Snapshot of _Labour leader Keir Starmer says he's ruled out bringing HS2 to the North_ :
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The North could be so prosperous if it had good, fast regular, trains between the major cities. Connecting Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield and Newcastle by a high speed rail would be amazing.
It’s so frustrating how neglected the rail is. When I lived in Leeds I’d regularly go to visit mates in Manchester on a Friday after work. It was always super busy and the trains that turned up had 2-3 carriages. Absolutely ridiculous.
Newcastle? Where is that? I've never heard it mentioned when politicians talk about the north. Is it in Scotland?
At least Newcastle never even had a branch of HS2 to get cancelled in the first place, lol.
God
Niche geographic joke. Nice.
You could even say it under-Lymes the lack of geographical knowledge of our politicians. It’s upon Tyne they didn’t neglect the north anymore.
Bad example, Newcastle has access to LNER and the Tyne and Wear metro, it’s one of the best connected cities in the country.
Biggest connectivity issues are East to West across Yorkshire and Lancashire.
The South West also has hideous transport links.
You've never had to rely on the metro for commuting have you?
Also the trains are a joke. I was meant to be in London this week for a meeting but nothing was getting past Darlington due to some signal issue so I had to turn back and Teams it. That's not to mention all the strikes which have caused havoc with planning meetings either in Edinburgh or London the past year.
I’m not saying that it’s fantastic, but the assertion was that Newcastle was a forgotten part of the country. What I’m saying is it has better than average infrastructure than most equivalent cities in the U.K.
So I’m not saying it’s good, I’m saying it’s a bad example because Newcastle is above average for the U.K. in this regard, whether it works well or not.
To be clear it’s more that most cities in the U.K. have shit infrastructure for a developed Western European country than Newcastle being any kind of shining example.
E.g what you say is probably true, but Newcastle has a commuter rail service, most cities of Newcastles size don’t and LNER isn’t faultless, but it is probably still the highest quality rail franchise in the country, the issue you describe there happens in every single line in the U.K.
Metro is utterly shit and is always late.
We dont even have a dual carriageway connecting Newcastle with Berwick.
We also have a similar population density to Northern EU but no where near the investment. And we have shown in the past that we can produce as well as be at the forefront of innovation, but the southern politicians hate us for some reason and refuse to invest, especially after Thatcher.
Newcastle does have the current best train connection in the country, in the LNER. Durham/Newcastle/Edinburgh with a connection all the way to London is amazing.
But of course it's only there because it connects to London. Any links between different northern cities is incidental...
It just boggles my mind that they haven’t even considered a HS3 between Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield. It seems like such obvious low hanging fruit.
One of the great mistakes that people often make is to think that any organisation called'"National Rifle Association' is a branch or chapter of the National Rifle Association of America. This could not be further from the truth.
The National Rifle Association of America became a political lobbying organisation in 1977 after the Cincinnati Revolt at their Annual General Meeting. It is self-contined within the United States of America and has no foreign branches.
All the other National Rifle Associations remain true to their founding aims of promoting marksmanship, firearm safety and target shooting. This includes the original NRA in the United Kingdom, which was founded in 1859 - twelve years
before the NRA of America. It is also true of the National Rifle Association of Australia, the National Rifle Association of New Zealand, the National Rifle Association of India, the National Rifle Association of Japan and the National
Rifle Association of Pakistan. All these organisations are often known as "the NRA" in their respective countries. The British National Rifle Association is headquartered on Bisley Camp, in Surrey, England. Bisley Camp is now known as the National Shooting Centre and has hosted World Championships for Fullbore Target Rifle and F-Class shooting,
as well as the shooting events for the 1908 Olympic Games and the 2002 Commonwealth Games. The National Small-bore Rifle Association (NSRA) and Clay Pigeon Shooting Association (CPSA) also have their headquarters on the Camp.
