Just three days after Secretary of State for Transport Patrick McLoughlin presented a Paving Bill to Parliament which asks for a blank cheque for the HS2 project, the National Audit Office has produced a damning report into the project, which demonstrates the project will cost £53bn.
Key findings of the report include:
The timescales for the project are over-ambitious, which could lead to mistakes being made.
There is a £3.3bn… Continue Reading
The Government have published their High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill, without saying how much extra money they actually want and asking that figures for actual spend on the project are not published until after the next election.
The Bill is required so that Parliament can give authority for more money to be spent on pre-construction activity, acquiring property, and providing compensation. Of course none of these items are new and… Continue Reading
Campaigners are calling for MPs along the proposed route of HS2 to put their money where their mouth is, now it has been revealed that the HS2 Paving Bill is to be the first bill introduced into parliament following the Queens Speech. The first reading of the High Speed Rail (Preparation Bill), will actually take place before the first debate on the Queens speech on Monday 13th May.… Continue Reading
The speed
Desperate to find a way to spend more money more quickly on HS2, the Government is expected to announce two Parliamentary Bills for the controversial project in the Queens Speech tomorrow. A Hybrid Bill would cover everything required to allow Phase 1 of the project to be built, but could take up to four years to get through Parliament. With the project beset by delays and cost-overruns, the Government is… Continue Reading
HS2 Ltd, the wholly owned subsidiary of the Department for Transport company has ‘lost all credibility’ according to Stop HS2 campaigners, after it announced an extension to the Exceptional Hardship Scheme (EHS) consultation … Continue Reading yesterday (25th April), just two working days before it was due to close. Last Friday (19th April) the company announced a downgraded rebuild plan for Euston station after it transpired that the plans were half a billion
HS2 is set to have a bearing on local elections on May 2nd, according to campaigners along the route. While almost all the local authorities along the planned route for Stage 1 have come out in opposition to HS2 and formed the campaign group 51m, many grassroots campaigners against the project are backing the slogan “we won’t vote for any party that supports HS2“. Whilst the three biggest parties in… Continue Reading
Written answers in the House of Commons have put the cost of the HS2 rail project at £41.25 billion, with over £1bn due to be spent in the lifetime of the current Parliament, before a vote on even the Hybrid Bill for Stage 1 is due to take place. In an answer a question put by Cheryl Gillan MP, Rail Minister Simon Burns stated on April 15th that the costs… Continue Reading
A report from Spinwatch has revealed how lobbyists set out to intimidate local opposition HS2. Their report, ‘Scaring the living daylights out of people: the local lobby and the failure of democracy’ … Continue Reading includes information about how lobbyists working for the Campaign for High Speed Rail set out to intimidate local opposition aiming “to shit them up”. The Campaign for High Speed Rail is also cited as an example of ‘astroturfing’,
The news that HS2 is already over budget has come to no surprise to campaigners against the project, just a fortnight after Secretary of State Patrick McLouglin announced plans for a ‘Paving Bill’ to be introduced in Parliament this year, which has the sole purpose of releasing more money for the project.
While there are many issues indicating alarming overspends, the worst example is the seemingly blank cheque awarded to… Continue Reading
The results of the Judicial Reviews into the legality of the Governments plans for HS2 are expected to be handed down at the Royal Courts of Justice on Friday 15th March from 10.30. In December 2012, five comprehensive cases were heard by Lord Justice Ouseley, questioning the legality of a host of issues including; an inadequate consultation including the failure to provide accurate information, failure to comply to environmental statute,… Continue Reading