We can’t see the wood for the trees

I was relieved to discover, earlier this week, that the Prime Minister’s special adviser, Dominic Cummings, was a symbol of inequality in modern Britain. Relieved because I have been scouring the country for such a symbol for ages and had hitherto not succeeded in finding one. Cummings is just that symbol, according to Robert Peston, because his father has a garden with some trees in it. Cummings was thus able to walk through these trees, whereas people who do not have fathers with a garden with some trees in it are not able to do so. Privileged bastard.

There is, however, one small problem. If Robert were to take a short trip out of London for the first time since 1987 I have the horrible feeling he would discover that several other people also own gardens — indeed, according to the Wildlife Gardening Forum, some 22.7 million households and thus approximately 50 million people.