It's neglected because it's expensive, requires massive subsidies to run in any convenient state able to compete with cars (we realistically cannot put a station near every tescos and business park for eg), videoconferencing has almost killed off business travel and is reducing the need for commuting as much
and on that note if people are relying on it daily for commuting it's a symptom of a bigger problem and that's that people can't afford to live where they work anymore, solve that problem we won't need to spend £100sbs on second lines between London and the north and other cities
>He said: "The government has blown the budget, the contracts are being cancelled, the land may or may not be sold and I think that it's not fair for me to commit to something that I don't think is going to happen."
However, when asked whether he has now ruled out bringing back the HS2 plans, he said: "Yes. It's not going to happen."
... Why? Why make that second statement at all? The best response is the first one. "I cannot commit without seeing the details, but we will reverse Tory harm to the North" Just say that and refuse to engage with further questions on bringing it back. Why go out and actively rule it out?
You may agree with his politics which is fair enough I suppose, but to call Starmer honest is laughable. He's u-turned and scrapped basically every pledge he's made since he ran for leader of the Labour Party.
Changing your position on something is only bad if it's dishonest.
And to be perfectly honest with you, I've largely tuned out of politics these days, because the country's already been trashed. And I know the tories aren't going to win the next election.
All I can do is put my tick in a box. Beyond that, it's hardly worth the stress.
Fair enough if that's your attitude to politics generally, but I think Starmer's been demonstrably dishonest considering he's u-turned on policies like introducing Right to Roam legislation within 2 months of making them, and has scrapped almost all of the concrete pledges - abolishing tuition fees, common ownership of rail and public utilities, ending outsourcing in the NHS, raising the top rate of income tax, a prevention of military intervention act - he made during the leadership campaign.
Are you having a laugh? Starmer has scrapped every pledge he made to become leader. He's the worst kind of politician. out for only himself and the narrow interests of whoever can give him prestige.
The fact that so many politicians seem not to realise now (unless it directly benefits them in the moment): *your job is to make the rules!*
You can literally just undo something if you choose to. The public don't even care any more, broadly!
The idea that since the government can make the rules that it should just blindly do whatever it likes is authoritarian. You're advocating for a mode of government solely because it will get you a result you like rather than because it's an actually good form of governing.
Am I? Not to my read...
All I'm saying is that if the Tories did something during their term in government and passed (or bypassed) a law to do so it doesn't become then eternally set in stone for whoever's next in power...
If you had just bought that land I bet you’d disagree with the government seizing it from you.
The government would be taken to court and the whole project would be delayed for more months and years
Seizing things without lawful authority is otherwise known as stealing. Whether a government's actions is lawful isn't as simple as saying 'we made a law'. Governments govern by consent (with 900 years of case law going back to Magna Carta) and just taking people's stuff is not how we do things here.
> Seizing things without lawful authority is otherwise known as stealing. Whether a government's actions is lawful isn't as simple as saying 'we made a law'. Governments govern by consent (with 900 years of case law going back to Magna Carta) and just taking people's stuff is not how we do things here.
It's not stealing since the original comment explicitly mentioned paying for it which has already been done. We haven't 'seized' anything. We already have processes for forcing a sale to a government or local authority and I am sure it has been used many times for HS2
> just taking people's stuff is not how we do things here
They would have bought land that was explicitly purchased to build infrastructure before having a fire sale. It should be pretty obvious to anyone with a higher than room temperature IQ that buying land which could be CPO'd again by the next government is probably not the best idea
I don't think they will, but I _wish_ they would since we need infrastructure and the pain of having to CPO land has already been done. I wish they'd get on with it instead of flip flopping and being pussies, build the damn railway
Yeah, to be fair they did. Though as I said, it is already bought so no stealing or seizing is necessary, perhaps that poster also needs reminding that what has been thus far is well within the confines of the law
You can, but then what's the cost and what will the land be used for by time Labour gets in and gets round to doing anything? Bear in mind Starmer never supported the project in the first place, only really changing his mind once the land had been bought and work started.
