying to push a print-out of a Powerpoint slide over to Cameron.

LibDem questions: John Thurso asked about the difficulty of small and medium businesses in obtaining financing, and whether the PM would consider breaking up the nationalised banks to create more competition on the High Street.

Ian Swales asked about possible plans by Redcar and Cleveland borough council to ignore the council tax freeze and raise tax locally by 3.5%.

Tease of the week: Mark Tami (Lab) asked Cameron if he had plans for a Christmas bash with Rebekah Brooks and Jeremy Clarkson. The PM said he’d be having a quiet family Christmas.

Researcher-watch: Some poor researcher scraped up the fascinating fact that the only people in Europe who support Labour’s plans are the Moldovan Communist party. Good work!

Paul Walter blogs at Liberal Burblings