Chooom! Davies has arrived. Sir Howard’s report made a text-book landing on the PM’s desk yesterday afternoon and began taxiing towards Cameron’s in-tray. But the PM hasn’t read it yet. Or so he claimed at PMQs. He therefore avoided any commitment to building a third runway at Heathrow. And his excuse? Wilful ignorance.
Seriously? He hasn’t read it? Given the time and cash the damn thing has gobbled up he might have glanced at the executive summary. Sir Howard has worked his way through twenty million smackers reaching a foregone conclusion. His defenders point out that this money was very well spent because Sir Howard pays scrupulous personal attention to every detail of an important commission. On the day before the report appeared, (Monday, that is), Sir Howard’s chauffeured Bentley drew up a few yards from Heathrow’s perimeter fence and the great man lowered his electric window with an abacus at the ready.
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