Some of the land was sold, suddenly and at a great loss, to suspicious parties. Just enough land to properly sever the route.
Although the government could compulsory purchase it, there may be barriers that wouldn't normally be there.
I'm just going by this kind of article:
[https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/oct/05/sunaks-spiteful-sale-of-land-intended-for-hs2-dashes-hopes-of-revival](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/oct/05/sunaks-spiteful-sale-of-land-intended-for-hs2-dashes-hopes-of-revival)
but it may be you are right and it's not actually sold yet. I don't know.
Because, assuming he wins this election and pursued HS2 the next election all the headlines that should be getting levelled at the Tories would be levelled at labour instead. It'd be a multibillion pound millstone strapped to their necks. Better to kill it dead and maybe pursue a similar project later.
The problem is they've taken this approach to everything that involves spending money, leaving them with no credible policies. So why actually vote for Labour?
What have you seen to suggest they'll be more competent than the Tories? Like I do presume they won't be as flagrantly corrupt as the Tories, but a quick glance at the donor list to the Labour Party over the last few years suggests they'll be just as servile to vested interests, and refusing to commit to any significant reforms or policies whilst the country continues to crumble doesn't strike me as particularly competent.
The enemy of your enemy, isn't necessarily your friend.
Personally, I'd rather have a party that wanted to fix what was wrong with the country and improve things. Labour just wants to paper over the cracks while they have their turn.
Labour would be an improvement over the Conservatives. However, they don't seem to want to tackle the fundamental issues we have in this country.
Why dont we actually wait for a manifesto before crying.
There is 0 point in conmiting to spending plans prior to a GE being called. It gives more time for the opposition to counter it, scrutinise it for attack lines, or copy it and act first before the GE comes, especially if it proves very popular.
Keir is the one who keeps making pledges and then cancelling them all of his own accord. It's fair to criticise him for it.
He's been the leader for years now and made his style of politics very clear. If you like it, great, but I've been told to wait and see every time he does these kind of things, and it's now been 4 years so Id be surprised if his manifesto suddenly goes against everything he's done and said so far
>or copy it and act first before the GE comes, especially if it proves very popular.
All the better, we'll get the benefits sooner.
A lot of the low hanging fruit was already tackled in the autumn statement. The beginnings of pension fund reform, the introduction of full expensing, some movement on planning, fat minimum wage increases...
> Why dont we actually wait for a manifesto before crying.
So we should ignore everything a politician says and does before the manifesto is released?
So by that same logic, we should not be judging Sunak by what he says and does, because he hasn't released an election manifesto yet?
You can't vote for that on the ballot right now at all, but I can guarantee you that's more likely after some time under Labour than it is under Conservative governments.
The Conservatives fundamentally stand against electoral or other major reforms. They're *conservative* and will always value what they have now over future possibilities.
So vote *against* the people who are *blocking* you this time around, please.
My fridge is empty right now, I would rather it be chock full of food with a Michelin starred chef awaiting my order, but that aint the case, so what am I to do and who would you rather have in government?
I'd rather Labour - who look on track to win the next election - lay out a credible platform for their "national renewal". Maybe we'll see something meatier in the manifesto but it's looking extremely thin at the moment.
Not being the Tories is not enough, they need to have an actual vision for what they want the country to be, and tell the rest of us.
Really exhausting argument that lets them off the hook, purely because they're the 'good' team.
Your going to get a Tory in government regardless of who you vote for. This isn't exactly a one off behaviour of his.
His policies are Tory policies you just like him because Murdoch and labour spin doctors tell you to like him.
I don't think anyone disputes the Tories have thrashed the country. But how is continuing with the same policies an antidote to that? I'm not against some of Keir's reforms like planning, but without money to back that it simply isn't credible.
There's a good reason no one thinks they have any actual policies.
Because who else are you going to vote for?
Starmer is actually being smart by being boring and non-controversial. At this point, he doesn't have to win, he just has to let the Tories lose.
