Clearing the Air

An economy is a complicated thing, and nowadays it appears that there are nearly as many factors choking off Britain's growth as there are Bullingdon spermatozoa making rah-rah in Wee Nicky's throat. The last Labour government, nurses' gold-plated pensions, the tax burden on multi-millionaires, the gratuitous complexities involved in sacking people whenever one feels like it, bad weather and the Euro-wogs have all served their turn; and now, since Government economic policy cannot possibly be to blame for the state of the economy, the burden has fallen upon the crying need for a third runway at Heathrow. The Conservatives pledged not to allow such a thing, but that was when they were still pretending to be the greenest government ever; the coalition agreement rules it out, but the Deputy Conservatives happily tore up the coalition agreement in the interests of Twizzler Lansley's anti-NHS bill, and there seems no particular reason why either partner should be interested in reinstating that pathetic scrap of paper at this late date. Vincent Cable might possibly grumble a bit, and the transport secretary would have to find some way of painting a betrayal of her pre-election stance as rational flexibility in the interests of doing the right thing; happily, experience suggests that these difficulties may not be altogether insurmountable.