Head of Communications at the ASI, Kate Andrews, has written for the Telegraph on her experience when taking part in a debate with anti-Heathrow expansion campaigners.
After being asked by presenter and producer Fatima Manji for the "economic perspective", It seemed obvious to start by mentioning that the expansion of Heathrow is estimated to generate £100-200 billion in economic benefits (specifically £147bn in the latest report).
Who knew a sentence could be so powerful – or provocative. Sure, some people have a knack for creating outrage succinctly. Donald Trump comes to mind, but even he usually takes more than one sentence to do his thing.
No, apparently my sentence was bad enough to drive some "campaigners" and pub-goers to intimidation and shouting thing like "people like you killed my husband" once the filming stopped. One of the men got in my face, but didn’t put his hands on me. Fortunately, it was only an old woman who actually grabbed me.
Sometimes we call people like this Bananas – Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone – but these guys? They were just bananas.