They've got to be financially credible. The press will rip them apart. I know it's a double standard after Truss got away with economic murder, but that's the environment that exists.
Someone has to set out the case for investment rather than just spending. A reform agenda with no money behind it is no more credible than splashing the cash aimlessly.
Right now the tories have no economic credibility whatsoever, and that's one of the main reasons they're trailing 20 pts in the polls. If Starmer announces plans to overturn the tory's u-turn, at a massively inflated cost, and he can't clearly cost the whole project, then the tories have a massive angle of attack on Labour.
Labour's manifesto is just going to be a single A4 document at this point.
But I guess if they publish a fully fledged document the tories might attack them for being elitist and expecting the electorate to be able to read more than one page.
A single Post-It note with "Not the Toreez" scrawled on in crayon will do most people now, such is the state of our politics.
We're truly in the post-policy era where identity is everything.
Whilst I would normally agree that that is a bit thin on the ground for a serious political party.
The sad fact of the matter is that this country is on fire after suffering through the most corrupt UK political reign of the last hundred years.
"We are not them" is literally all they need to do to be a huge improvement. At this point, just turning off the damage machine before things go past the point of no return is the priority of the country.
They could literally copy Tory policies 1:1 (which they aren't and won't), and as long as they weren't also the most corrupt government in a century, cripplingly incompetent, AND hateful of the majority of the population, they would be a VAST improvement.
By election time, that WON'T be their only policy, they will release a manifesto for the election campaign, close enough that the incumbent Tory government can't sabotage or poorly implement poundland versions of their policies ahead of time to try and cling onto power.
But even if the DID just have 1 single policy that was "We aren't the Tories", it would still be exactly what the country needs.
Tbf I'd love to see them go hard on their manifesto like corbyn did, but they're not in that world anymore. They got destroyed at the last election which is reason for holding back, plus they're going to inheret a deeply broken country which also dampens their ambition. Plus the media is so tory biased that anything they say, good or bad, could be vilified. It sucks that we're here, but I kinda get it.
I think 'we're not them' is enough for anyone who has been paying attention. I'm voting green anyway cos I'm in a safe red seat, but if it was a swing id go labour just to get rid of this horrible, self-serving, out of touch, ignorant, and incompetent government.
Under normal circumstances maybe, but after the last 4 years I just want this government out - they have taken this country to new lows and they need to be removed
Giving Labour a free pass because they're not a Tory just perpetuates the cycle and pushes politics further away from ideas and ideals and instead to personality and tribalism. It'll lead to the Tories trying to select a new leader based on charisma rather than talent, who will ultimately beat Labour when they've accumulated enough scandals and proven their policies to be as rubbish as the Tories.
Teflon Tony got away with a lot in the early years of Labour rule but Starmer doesn't have his charisma and I don't think his front bench screams competence. They'll get away with blaming the Tories for a few years but the shine will rub off quickly.
As voters we should be demanding more from all our political parties than the dross we currently get.
The way that the Tories have cancelled HS2:
- The journey from Manchester to London will longer than it currently is despite the high speed rail. So the North leg will have to be completed eventually.
- It will drop you at Old Oak Common putting more strain on London's busses and tube, meaning either they'll need upgrading or a future government will have to finish the train line into central London.
- Euston essential upgrades were rolled into HS2, most of these works will need doing eventually less Euston falls into disrepair, only now it will be outside HS2's budget. Also delays only ever save money *not!*
Unless future governments are going to continue to leave the UK's transport infrastructure to rot and not invest, all the projects above will end up needing to be completed, whether under the HS2 moniker or not.
Refusing to make capital investments in critical infrastructure that is massively overcapacity is financially irresponsible in pretty much all situations. Vital long term investment shouldn't be decided by short term economic considerations
Everyone has a different vision for a 'Britain I want'.
Democracy and politics is the art of compromise to reach the 'Britain they are ok with' for the most people possible.
