Businesses can grow just fine without HS2
THE HS2 parrots are squawking again. The cluck, clack and cackle, the dawn chorus of desperation as, inevitably, fears that the Eastern leg of this hideous project will be dumped keep some people awake at night.
A particular fascination over the years has been to note just how so many of the suited, acephalous gatherings who bang out their obsession for HS2 persist in trotting out those same worn-out and meaningless mantras about how the world will end if HS2 isn’t delivered in full.
The usual stuff about connectivity, the enormous once-in-a-generation economic development opportunities, and, that classic, “future-proofing” the transport infrastructure.
It’s embarrassing to hear, frankly. When someone talks about things they know nothing about it usually does end in some degree of embarrassment. This behaviour is commonplace within those most precious of domains – the array of public and private sector partnerships that we see cuddling up to each other over HS2.
For reasons still unfathomable, all they need do is study the HS2 business plan for themselves. But they don’t. I’ve not met a business leader (or politician) who has read it themselves in more than six years of asking.
By so doing, they would learn that the most expensive project ever proposed by a British government in peacetime still has no quantifiable revenue projections, for example. What breed of business supports that concept?
They would also learn that HS2 has been forced to change its primary justifications several times as the cracks and flaws presented themselves.
Finally, they would realise that the arguments presented by the numerous bureaucratic commercial quangos have never even featured in that business plan – nor formed part of the reason why the HS2 egg was hatched in the first place. It’s all peculiar and alarming, really.
The top banana at the East Midlands Chamber of Commerce never gives up digging the hole deeper, despite (like all the others) being unable to substantiate the ludicrous suggestion that all things bright and beautiful in the commercial sector depends entirely on a fast train and a new train station.
Such conclusions are increasingly insulting to the public. The challenge: to name any business with plans to employ more people, expand or voluntarily relocate as a consequence of HS2 remains.
Let us be quite clear about this. Any regeneration, commercial development or business growth being spouted about, can be achieved without HS2. But the genuine and honest desire to make that a reality must first be there. Any notion that this region’s future will be hindered if HS2 doesn’t end up here, is simply rubbish. The cost burden (not to mention the environmental legacy) already being experienced, continues to make HS2 an economic disaster in waiting.
The sooner that decision to scrap it is made the better.
David Briggs, by email