London is poised to reach further out into the sky. Plans are afoot to build scores of new tall buildings across the capital over the next few years in a wave of construction that will reshape the city’s skyline for the next century.
A remarkable 230 high-rise projects of 20 storeys or more have been granted detailed consent since 2017, a rate of more than three per month. Only this week, developer Brookfield Properties revealed it was planning a 54-storey skyscraper at 99 Bishopsgate that, when completed, would be the fifth tallest building in the Square Mile.
Planning is never straightforward and opposition is often curiously well-organised. But as the capital continues to grow, the race for space will only intensify — with Londoners crying out for more room in which to live, work and have fun.
And so if the health of a city can be summed up by the erection of cranes and the images of steel, concrete and glass, then London should be content. When it comes to the future, the only way is up.
The China threat
That Chinese state-affiliated actors have made multiple attempts to interfere with the United Kingdom’s democracy, including the targeting of parliamentarians and the hacking of the Electoral Commission, ought to be a watershed moment.
Chinese spies are likely to use the stolen details to target dissidents and critics of President Xi Jinping’s government in the UK, British intelligence services believe. Meanwhile, businesses and universities face danger too, as hackers target them by way of intellectual property theft.
The rise of China has been perhaps the most significant change in the global economy of the past three decades. Unlike the Soviet Union, the Chinese economy is far more plugged into world trade, and so interdependence is greater. An intensifying trade war would therefore materially affect economies all over the world, not least our own.
But the UK government must be honest with the public: our democracy and way of life are under threat from those who do not share our values of freedom and human rights. And be clear with our adversaries when we say: we intend to defend them.
Auditing the Mayor
With little more than six weeks until the mayoral election, the Standard has launched a series of audits highlighting the performance of Sadiq Khan, running for an unprecedented third term in City Hall.
The series starts in today’s paper, as Home Affairs Editor Martin Bentham examines Khan’s record on crime. Voters can judge for themselves on the basis of the evidence.