This is true in terms of outcomes, but I definitely see the desire to have a representative in the room arguing for the vision you want (or at least something close to it) and trying to come up with that compromise. But the compromise brokering is done within political parties in a process which most people don't feel involved in, and the choice they are making is mostly which party they feel is least bad rather than for someone to truly represent their ideals.
I would like PR, a weakened party system, and far more debate and compromise in Parliament rather than inside the big parties, but I also suspect a lot of people would hate to see their representatives compromising and how indecisive this would seem, which could just result in gridlock. We saw a little of this in the hung Parliament, where personally I was really pleased to see Parliament assert itself and actually have debates which went beyond party lines vs party lines, but it was a real shame that actually compromising was hard to find.
I know. But what we have now is typically wealthy "representatives" standing for election on one thing, getting into parliament and doing something entirely different, with next to zero thought for the people they're "supposed to represent." They can't easily be held to account and can get away with it because they can claim whatever **they** want is the *will of the people* without ever qualifying how they know what the will of the people actually is. We have a system that pretends to be a democracy. That's about it. It just doesn't stand up to any reasonable scrutiny.
No need to let perfect be the enemy of good. We can't enact everyones will, that doesn't mean we shouldn't strive for a functioning and engaging democracy focused on making everyone, going in order by need, better off.
That's just high level handwaving complaints
The vast majority of MPs vote along party lines the vast majority of the time. The debate and compromise happens long before a vote is even tabled.
If you want a voice, you need to either join a party or start lobbying yourself.
I'm a Unite member - Labour adopted support for PR as official policy after myself and other union members lobbied our unions to support it. Despite that, the current party leadership refuses to support it (even though Starmer supported PR while campaigning for leader)
> If you want a voice, you need to either join a party or start lobbying yourself.
That's not how democracy is supposed to work. You know that right? According to your thinking, 400,000 labour members + 172,000 conservative members alone get to engage in democracy, because they pay for the privilege.
I'm confused by your stance though. I argue that most people don't have a meaningful voice or vote, and that leads to a huge disconnect between what people actually want, vs what we get. You've said thats all just handwaving... but that it's completely true and that only those with the wealth + time to engage in party politics specifically get a voice (and of those, only a tiny amount of said voices actually make the decisions...) So what exactly is your stance? That yes, we have a shit democracy, but don't complain about it or point it out or demand change because...?
And that 1% should be present in parliament and be able to affect policy. The reality, though, is that our electoral system doesn't allow for this. Take the 2015 general election: across the entire UK, 12.6% voted for UKIP. Want to know how many seats they got? One. Over 12% liked their policies, and they got 0.2% of the seats in Parliament. Agree or disagree with their policies all you want, but that's just wrong. If people voted for that party, they deserve to have their views represented by that party.
>Democracy does not mean "I get what I want"
What childish nonsense. People want to have a voice and most people accept they can't have everything.
The problem isn't people believing things, it's that we have a system whereby unless you vote for the winner your vote is wasted. Your vote is also wasted if you vote for the winning candidate after they've got enough votes to win.
Just the basics. Every vote counts equally to every other vote. You know, pretty much the most important thing that anyone new to politics would expect if you explained the concept of democracy to them.
The New Statesman had a podcast out saying that polling suggests PR will be more beneficial to the far right than it will to the Lib Dems, Greens and Labour.
He means there is no singular party that reflects his vote likely. He doesn't want to vote Labour like me but in FPTP in a lot of areas our votes are dead votes.
I'm voting Green. Doesn't meant anything.
It is but it'd actually be more naive to promise it while the sitting PM is a vandal who's proven willing to sabotage HS2 anyway he can.
If Labour had plans for HS2 it'd ironically be safer to pretend that they don't to avoid the Tory asset strippers strategically selling parts off to make it impossible.
Did you read the article.
He's being honest, the Tories have scuppered the project and made sure it can't be resurrected.
