Why he’d happily pay £2.65 for a pint of milk

B ernard Ho gan-Howe, the Met C o m m i s s i o n e r, despite the controversies over his force’s zealous pursuit of abuse claims against figures such as Lord Bramall. “I like him, I rate him. I like the fact that he is tough and that he would stand up to the Prime Minister.” As for the VIP investigations, Goldsmith defends him. “You can’t a pol o g i s e f or f ol l owing up l e a ds , because that’s his job.

“A couple of days ago I was at Scotland Yard talking with armed response officers. They genuinely are heroes. They were so keen to impress upon me the need to know that whoever is in City Hall is on their side. If you’re on the front line having to make a splitsecond decision, you need to know your team will back you up.’

Goldsmith and Khan boast that they are independent-minded, but both campaigns are affected by the fortunes of their parties. The Labour party is riven with feuds and the Tories have had a t e r r i b l e we e k . G o l d s m i t h concedes: “Any n o i s e that is not relevant to the mayoralty is not helpful. A ny d i v i s i o n , a ny b u s t - u p s , a ny scandals, are unhelpful.”

Following the spotlight on the Prime Minister’s tax affairs, how damaging is it for Goldsmith to be yet another wealthy old Etonian Tory? He shifts his elongated frame on his chair at the Marriott hotel in Westminster and sips from a bottle of Coke.

“The thing is ... I am what I am. People either like you or they don’t. If they don’t like you, your background matters. If they do like you, it doesn’t matter.”

The electorate does not know him wel l . Hi s character is a series of principled positions. He has doggedly opposed Heathrow expansion and claims that the Government is “on the cusp” of ruling it out. “I think it is inevitable that we will end up needing to expand Gatwick.”

On coming out for Brexit he says: “I didn’t choose my position on the basis of how this would play out on the mayoral election. You’ve got to go with what you think is right.”

Eve n h i s f a mi l y l i f e b e c o me s a principle. The campaign has coincided with the birth of his son, Max, by G o l d s m i t h ’s second wife, Alice Rot hs c hi l d. We poi nt out t hat a n election photograph of a bonny baby would do no harm. Goldsmith frets that he cannot expose his family unless he is prepared to do so consistently, for good or for ill. So we must make do with more frozen pictures of Goldsmith touring factories, as if he were a minor royal. Yet in private he is conversational, with flashes of mischief.

He says that paternity leave has been non-existent and the last family holiday was summer in Spain. “Max i s an amazingly good little baby, very happy, smiley. He smiles at me even though he hardly knows me so I get a pang of guilt at least once a day. I can’t pretend I’ve been a good, active, hands-on father. The reason for that is that I have so little time from the campaign, if I do have time I spend it on the kids who are going to know — and he is not going to know. My calculation is that in a few weeks time I can get to know him.

“A l i c e has been unbelievably generous. She knows why I want to do it. And the last thing she wants is me lounging around at home. She’s a sounding board on absolutely everything. She is my go-to person. Any conundrum of any sort. She’s not strident but she has good instincts.”

G o l d s mi t h is accused of taking insufficient interest in the arts, a vital part of London. He responds: “It’s not completely untrue, I can’t deny that.” He responds more naturally to planning than performance. “My views on architecture and building are that if you build a building it is public art, you have a duty to ensure it improves the landscape.“

Asked about his favourite television programme he answers that he has seen every episode of Breaking Bad. The last show he saw, with one of his smaller children, was The Lion King. It is fair to say he is not up to date with London’s cultural scene. At least wife Alice, related to arts grandee Hannah Rothschild, takes a closer interest.

If Zac Goldsmith does become mayor he says “day one” will be dedicated to clean air. “If I delay, we are not going to see results. By the end of the term I want every bus in London to be either electric or zero-emissions. We can do more or less the same with the black cabs. And I want a Boris bike equivalent for the electric car.”

On Boris’s cycle superhighways he is more cautious. “Cycling is going to double. But you’ve got to do those things in such a way that the communities affected are broadly in support.”

More grass-roots, direct democracy. His warning is that we cannot take London’s success for granted. “Look at Paris, it is a beautiful place, but it is a divided and unhappy city. We could easily become that and it would be tragic.”

How well does Zac Goldmith actually know the city he wishes to represent? In a broadcast quiz he was hazy about the location of QPR and Tube line stations. He says defensively: “You have to be very odd to memorise all that stuff. I use Citymapper.”

But as a wealthy Tory, he will probably need to know the price of staples such as milk. His answer is idiosyncratic. “I’ve been longing for months for a journalist to ask me that question. I went to a temple where the milk costs £2.65 a pint and the reason is that they do not kill the cows, they retire them. They massage them every day and play classical music to them. I said to them if I get hit by a car I want to come back as one of your cows.”

It’s attractive to witness the milk of human kindness in full flow, but are Londoners ready to pay £2.65 a pint?