London: Newly elected Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn faces his first head-to-head confrontation with Prime Minister David Cameron in Britain's Parliament today.
The "prime minister's questions" session will give many Britons their first extended look at the veteran left-winger who became the Labour Party leader Saturday after a months-long campaign.
He has already ruffled feathers by declining to sing the national anthem, "God Save the Queen," at a memorial event honoring the pilots who repelled Hitler's Luftwaffe during World War II.
Tabloid newspapers screamed that he had snubbed Queen Elizabeth II, who last week became the longest ruling monarch in British history.
Corbyn does not support the monarchy.
He told Sky News he had shown respect by attending the memorial, declining to say if he would sing the national anthems at other events in the future.
Some of his appointments have also alienated parts of the Labour Party, which was soundly beaten by Cameron's Conservatives in a national election earlier this year.
The new leader wants the traditionally raucous prime minister's questions sessions to become more respectful and fact-based.
"I think the public as a whole has had enough theatrical politics," he said of the weekly verbal confrontations between the prime minister and the leader of the opposition that have long been a feature of British political life.