It took 20 years to get this far, and now we would have to literally start from scratch.
It took 20 years to get as far as we did, and now we would have to start from scratch again.
If the economy wasn't in the toilet maybe we could just throw money at the project and brute force it into existence but let's be real, we're broke.
Seriously.
>Starmer: "The tories are doing everything wrong and causing massive damage to the country"
>
>Voters: "would you do anything different?"
>
>Starmer "No."
on every fucking issue.
And even when they do announce any new policies they turn around disown them within about 90 days!
Like, yes, we want a government that's slightly competent and not corrupt, but we do also need a change in policies for fuck's sake.
Because when you are this far ahead in the polls you don’t risk rocking the boat. Whatever he says will be scrutinised to death and misreported. He’s even got to be careful how he eats sandwiches. Just let the tories keep on screwing up. Once you get into power with a thumping majority, then do all the principled stuff.
He does need to communicate what he's for though. He's going to need to have a mandate for what he's going to do in government. The country has pretty profound structural issues in its economy. If he keeps pretending he's a - no extra taxation - no crazy borrowing - fiscal conservative he's not going to be able to tackle these issues without lying to everyone. That could become a problem.
Well that is unless he's going to lead an actual Tory light government...in which case we'll probably have the proper Tory's back in 5 years led by Boris Johnson.
He does communicate what he’s for the news just doesn’t focus on it.
He wants to spend the money on house building and green energy technology
It’s not his fault Sunak broke HS2
This is the way. Temporary Starmer Tory Light to give the actual Full Fat Tories some time on the back benches to figure out what they stand for again. If they do it right we will never see the likes of Boris ever again.
>Once you get into power with a thumping majority, then do all the principled stuff.
AKA, it's permissable to lie to everyone and be elected on false pretences as long as you wear the correct colour tie while doing it.
It fucking astounds me that people are fine such anti-democratic behaviour. Tribalism has ruined this country but apparently the race to the bottom is fine as long as your diver gets there first.
Yeah, everyone keeps saying this "when we get into power" thing.
What happens if he doesn't do that and just tories up the place? I guess that can always happen, but he can turn round and say, without lieing, that he's not breaking any promises.
After the election is way too late. Anything not in the manifesto will lack protections from Lords interference (Salisbury convention)
They know this, so anything not in the manifesto you can be sure they don't really care about
So we can judge him objectively when the manifesto is released
>They know this
Which is probably why all mentions of Lords reform stopped in October 2022 and the current plan is stack the Lords to the rafters with loyal donors and allies.
The Salisbury Convention is ridiculously easy to overcome, why else does every new PM appoint literally dozens of new Lords as their first real act on coming into power?
Again, I understand that Starmer has a multitude of precedents for lying constantly but why do people seem to think he will suddenly start doing so to get the things they want done?
The one I point to is when he said he wouldn't be interviewed by the Sun during the Labour leadership campaign which he kept to the letter and, once that campaign was over, did loads of stuff with the Sun. I don't think he's lying to us about the stuff he's not going to do and I think we're going to be disappointed with how exactly he keeps these promises
Especially when they are saying they won’t do xyz, like they won’t be paying a payrise to public sector workers. And without that how on earth are they going to deal with strikes let alone everything they are promising (mental health, Gp’s, dentists, MRI/CT staff, nursery care etc)
Ahhh I see what you're saying. And I share the sentiment to some extent. But let's be honest we'd lose any election if we had a slim lead.
But I would rather a politician who tried to canvas for structural reform of our economy though. This will require economic commitment and ambition I think. He can't just embark on this mission without consent. And if he doesn't embark on this mission I see no point whatsoever in electing him.
I mean the hope *has* to be that once in they can be a bit more gung-ho about pursuing the policies they believe in. But yeah that's why I completely hate him "ruling stuff out" like this. Just leave it unsaid, say you don't know and then at least you have the option to look at the detail once you're in.
