So much for the Northern Powerhouse

[ellal]

HS2 is simply a project to reward the funders of the nasty party..

Who gives a monkeys if you can get to various cities/towns a few minutes earlier when most people can't afford the tickets anyway!

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

Talking to a railway engineer (having spent 2-1/2 years meeting these guys at the "butty van") it was rather obvious what the big plus of HS2 would have been in the north - by taking some of the load off the west coast line south of Manchester, the Midland main line and the East Coast route south of Leeds it would have allowed the operators to reduce rail congestion. The knock on would have been more train slots and/or better timings on a slew of local services that started or ended at Manchester (Piccadilly), Leeds and Sheffield as well as easing timing restrictions on the Trans Pennine "spine" between Manchester and Leeds. As delays cost money and increase pollution the overall effect on local services alone would have been to see improved time keepionmg with reduced atmospheric pollution (bearing in mind that about 50% of commuter traffic into Manchester and Leeds is still on diesel powered trains). So levelling up? More like levelling off

If they are cancelling those legs, so far as I am concerned they ought to cancel the whole HS2 plan. We (the UK) desperately needed better rail links, I was disappointed when HS2 was first announced and it didn't go London to Edinburgh - if a jobs worth doing, it's worth doing properly.

 

[ellal]

And people in the south wonder why some of us up here aren't happy with Boris the Bozo and has happy band of sleaze mongers

So why did you vote for that tw*t?

Oh that's right, you wanted 'brexit done'...

Turkeys voting for christmas yet again!

 

[Notch7]

So why did you vote for that tw*t?

Oh that's right, you wanted 'brexit done'...

Turkeys voting for christmas yet again!

I don’t think Job and Knock did either

 

[Deleted member 174758]

So why did you vote for that tw*t?

Oh that's right, you wanted 'brexit done'...

Turkeys voting for christmas yet again!

As you haven't read my current straplines, I'll reiterate them within the text of this response, viz.

...Britain at a time of crisis is being run by an amoral narcissist surrounded by sycophants... Ian Birrell (journalist and political commentator)

"This government is a shambles, and that's on a good day" - David Mellor (disgraced former Tory Cabinet Minister)

In a high-tech, high-wage Britain, who will hew the wood and draw the water? - Peter Wilson

All quotes from others, in the public domain, and correctly attributed. In what conceivable alternative version of the universe do you think I'd ever vote for the blonde bimbo or his sleaze bag mates?

Just to underline the point; I've spent about 1/5 of my working life living and working outside of this country, mainly in Europe, but also the USA. My first wife was not British, and because I've worked around I can read and just about speak and write a couple of other languages. This gives me the ability to pick up the gist of what some of the foreign language media are saying about the UK. So I'm about as far from being a pro-Brexit little Englander as you are ever likely to get. I'm not blinkered when it comes to the EU, either - it needs some fundamental reforms - but what we now have is far, far worse; it is corrosive and damaging to this country, and especially to the longer term prospects of young British people and British industry