Kay doing a DTL interview with Hancock who appears to be outside NBH - just goes to show that doing a programme from Westminster doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get the politicians in person...
You see that a lot, its quite funny though how they go into NBH to do Breakfast when they aren't there, and then end up doing down the line interviews with Sky, when they are in London
If there's a big political guest they'll presumably also be in NBH for Radio 4 - though are Today's presenters still working from home? Going to Millbank would make more sense because then the BBC can still get a quality link and Sky get them in person. Though perhaps if you know you're going to get skewered by an interviewer you don't want to be in the same room as them.
In all reality the set could be done quickly by two people.
Have you ever worked in a TV studio?
Set building is its own craft that's separate from installing video walls, which is separate from integrating them with your broadcast infrastructure, which is separate from lighting, and rigging for sound...
Add in the current requirements for social distancing meaning far fewer people working on set at the same time. We don't know what else was going on behind the scenes that caused this project to take so long. Maybe under normal circumstances they could have squeezed it into a week's parliamentary recess, but giving themselves until the end of the summer break gave them plenty of time to work with new dependencies and time for piloting, etc
Sorry for ruining your day.