Every few years or so, a politician dons a tin hat, waltzes out into No Man’s Land and brazenly declares that MPs need more money.

It’s a bold, albeit foolhardy thing to do, not least as none of their peers ever dares venture over the top with them.

No sooner have their ill-judged words left their mouths than an eardrum-bursting ‘rat-a-tat-tat’ can be heard as they’re felled by heavy machine-gun fire.

The latest to brave such a furious fusillade is former health minister Sajid Javid, who this week suggested MPs should have their salaries doubled. Not just a smidge more than the £86,584 they currently receive, you will note. Double.

Nice chap, The Saj, but possibly not an ideas man. As Chancellor, you may recall, he appointed Andrew Bailey as Bank of England governor. And look how that stroke of genius is working out.

The argument that Saj and those brave souls who made the same case before him, tend to trot out is that our political masters could enjoy far more lucrative jobs in the private sector. That we should, in a sense, be jolly grateful to have them.

Yet when watching PMQs you really do wonder which of these intellectual juggernauts might provoke headhunting firms to scale the security gates at New Palace Yard in an effort to poach their talents.

Take the main showpiece, which once again featured Oliver Dowden facing off against Angela Rayner, an event which hardly screams clash of the titans.

Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer, by the way, decided their gifts were better served by attending a service at Westminster Abbey celebrating the 75th anniversary of the NHS. A reasonable excuse to skip their weekly showdown? Discuss, as my old history exam papers used to say.

Anyway, Dowden v Rayner. What was at first a watchable contest between two endearingly hopeless performers has now morphed into a tedious game of conkers, with the exchange of blows ultimately inconclusive.

The format is pretty straightforward: Ange stamps her foot and rails against ‘13 years of Torrrry guverrnment’ while Ollie reels off a string of irrelevant witticisms with the comic timing of a dead moose.

Tory sycophants cheer, their Labour counterparts groan. Meanwhile, the rest of us examine our fingernails. For the most part, Rayner focused on soaring mortgages. Or the ‘Tory mortgage bombshell’ as she kept calling it.

Dowden responded by trying to crowbar in a joke about Rayner’s chilly relationship with Starmer.

Ange bit back. ‘The only thing that is not soaring in price at the moment is the right honourable gentleman’s gags, which aregetting cheaper by the minute,’ she sneered.

With each question, Rayner became more and more exasperated. Rather than answer, Dowden replied by reeling off irrelevant Tory achievements and attacked Labour’s economic record. It was as though he was treating us to a rendition of his own one-man play. If there had been an interval, I suspect many would have used it to make their getaway.

As for the rest of the session, one almost had to marvel at the sheer banality of some of the backbench contributions.

For example, do the blameless voters of Chelmsford really need their MP Vicky Ford (Con) to demand Dowden send a shout-out to the recently graduated doctors in her constituency? Do we really another week of someone urging the Prime Minister to visit their area, as Conservative former Northern Ireland minister Karen Bradley did this afternoon?

Small wonder the noise around the chamber barely got above a low-level hum. But then it was far from full.

Just three Lib Dems showed up and only one, Jamie Stone (Caithness), bothered to stay until the end. Doubtless those absenting themselves were all working their little socks off somewhere.

Thank goodness then for Mhairi Black (SNP, Paisley and Renfrewshire South), who at least provided some comic relief. Ms Black, who pounds the parliamentary corridors in heavy-duty Doc Marten boots, is off at the next election, which is a shame. Her performances in the House, when she bothers to turn up, tend to be nothing if not lively.

Dowden acknowledged her colourful contribution to the Commons, noting how they had joined at the same time.

Black thanked Dowden for his remarks, demonstrating a moment of gracefulness.

She then added tartly: ‘I’m pretty sure we’ll be leaving at the same time too.’ Cue an eruption of laughter from all sides. The after-dinner speaker circuit beckons.