This wasn’t just any planning row. The boss of Marks & Spencer drafted two statements in preparation for a government decision on the proposed redevelopment of its dilapidated Marble Arch flagship store – one for victory, one for defeat. But Stuart Machin was so incensed by the way that Michael Gove rejected the scheme on heritage and environmental grounds that within minutes he dictated a new one, branding the levelling-up secretary’s intervention “utterly pathetic”.
The man who as education secretary picked a playground fight with “the Blob”, as he called the teaching establishment, has achieved a rare thing in less than a year of running what was formerly known as the housing department. Gove has turned property developers, not traditionally Guardian or New Statesman readers,
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