Boris Wastes Public Money - OFFICIAL

It would be funny, if it were not so real: London’s increasingly occasional Mayor Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson has long been regarded as a serial waster of taxpayer funds - while not being challenged by all those lobby groups that claim to be hot on the trail of waste in the public sector - but today the official stamp of the Home Secretary has been applied to his latest whizzo wheeze. So now everybody knows.

A total Muppet. And a guest from Sesame Street

Bozza’s implementation of the cycle hire scheme has been gobbling up money hand over fist since its inception, the cable car over the Thames remains a laughing stock and vulnerable to crosswind, his punter-roasting vanity buses are now being rolled out without the rear platform attendant to save money and still they are more expensive than off-the-shelf buses, and now to top it all has come the saga of the water cannon.

Bozza claims that he had the encouragement of the Met and Young Dave in buying the three 25-year-old Ziegler Wasserwerfe 9000 vehicles, which have cost taxpayers a cool £213,000. He also claims that he “saved” £2.3 million by buying them, but that would depend on his getting permission to use them, which Theresa May decided today he was not going to get, telling the Commons earlier. Bozza was sitting behind her.

Ms May detailed her reasons for refusing permission, concluding “Finally, I am acutely conscious of the potential impact of water cannon on public perceptions of police legitimacy. As a number of chief constables argued, in areas with a history of social unrest or mistrust of the police, the deployment of water cannon has the potential to be entirely counterproductive”. That was in addition of the potential to cause serious injuries.

There was a show of cross-party support: Yvette Cooper agreed wholeheartedly with Ms May’s decision, perhaps because it gave her the chance to rub Bozza’s nose in it. The Mayor doesn’t like having mere girlies telling him what a buffoon he is, and was defiant in the face of ridicule (no change there, then) as he asserted that the water cannon would be retained in case he could get the decision reversed at some time in the future.

The problem with that idea is that, unless the evidence on which Ms May made her decision changes, she or whoever succeeds her is unlikely to change their mind. Water cannon, to put it directly, are not compatible with the style of policing used on the UK mainland. Moreover, that these vehicles are carried on three axles tells you just how heavy - and therefore cumbersome - they would be on London’s streets.

And Mayor Watch has floated a more fundamental reason why Bozza would want to hang on to the water cannon: Ms May’s decision means they are worth no more than scrap value. That makes them a rather more expensive monument to political vanity than, say, the “Ed Stone”. Bozza ought to thank his lucky stars the right-wing press won’t give him the kind of hard time they gave Mil The Younger, although goodness knows he deserves it.

This clown wants to succeed Cameron as Tory Leader. Many of his press pals support his bid. Be afraid, voters of all parties. Be very afraid.