Jeremy Paxman delivered what was labelled by some as the “best quote of the election campaign” during Monday night’s leaders interviews.
The veteran interviewer said to the Theresa May: “If I was sitting in Brussels and I was looking at you as the person I had to negotiate with, I’d be thinking ‘she’s a blowhard who collapses at the first sign of gunfire’. Isn’t that right?”
His comment was met with loud applause - and in some cases downright shock - by the audience.
The prime minister responded: “I think, Jeremy, what you’ll find is that what the people in Brussels look at is the record I had of negotiating with them in Brussels and delivering for this country on a number of issues on justice and home affairs which people said we were never going to get, and I got those negotiations.”
Many on Twitter cheered Paxman on for the comment...
But despite being praised for the “blowhard” comment, some did question his interview style.
The PM’s encounter with both Paxman and the studio audience was a bruising one, with May laughed at, jeered and heckled over Tory cuts and manifesto U-turns.
Jeremy Corbyn seem to survive - and even at times thrive - under scrutiny, however.
Many commented that the Labour leader was left looking really rather reasonable despite an aggressive line of questioning in which Paxman tried to nail him on some of his long-held beliefs which did not appear in Labour’s election manifesto.