No fairytale ending for Pixie, or for Salisbury

WELL now, I haven’t been so shocked since Sunday, when head judge Len booted the lovely Pixie – the best dancer on Strictly - off the show.
He was, apparently, less than cha-cha-charmed by her illegal lifts.
Still, he could have let her off with a caution.
I, for one, won’t be watching the rest of the series because it can no longer maintain any pretence of being a serious competition.
But even that earth-shattering departure pales into insignificance compared with Monday’s announcement that the city may never get the new custody suite that was promised when we were being told not to worry our little heads about the loss of our old police station.
As Craig would say: “It’s a disaaaaster, darling.”
I find it very sad, quite frankly, that the poor old Chief Constable, Pat Geenty, was the one who had to make this announcement, rather than the Police Commissioner, Angus Macpherson.
It may have been, as Mr Macpherson states, the Chief Constable’s decision to review the location of the county’s custody units.
But it looks odd, given that Mr Geenty threatened as recently as April to resign if the city wasn’t allowed to keep one.
Now he’s having to execute a tricky reverse fleckerl, claiming he didn’t understand quite what a parlous state the force’s finances were going to be in.
He can only afford two custody units across the county instead of three, it seems, and one of those has to be in Swindon.
But sure as eggs is eggs, Mr Macpherson and his political masters must have known this.
Or did no-one at the top have a proper understanding, just eight months ago, of the savings required from all our public services over the next three years? It almost beggars belief.
Unfortunately we can’t vote off the Commissioner.
Of course this announcement is equivalent to a ‘Ten from Len’ for Wiltshire Council, which owns the land at Churchfields earmarked (alas, so briefly) for the cells and has always wanted to see it developed for lucrative housing.
Oh me, oh my, and they say journalists are cynical!
Officially, at least, there’s still a shred of hope that the review will come down in favour of Salisbury rather than some more northerly nick, saving our miscreants and their lawyers a 36-mile far-from-quickstep home.
But I fear that’s about as likely as any normal woman being able to stand up, let alone prance about, on heels the height of those sported by Tess, Claudia and Darcey.
Or Bruno managing to get through an entire show without parting company with his chair.
As they’re fond of saying on my (ex) favourite programme: It’s the moment of truth.