Don't go north of Birmingham
When the government announced that it was going to “level up” the country and create a Northern powerhouse, I imagined it meant Northern England. But apparently they meant North London.
It now looks likely that HS2 will end up going from somewhere on the outskirts of northern London to Brum. It won’t even make it to Euston for decades.
Having spent billions on the most expensive part, going through Tory constituencies where back bench MPs demanded and got tunnelling and other expensive and unnecessary extras, having bought up and demolished large parts of London, the whole scheme seems to be grinding to a halt.
When HS2 was first proposed it was suggested that work start in the North, which would get the benefits of better regional transport long before the project reached London.
I didn’t think much of that idea at the time but it was spot on.
The North of England has already been abandoned and shafted, regional spurs have been dropped. HS2 has to at least make it to Manchester if it is to mean anything.
But it is the South which has got a second high speed rail line, even if it is one that doesn’t reach the centre of the capital. Unbelievable.
How do you actually manage to spend so much for so little and abandon half of the country?
It is as if incompetence has somehow become proactive for this government.
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.
By Jonty Bloom Media