North London townhouses? Liz Truss’s critics can’t afford them

Townhouses in a leafy street in Islington – a short walk to the City, as well as a taxi ride to the BBC. Photograph: Simon Dack/Alamy

When Liz Truss caustically referred in her conference speech to people who “take taxis from north London townhouses to the BBC studios” to defend the status quo, she was not the first Tory leader to try to cancel the capital’s northern quarter.

At last year’s Conservative party conference, Boris Johnson condemned “lefty Islington lawyers” for hijacking the Labour party and turning it soft on crime. To be fair to him, it was a subject he knew something about, having for 10 years shared a £3.5m house in Islington with his former wife, a lawyer.