Sajid Javid may be in the dog house with steelworkers, but at least the global travel industry loves him
Sajid Javid has has had the worst summer holiday ever, but at least the travel industry loves him.
As he flew to Australia for a roster of business meetings earlier this week, the secretary for business, innovation and skills was forced to abandon his whirlwind tour of the country and fly back to the UK after Tata Steel announced plans to sell its entire UK business, which has put up to 40,000 jobs in jeopardy.
Javid was meant to meet New South Wales premier Mike Baird, but is now on his way to old Wales having spent just 15 hours in Sydney.
Labour MP Stephen Kinnock, whose Aberavon constituency is home to Tata's Port Talbot steelworks, criticised Javid for not flying to Mumbai with him instead, where Tata execs held a board meeting to discuss the firm's UK business, but no one can say he hasn't put the miles in.
Sydney may only be 6,000 miles away, but presuming Javid's flight connected in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia, the business secretary had to make a 6,596 mile slog lasting more than 12 hours before he even made it to the right continent. From there, it's another nine hour flight to Australia, covering a further 4,108 miles.
Yesterday, Javid spent a further 21 hours doing the exact same journey in reverse, meaning the poor man has covered an impressive 21,408 miles, which beats Kinnock's return trip to Mumbai by at least 5,000 miles.
But the journey is only just beginning. Today, after a quick nap having landed back in London late last night, Javid is making a 178.2 mile trip to Port Talbot to let steelworkers know he's serious about the issue, but at least this time there's a direct train from Paddington.