UK XI: Election Day

[Nu-Eclipse]

One of the downsides of PR is we'll have Reform Party MPs.

The current climate (see the current Tory Party Conference) is tantamount to having them running the country anyway, surely?

[MartyG]

Things can always move further to the right.

[Asura]

One of the downsides of PR is we'll have Reform Party MPs.

We absolutely need Reform, UKIP etc. MPs though. And Greens. And all the crackpots and loonies, if they get the votes.

UKIP got ~13% of the vote in 2015, but they got 1 seat out of 650, which is what, 0.15% of the seats?

I'm absolutely convinced that half the reason Brexit even happened was because of this problem; those parties go out and tell people "the system is against them", and the problem is that they're right. The system is stacked against small parties.

Right now, a person might want to establish a "Reform the NHS" party or "Renationalise Utilities" party, to push a single issue agenda, but it's completely pointless as even if you get more than 10% of the popular vote (an almost inhuman task), you still don't get a say in government. That feels wrong.

[Nu-Eclipse]

Things can always move further to the right.

Again, I'll refer you to the Tory Party Conference and also refer you to the likes of Braverman and Badenoch. We're on our way there with the incumbent administration.

[MartyG]

And I'll say again, things can always move further to the right - Braverman's speech isn't current policy, it's her preaching to a specific audience at their conference and laying the ground for the inevitable leadership bid after Sunak badly loses next year.

As much as people like to over-exaggerate that we have a fascist government, we are far far far far far away from that. It can always go further to the right - ask Germany.

[Neon Ignition]

A word cloud formed from polling results:

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[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2023/oct/04/hs2-rishi-sunak-manchester-tory-conference-conservative-rail-latest-updates?page=with:block-651d4b268f08584119dcf402#block-651d4b268f08584119dcf402

It's a long stream of lies but the crux of the issue is that Sunak has said that HS2 is scrapped from Birmingham to Manchester and every penny of the £36m saved will go on refreshing existing infrastructure in the North - which will literally never happen and even if it did negates the savings the decision was supposed to be based on.

I expect extra funding in his local constituency to be announced in due course...

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2023/oct/04/hs2-rishi-sunak-manchester-tory-conference-conservative-rail-latest-updates?page=with:block-651d4a668f08297bb3421128#block-651d4a668f08297bb3421128

On the long, long list of Tory MP's twisting the Referendum result to suit their arguments, Sunak says the vote for Brexit was also a vote for change

Which is a huge misreading of the situation. It was, for many, a vote against change - to restore the nostalgia goggled past

[MartyG]

that HS2 is scrapped from Birmingham to Manchester and every penny of the £36m saved will go on refreshing existing infrastructure in the North - which will literally never happen and even if it did negate the savings the decision was supposed to be based on.

It's exceedingly short-sighted. Long-term investments in national infrastructure are a requirement for growth. They should have started development on the Manchester to Birmingham part as the priority. Given it will now join existing routes, it won't be able to take proper advantage of the trains, much like the Eurotunnel trains are unable to currently.

It's another example of short-term appeasement that's plagued politics for decades now.

[Nu-Eclipse]

And I'll say again, things can always move further to the right - Braverman's speech isn't current policy, it's her preaching to a specific audience at their conference and laying the ground for the inevitable leadership bid after Sunak badly loses next year.

As much as people like to over-exaggerate that we have a fascist government, we are far far far far far away from that. It can always go further to the right - ask Germany.

No amount of disingenuity or whataboutery or downplaying changes the fact that we're already heading there when the incumbent administration literally speak of what the right/far-right want to the point of Farage feeling comfortable enough to attend said conference, and Tice feeling comfortable enough to publicly talk about his policies being stolen. It's literally playing out in real-time right here and now. It's not in stasis.

[Protocol Penguin]

Braverman and other Tory ghouls are literally using rhetoric that less than a decade ago would’ve been the preserve of the BNP, UKIP and other far-right organisations. There isn’t really any ambiguity.

[Lebowski]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...08584119dcf402
It's a long stream of lies but the crux of the issue is that Sunak has said that HS2 is scrapped from Birmingham to Manchester and every penny of the £36m saved will go on refreshing existing infrastructure in the North - which will literally never happen and even if it did negates the savings the decision was supposed to be based on.

