As House of Commons Speaker John Bercow tried to suspend parliament on Monday night, well after midnight, a brief scuffle broke out near his chair as opposition lawmakers tried to stop him leaving his seat in protest at the prorogation. ‘
This is not a normal prorogation,’ Bercow said. ‘It is not typical, it is not standard. It is one of the longest for decades and it represents not just in the minds of some colleagues but huge numbers of people outside, an act of executive fiat,’ he told a raucous chamber. As Conservative MPs filed out of the Commons, opposition MPs booed and cried out ‘shame on you’.