Today had on Sir David Higgins urging us to buy into the HS2 lunatic express scheme…the quicker the better….time, as he said, is money!
Jim Naughtie didn’t press Higgins hard at all….and seemed to accept the basic premise that HS2 is the best way of spending £80 billion that the nation doesn’t have….never mind flood defences, road maintenance, broadband, improving the existing rail network and so on…all of which would be less controversial, far easier to accomplish and far more beneficial to far more people than spending £80 billion on ‘elite’ business executive’s own private train…which is what HS2 is in reality….just another version of the ‘Royal Train’.
Perhaps not bias but bad reporting or journalism not to challenge Higgin’s assertions….however the default position of not testing the claims results in the same effect of being favourable to HS2.
His claim that we must crack on with the project, which he is in charge of, otherwise costs will rise is an obvious political trick….not so obvious that Naughtie tackled him on it.
Higgins tells us that HS2 is “vital for the future of the country” and said it could be “a catalyst for fundamental change”.
No objections to that from Naughtie.
Higgins knows the project is in trouble, massively expensive and benefiting a select few and so his answer is the same answer that hucksters all over the world use…‘Buy now whilst stocks last’…..’Buy now as these fantastic bargain prices can’t last much longer!‘
Never mind consultation or the approval process…never mind what Parliament or the people think….drive it through, time is money.
The reality is Higgins doesn’t really care about the costs just with getting his pet project going and his well paid job, and his legacy, secured for years to come.
The real way to save money and not waste it..is not to do HS2….and what should really damn HS2 is that the backstabbing Vince Cable supports it….
Business Secretary Vince Cable said in an interview with the Observer on Sunday that there was a “compelling case” to speed up the extension of the HS2 rail link northwards.
The man who thinks a mansion tax is a workable, sensible idea.
The BBC’s web report pads Higgin’s claims out with more pro voices:
A Department for Transport spokesman said Sir David’s report “confirms that HS2 is the right project at the right price” but added that the report challenges the government to deliver the project more quickly and more effectively.
The Transport Secretary is due to respond to the report in Parliament later.
Shadow transport secretary Mary Creagh said: “David Higgins has made it clear that there are significant savings to be made if David Cameron gets a grip of this project and stops all these delays.
“The government must now act so this scheme can be delivered under budget.”
So everyone is in favour then…such a brilliant project.
The report does mention some opposition:
‘Waste of money’
Opponents of the scheme question how easy it will be to speed up the construction of HS2.
Richard Houghton, spokesman for HS2 Action Alliance said: “Bringing forward work will not be as simple as it sounds.
“Unless there are plans to circumnavigate the statute book, then a separate Hybrid Bill will have to be introduced.”
HS2 Action Alliance, which represents a coalition of groups opposed to the new rail link, says the project will be a “huge waste of money” and claims it will cause severe environmental damage, with the first phase alone having an impact on 130 protected wildlife sites.
That’s it then for the opposition….no real analysis….just ‘Not as simple as it sounds…and a few badgers might be inconvenienced’…….But then the BBC ducks back to the pro-side again….
Robbie Owen of Pinsent Masons solicitors, whose clients broadly support HS2, told the BBC that Sir David’s report was “incisive and powerful”.
“I think, in all, this [report] will hopefully help forge a much stronger cross-party consensus for the project,” said Mr Owen, the head of infrastructure planning and government affairs at the law firm.
“It’s crucially important to transform the economic shape of the UK and to try to rebalance the country away from all the emphasis on the South East,” he said. “We just can’t carry on as a country eking things out in terms of our infrastructure.”
The BBC’s report isn’t exactly dealing with the issues and is giving the pro-HS2 side a readymade platform to push their agenda unchallenged.
I don’t think there’s ever been a situation where the Royal train has required a whole new network to be constructed for it at vast expense.
Higgins is a very familiar manifestation, though. Does he still live at ‘Atomdene, Edgbaston’ ?
Albeeba breakfast this morning, had the interview with Higgins.
Naga put it to him that a mark of his success was delivering the olympics on time and on budget.
What? On fucking budget?
I spilled my coffee laughing.
Which budget was that then…..the one they decided on after it was finished?m
FFS!
It is strange how the BBC, which is normally not in favour of big business and large infrastructure projects, especially those with such immense environmetal impact, seems to be so keen on HS2
Quicker commutes between Salford and London?
