He's Back & He's Mad

Returning from his summer holiday, the Mayor has a bad luggage day at Gatwick:

"The only representative of authority was a nice but increasingly rattled young man from the lost luggage department. Shielded behind his attack-proof glass, he told a growing crowd of passengers what he knew. He knew nothing. Why had some bags arrived from Dalaman, and not the others? He didn’t know. Where were the bags from Cagliari? He didn’t know. All he knew was that our bags were out there somewhere in the dark on the rain-lashed tarmac. We offered to mount a Entebbe-style raid to liberate our luggage, and were told we couldn’t do that for health and safety reasons."

Not being funny or anything, but I'd love to hear the lost luggage lad's version of these events. Now read on.

Comments

[Tory Troll]

"With Gatwick full to bursting, and with Heathrow’s third runway already bitterly contested - and I bet it never gets built - it is also ever more urgent that we investigate the possibility of a long-term solution, in the form of a new and more eco-friendly international airport at a site in the Thames estuary - of which you will be hearing a lot more in due course."

There has been a lot of attention paid to the donut strategy, but if you actually look at the swing in votes to the tories at the election, the biggest shift was in West London. At least part of this was down to Boris's opposition to the Heathrow expansion.

So what does Boris do? Plans an airport in an area where people can't vote for him instead. Marvelous.

[Helen]

He should've gone to Suffolk instead...

[Tom]

"Plans an airport in an area where people can't vote for him instead"

And where he has no planning powers. I suspect from this he means that he's trying to winkle it into the Conservative manifesto for the next election. Eco-friendly airport? Do me a favour.

Heathrow's third runway won't get built because of fuel prices, local and national opposition and because the figures on demand are bogus, and increasingly bogus in a recession. All of these apply to Boris International, as I'm sure it'll be called. Build some bloody railways man.

[Guano]

It's interesting to look at the comments on Boris' article, where some familiar names try to blame "NuLabour" for Boris losing his luggage. I'm quite happy to blame NuLabour for things that they are responsible for, but it's unclear why NuLabour are responsible for a private airline at a privately-run airport losing Boris' luggage.

And the commenters on the Gimson article at the DT seem to imagine that the GLA under Livingstone was in complete chaos. It never seemed that way in my dealings with the GLA.

[Frankie Roberto]

oh lordy. the thames estuary airport idea hasn't gone away then.

[Mathew]

Boris, your the Mayor of London. Get back to work!

[angela]

Well, Boris said Bugger Bognor, didn't he? A lot of handlers live in Bognor, so they are obviously staging a protest. (JOKE - I put this for Tom's benefit because he never knows when I am joking.)

[Roger Evans]

I suggest he uses Stansted next time. Last month I travelled to Italy for two weeks. No problems at the Essex airport, plenty of space, friendly staff, baggage where expected coming and going, good rail link to Liverpool Street - very impressive.