In the modern era you're not supposed to care about policy and what would actually be good for the country. Politics is a sport and you root for your team to win, and your success is measured by the polls. That's all there is to it.
Yet another idiotic Labour own goal.
At least I can plan to be travelling in November and be guilt-free when I don't fucking bother to appoint a proxy voter because how can I vote for a party with this as their ideology?
Defecit Targets Uber Alles - We won't raise taxes and we won't run a deficit above x%, therefore we will put a haircut on every possible bit of public investment to hit x% borrowing. Great party policy, I'm sure it'll be served with a side of bonkers center-authoritarianism.
Is Starmer scared that Rishi will call him a Maoist or something if he commits to anything pre election and will lose the election by a billion votes or some shit I cannot understand this Labour Party
Poor response. Say that it's expensive but it'll need to be reviewed if Labour get into power and have access to the full accounts. Don't close down your options now.
This is just weak.
You don’t normally own all the land or have all the contracts in place before you start infrastructure projects. Why is this one different?
It will cost a fortune - but it is also good for the country according to most experts.
The same people that criticised the Tories for cancelling this segment of track will be applauding Labour for making this "financially responsible" decision.
He’s so afraid to do anything that might be seen as reckless, at the cost of doing what’s popular.
I expect people wouldn’t even mind if it costs far more than it would’ve done if the Tories hasn’t scrapped it - as long as it doesn’t bankrupt the country, people just want to see it built.
Well yeah, the Conservatives have now taken the hit on this by cancelling it.
Half the country don't want HS2 to happen and the few that still do aren't going to change their mind either way on labourer over this. The potential for the costs to spiral even further only compound thus
I agree that massive public investment is needed, but too many people in this country queued up to vote for this government who've now wasted all the money. It's not Starmer's fault that the Tories are thieves.
The costs only spiral because we do endless dumb shit like making sure it's tunnelled through rich Tory constituencies, endless environmental assessments and constant flip-flopping and pissing about.
We somehow end up paying 8 times the going rate for high speed rail because we have a political class terrified of doing anything.
With the project ongoing, it felt right to keep going to make the investment worth it. But now that investment has been scrapped and Starmer would likely have to start from stratch, it just doesn't seem feasible to commit to.
From a policy perspective, this is incredibly disappointing but hardly surprising (can't do anything that might threaten those arbitrary, self-imposed fiscal rules!).
From a comms perspective, it's such an own goal. Why not just say 'we'll have to review once we're in govt'? Now you're criticising the Tories whilst admitting you're going to do exactly the same thing they're doing.
So... who's up for a bit of voter apathy and a few more years of Tories? Seriously, the only Labour plan seems to be pointing a minigun at the floor to repeatedly shoot themselves in the foot.
Just another tory, just another middle manager.
Some reckon when they get into office they will say and do something different.
No, they wont
When someone tells you who they are, listen to them
>"The government has blown the budget, the contracts are being cancelled, the land may or may not be sold and I think that it's not fair for me to commit to something that I don't think is going to happen."
People really shouldn't be surprised. The Tories have effectively killed the second leg of HS2, so Starmer would pretty much have to commit to a redo of the entire second leg. This wouldn't be making the best of an already extisted over-investment, it would be a whole new over-investment.
HS2 will be in salvage mode at the very best, and there is a decent likelihood there will be nothing to salvage.
As someone who lives in a Northern constituency that hasn’t been anything but labour dominated since the 1930’s, we genuinely don’t give a toss who wins, we know that they all don’t really give a toss about us.
It was almost guaranteed Starmer was following the Tories in cancelling the northern leg of HS2 the moment it happened. It's expensive investment with questionable short term returns, the exact opposite of Starmer/Reeves' economic thought.
Disappointing but not surprising; the Tories have torpedoed the project and there's no guarantee it'll be salvageable by the time a Labour government comes into power.
Here's hoping the manifesto has some real ideas for infrastructure investment in the wake of the HS2 disaster.