Thinking about it, this is even more strange when one considers the open goal that the business case (revised 3 times so far?) offers for investigative journalism (I know this doesn’t fit with the BBC’s current MO of republishing Labour party media statements)
The BBC are definitely not keen on HS2 in judging by the numbers of negative reports on Midlands Today or from my reading of their coverage in the North West where the anti’s are regularly given a platform.
One of the country’s leading Rail journalists Nigel Evans led an excoriating attack against BBC bias recently in particular that the BBC without any investigation or corroboration whatsoever the BBC adopted and quoted repeatedly a highly inflated, made up figure, of £80bn for the scheme – the actual cost being around £28bn – or about 6 years worth of the BBC – inflated by a Treasury imposed contingency. (The IEA, who cited the £80bn, inflated the cost by adding the price of other infrastructure improvements across the country like the Manchester Metro – and a fictitious HS line to Liverpool – where HS2 isn’t even going)
Harris accused the BBC of bias and incompetence and wrote an ‘open letter’ to the BBC Trust complaining about their misleading reports. He got from the BBC a ‘we got it about right’ response that no-one here would be surprised at. Specifically they wouldn’t investigate his complain because he didn’t give the BBC the dates and times of the broadcasts that had angered him. Harris’s response to his brush off from the BBC is equally angry;
‘This sort of response (from Sean Moss, Complaints Advisor for BBC News) is what happens when you don’t have to work for your money, and are effectively accountable to no one. Despite talking a lot, the letter says little because at no point does it actually address my complaints.
Because I did not specify the day, time and minute of the specific bulletins I complained about, the BBC seemingly can’t find them. This doesn’t stop Sean Moss going on to make hypocrisy an art form, by using the August 19 publication date of the IEA report to rule my complaint inadmissible because they were not received within the ‘within 30 days of transmission’ rule!
So, on one hand the BBC can’t find the items I’m complaining about, because I don’t give a date in my complaint. Yet it uses the date of the IEA report’s publication (on which the stories were based) to rule my complaint is ineligible. Contemptible.’
SOUNDS FAMILIAR?
Two points.
1) Once again the labyrinthine BBC complaints procedure comes to their rescue and seems to confirm that the BBC seem only prepared to consider complaints at a granular level – i.e. specific broadcast / programme, conveniently allowing them to refuse to look at the ‘bigger picture’ and acknowledge that the weight of all of their broadcasts confirm their bias, whatever it may be .
2) Whether or not you support HS2, the BBC is obliged to treat subjects in a fair and balanced way and ensure that its journalism is sound and that claims, like those of the IEA, are properly scrutinised and balanced (as should those of Ed Balls, Miliband and their ilk).
Nigel Harris, not Evans. Freudian slip.
As usual, if you want to get to the bottom of a seemingly ludicrous and incredibly expensive state project, look no further than the EU. As Christopher Booker disclosed a couple of years ago, HS2 is part of the Delors dream of a USE. More to the point of this blogsite though is one pertinent question put by Booker: why do those closely (and not so closely) involved, particularly those inveterate watchdogs in the broadcasting and paper press (which includes the BBC as evidenced by the joke interview broadcast on Today this morning), lie about and/or conceal the EU connection? What are they ashamed of? If the HS2 project is financially viable and proveably beneficial to the UK as a whole why hide the ambition which is the foundation of its purpose? If they’re hiding this aspect of the HS2 project, what else is being hidden? Whatever the answers, don’t expect them to be aired, let alone discussed, on the BBC.
Although , I am a Eurosceptic , I am in favour of HS2 . Our rail system just needs updating & brought into the 21st century. After my first trip on Eurostar & going round France , mainly on TGV`sfor the price of £250 railpass ,whizzing though France at 200mph is just fantastic . I highly recommend it , after all, when you fly, you would not expect to fly on propeller driven Viscount Vanguard, would you, or for short haul a Dakota .
You start with an asssertion that the only way to achieve fast clean travel in the UK is by train
That has never been objectively tested as far as I am aware
Travel solutions in larger countries with lower population distributions are not necessarily appropriate to the UK
I would point out that the far sighted populations on France Germany and NW europe have for some strange reason also heavily invested in motorways, canals and air travel
So the argument for HS2: well the Frenchies av dun it, seems rather uncompelling to me
I take your point but a lot of us really liked the DC3 or Dakota. Lots of class. And 200 mph by train. Far too fast to enjoy the scenery. If you want that speed use a jet ( not a Dakota though)
Per Wiki DC3 cruising speed listed as 207 mph. Faster than the ruddy sooper dooper train AND you can look out of the windows and see something more than a blur going by.
