Back by unpopular demand, the great Heathrow expansion show. If only planes ran on hot air | Marina Hyde
HHow can people say we can’t build anything in this country anymore? Listen: literally our parliament Fallinghas caught fire 45 times in the last decade alone, and it would take tens of billions of investment just to get it in the same postcode as fit for purpose – a fact that has now been put off for literal decades by successive cohorts of MPs who can’t bear to be the ones to They face reality, even though they navigate it every day. So don’t you dare tell me we don’t build things. We build the best damn metaphors in the world.
Another thing we might build, perhaps in our own unique style, is… The third runway at Heathrow Airport. That’s the weighty hint dropped by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in Davos this week, which – if it comes true – could open the door to an upside-down Labor Party. Half the cabinet hates it, half loves it. Imagine Tony Blair but on asphalt.
Yes, we are now just days away from Rachel Reeves’ big speech on growth, delivered against the backdrop of an economy that she is widely credited with shrinking. This won’t be the literal background, of course – it will be one of our specially designed logo backgrounds, saying something like ‘Making Britain Grow’, ‘Growing from strength to strength’, or – my personal favorite – ‘Let’s Grow a Pair’! In this speech, Reeves is expected to support the construction of a third runway, as well as the expansion of Gatwick and Luton airports. Students of the British infrastructure model book should know that it is unlikely at this stage to unveil the three options for a third runway. Which are:
1. Significantly over budget.
2. Significantly over budget, still under construction in 2040.
3. Significantly exceeds budget and, in a 2039 cost-cutting measure, is being “reimagined” as a runway not physically connected to the runway Heathrow Airportacting as a kind of modern route to nowhere, is located randomly in the Harmondsworth area.
Anyway, on to Davos. As previously mentioned, Reeves was present at the World Economic Forum, perhaps to visit some of the 10,800 millionaires Who are presumed to have left the country in the past year. Certainly the Chancellor who only last September said: “We will end tax loopholes for non-residents!” He had a message for those non-residents: that the government was keen to reopen some loopholes. or, As Rachel said: “We have listened to the concerns raised by the non-resident community.” Please enjoy that non-residents are now one of Labour’s ‘communities’. I wonder if they, like others, have “community leaders” who can appear in the media to demand calm / condemn a small minority / call for an immediate end to the chaos in the Hermès store.
Back to the runway, though, which could turn into Ewen level A shit storm at the expense of all Labour’s climate commitments. How can you have both, some people asked this week? Rachel explained that it was simple, because the mission of growth “It trumps other things“.Enlightening to hear there He is Trump’s mission. Not a Trump mission, but one that automatically trumps any of the 437 other missions, pledges or goals Starmer has unveiled since coming to power. I would now like to see a hierarchy of buzzwords for a Starmer administration, or at least a working exchange rate. One mission is worth two pledges, one organization is worth three milestones – that kind of thing.
As for hardline opponents of the third runway, among them is Environment Secretary Ed Miliband. Back in 2009, Ed “almost” quit from Gordon Brown’s government over plans for a third runway, while ending support for her as Labor leader at the time Vote against them In 2018 (with Keir Starmer). “We owe it to future generations not only to have good environmental principles,” Ed said then“But to work it out.” However, on Thursday, Miliband rejected the suggestion that he might resign, saying: “silly“Ed. You can’t do nothing because it’s ridiculous. It’s too late to do it.”
Then there’s Boris Johnson, who… The famous promise “to lie down in front of the bulldozers” to prevent the third runway from going ahead. My friend, there’s still time! And don’t let any principled British person stand in your way (possibly fatally, in the path of the bulldozer). However, speaking of upside-down doors, I increasingly fear that the gateway to a world in which Boris Johnson returns in some form to British politics is not quite closed. Therefore, despite his self-documented inability to continue OzimbekJohnson may not consider that being or becoming a full-fledged eco-warrior best serves his immediate interests (his only measure).
As for former Labor Party leader Sadiq Khan, it is a more complicated moment. In 2018, the Mayor of London joined a lawsuit to sue the government if Parliament approved a third runway at Heathrow Airport. He won the mayor’s office for a third time last year on a similar platform and He reiterated his opposition last week — only for Reeves to hint that she would be supporting the runway this week. They were later pressed to explain how such a court case would be financed, Khan admitted“There are no funds allocated in the budget for legal appeals.” He continued to refuse to comment on the speculation, a form of word that might buy him a few more days to come up with a different form of word as to why he should not mount a legal challenge.
Wordforms are arguably the last of our other great manufacturing industries. So, we expect record levels of its production in discourse now, as we open the debate on whether a third runway will be a magic economic bullet – or the deadliest form of cake in Britain in the 21st century so far.
