Despite it only being June 21st, the winner of the “Least surprising news story of the year” competition has already been declared.
The news that the upgrades to the Docklands Light Railway in east London will in fact take longer and cost more than predicted has been described as “so obvious, you wonder why they even bothered reporting it”.
“It’s a public infrastructure project, of course it’ll take longer and cost more than they said,” said one of the award judges. ”Compared to that, ‘Sun rises in the morning’ or ‘Leaves fall off trees in autumn’ would have readers fainting in shock.
”It’s a headline we’ve seen with literally every public infrastructure project, up to and including Crossrail. We would have seen it with HS2, if they hadn’t given up on it entirely. And don’t get me started on the £37 billion Covid app that didn’t work, or mates of cabinet ministers who got PPE contracts and delivered faulty equipment…
”I’d just love to live in their world, where you can do your job so badly and not suffer the slightest penalty. And given that all these projects were put out to tender, presumably the predicted cost and timeframe were a significant part of choosing who got the job? So how can they junk all their promises the moment it suits them? I really don’t understand it.”
A suggestion that “England go out on penalties” might be an even less surprising news story in a couple of weeks time was rejected on the grounds it assumes England makes it past the group stage of the tournament, which would be very surprising.
First published 22 Jun 2024
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