I expect extra funding in his local constituency to be announced in due course...

https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/ferrovial-boss-on-why-high-speed-rail-costs-more-in-uk-12-07-2022/

The cost of building the entire High Speed 2 (HS2) network is estimated to be in the region of £100bn. The funding envelope for phase one alone is up to £44.6bn. It means building HS2 will cost around £200M per kilometre.

By way of comparison, a government assessment of 20 European high speed railway networks (High speed rail international benchmarking study) concludes that “that high speed rail lines can be delivered under certain circumstances at an average cost of £32M per km”.

Why is it costing us six times as much to build this rail project in the uk?

Speaking at NCE’s Future of Rail conference, Ricardo Ferreras said that the process of obtaining permits and conducting environmental studies in the UK was largely behind the increased cost of building high speed railways in the UK.

“It’s true the cost per kilometre is way higher in the UK than it is in Europe, for example in France or Spain,” Ferreras said.

“It is about the number of resources that we use here in the UK that are linked with planning; the environmental matters, the stakeholder engagement, all the consents that are needed.

“As an example in Spain the government will get all consents, and all environmental permits, and then when they award the contract to a contractor, the contractor can just focus on delivering the project.

Incompetence doesn't even come into it, the route its planing to take isn't even fully approved it seems which is whats causing the budget to massively inflate and construction to progress at a snails pace.

Imagine hiring a builder for an house extension, and paying them daily while you wait for planning permission before you even draw up plans or get them signed off, this is essentially how HS2 is running.

[Neon Ignition]

I bet the Tories are wishing they had been in power for the last 13 years so could have looked at planning rules at some point to avoid such issues!


Oh.

[Asura]

Why is it costing us six times as much to build this rail project in the uk?

I mean, it's partially a lack of collective will. I read that the Buckinghamshire council literally said to the national government, after it led the charge in opposing the line which failed, that it was going to do everything legally possible to stymie it. They were going to follow the absolute letter of every regulation in finding ways to make it more expensive and harder to build, at every opportunity. Apparently they were only getting a station on it because they were permitted to insist on one, and asking for one was more expensive than not doing so.

Given, we have specific problems. England has a pop density of 474 people per-sq-km (it's often quoted as 250-odd but that's the entire UK, not England), while Germany's is 233 and high-speed-rail poster-child Japan is 370 or so... But it's also that the UK's population is comparably spaced out. Sure, we have big cities with concentrations of people, but it's not like Japan, which has massive areas where practically no-one lives, peppered with extremely dense cities (Japan's equivalent of the Pennines - like the mountainous spine of the country - runs most of the way along its length, and hardly anyone lives there).

Frankly I think the whole thing was a waste. The entire UK rail network needs overhauling, as does nearly all of the UK's public transit. HS2 got off the ground for one reason and one reason alone - a decent number of powerful people stood to get rich off it, even if it didn't get built. That's surely the reason.

[Lebowski]

I mean, it's partially a lack of collective will. I read that the Buckinghamshire council literally said to the national government, after it led the charge in opposing the line which failed, that it was going to do everything legally possible to stymie it. They were going to follow the absolute letter of every regulation in finding ways to make it more expensive and harder to build, at every opportunity. Apparently they were only getting a station on it because they were permitted to insist on one, and asking for one was more expensive than not doing so.

Given, we have specific problems. England has a pop density of 474 people per-sq-km (it's often quoted as 250-odd but that's the entire UK, not England), while Germany's is 233 and high-speed-rail poster-child Japan is 370 or so... But it's also that the UK's population is comparably spaced out. Sure, we have big cities with concentrations of people, but it's not like Japan, which has massive areas where practically no-one lives, peppered with extremely dense cities (Japan's equivalent of the Pennines - like the mountainous spine of the country - runs most of the way along its length, and hardly anyone lives there).

Frankly I think the whole thing was a waste. The entire UK rail network needs overhauling, as does nearly all of the UK's public transit. HS2 got off the ground for one reason and one reason alone - a decent number of powerful people stood to get rich off it, even if it didn't get built. That's surely the reason.

I still can't see why it would cost 6 times as much to build a railway here than it dose in Spain or France or Germany, poor planning has meant we have spent more money not building track by not getting all consents and environmental permits in place before starting construction.