Christopher Booker is being disingenuous.
There is no European grand plan, just a common sense plane – stating the bleeding obvious – that if countries are going to build high speed railways – it’s had be a good idea to have common specifications so that rail traffic can more easily cross borders (the Froggies have for years tried to stop German railways operate in France).
And as for Booker saying:
‘As we know, the high-speed trains from Birmingham will not stop at St Pancras, where the HS1 line to Paris begins. They will either stop at Euston or, as the ministry confirmed to me, will continue, via the North London line and the Channel Tunnel, direct to the Continent.’
Well bugger me – Brummies being allowed to travel to the Continent by train? NO – it just mustn’t be allowed to happen.
The point Booker was making there was that if you must have HS2 why not have it connecting to HS1 at HS1’s London terminal. Even on its own terms it appears foolish not to have HS1 and HS2 using the same station in London rather than insisting that Brummies using HS2 walk half a mile down Euston Road – or get the tube – to connect to HS1.
BTW if you want to spend £billions on the railways, is HS2 the best way? I would have thought – and I’m not alone here – that spending that sort of money on upgrading/improving the existing network or spending less and providing an alternative to HS2 would be far more productive. But, hey, if you want to get to London from Birmingham, what, 20 minutes faster than now then I suppose £30 billion is cheap.
I note that you’ve taken the rather naive stance that things like HS2 are merely the effect of benign “standardisations” of EU wide facilities to make life easier for
the little peopleus EU citizens and thus “strengthen economic and social cohesion”. I would urge you to read this article and (if you can find them) the referenced EU commission documents on the trans-European transport network and the Connecting Europe Facility (or this) which, as the writer of the article and Booker note, our political masters – and most of their friends in the media – somehow forgot to mention.There is no room at St Pancras ,for HS2 ,as you already have Midland trains & South Eastern , High Speed also there . Even if Midland moved to Euston , you would need more Platforms added there, for the Midland trains. But I agree it could be possible to co-locate HS1 & 2 at St Pancras .
HS2 will go ahead whether we want it or not because it’s an EU project and they’ve already decided that it will be done. The only way to stop these projects is to withdraw from the EU; and that probably can’t happen for quite a few years, even if we started making plans now.
It’s not an EU project
Unfortunately the Today show is not what it once was…
If you want the real measure of BBC bias on HS2, compare & contrast the coverage of Dave’s Magic Train versus fracking.
Sure don’t get the arguments against fracking shoe-horned into a five second soundbite.
Anyone would think it was fracking that was guaranteed to cost billions while critics of HS2 were new-age ecofreaks.
Where to begin in discussing the flaws of HS2 is the problem. Reminds me of British Leyland in the past. Or any of the schemes dreamed up by the politicians.
It will never make money. The Victorians would never have done it for that reason alone. And even they got carried away in building unnecessary railway lines.
It misses out major population centres along the existing West Coast main line. Coventry, Northampton, Milton Keynes etc . And that is just the places south of Birmingham.
It gets a few expense account travellers to Birmingham a few minutes quicker. So what?
It will never revitalise the North. That is impossible. The modern economy has shifted south just as in the early 19th century the industrial age shifted it north.
I suspect it is an EU grand folly.
It benefits a minority at the expense of the majority who will have to pay for it.
I like trains and make no bones about it but there are areas where upgraded roads would bring real benefits to millions and cost far far less. Upgrading existing lines would also cost far less.
And while we are about it we could reopen the old Great Central line from Sheffield down to Aylesbury and the spur to Banbury. , build the Dawlish by pass line and invest in the West country lines so stupidly singled or closed in the bad old days.
They are trying to sell us this HS2 on the grounds of capacity and revitalising the North. Disingenuous to say the least and they know it. Politicians should never be entrusted with madcap schemes. They always cock up.
Exactly. Ask yourself whether a private company or investment fund would put up the money for it if they were allowed to own it and charge for its use. The answer is likely to be no, it would not be a good investment.
So if the private sector wouldn’t support it I don’t believe the public sector should either.