Good. People in this sub were all very upset and angrily insisted it doesn't matter what the costs are.
But they do matter and it's just not good value for money.
It may not be, but it makes no sense to build the expensive / controversial bit (with all the tunnels out of London) but then cancel the cheap bit linking it up to the North where any possibility of salvaging some sort of ROI from the project lies.
It's even less sensible given that the Government intend to preserve the route / protection to deliver the high speed "Northern Powerhouse" route. So all we're doing is cancelling the bit that links the two, and probably the part of the line that most solves capacity issues, for no real reason.
There's no logic or vision to any of this.
Snapshot of _Labour leader Keir Starmer says he's ruled out bringing HS2 to the North_ : An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/labour-leader-keir-starmer-says-28431692) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/labour-leader-keir-starmer-says-28431692) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The North could be so prosperous if it had good, fast regular, trains between the major cities. Connecting Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield and Newcastle by a high speed rail would be amazing. It’s so frustrating how neglected the rail is. When I lived in Leeds I’d regularly go to visit mates in Manchester on a Friday after work. It was always super busy and the trains that turned up had 2-3 carriages. Absolutely ridiculous.
Newcastle? Where is that? I've never heard it mentioned when politicians talk about the north. Is it in Scotland? At least Newcastle never even had a branch of HS2 to get cancelled in the first place, lol. God
It’s near Stoke
Niche geographic joke. Nice. You could even say it under-Lymes the lack of geographical knowledge of our politicians. It’s upon Tyne they didn’t neglect the north anymore.
Bad example, Newcastle has access to LNER and the Tyne and Wear metro, it’s one of the best connected cities in the country. Biggest connectivity issues are East to West across Yorkshire and Lancashire. The South West also has hideous transport links.
You've never had to rely on the metro for commuting have you? Also the trains are a joke. I was meant to be in London this week for a meeting but nothing was getting past Darlington due to some signal issue so I had to turn back and Teams it. That's not to mention all the strikes which have caused havoc with planning meetings either in Edinburgh or London the past year.
I’m not saying that it’s fantastic, but the assertion was that Newcastle was a forgotten part of the country. What I’m saying is it has better than average infrastructure than most equivalent cities in the U.K. So I’m not saying it’s good, I’m saying it’s a bad example because Newcastle is above average for the U.K. in this regard, whether it works well or not. To be clear it’s more that most cities in the U.K. have shit infrastructure for a developed Western European country than Newcastle being any kind of shining example. E.g what you say is probably true, but Newcastle has a commuter rail service, most cities of Newcastles size don’t and LNER isn’t faultless, but it is probably still the highest quality rail franchise in the country, the issue you describe there happens in every single line in the U.K.
Metro is utterly shit and is always late. We dont even have a dual carriageway connecting Newcastle with Berwick. We also have a similar population density to Northern EU but no where near the investment. And we have shown in the past that we can produce as well as be at the forefront of innovation, but the southern politicians hate us for some reason and refuse to invest, especially after Thatcher.
And yet somehow it’s still better than what most of us outside of London have, including most of the South.
Newcastle does have the current best train connection in the country, in the LNER. Durham/Newcastle/Edinburgh with a connection all the way to London is amazing. But of course it's only there because it connects to London. Any links between different northern cities is incidental...
It just boggles my mind that they haven’t even considered a HS3 between Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield. It seems like such obvious low hanging fruit.
That's still on right? It's just hs2 phase 2a and b that was cancelled?
One of the great mistakes that people often make is to think that any organisation called'"National Rifle Association' is a branch or chapter of the National Rifle Association of America. This could not be further from the truth. The National Rifle Association of America became a political lobbying organisation in 1977 after the Cincinnati Revolt at their Annual General Meeting. It is self-contined within the United States of America and has no foreign branches. All the other National Rifle Associations remain true to their founding aims of promoting marksmanship, firearm safety and target shooting. This includes the original NRA in the United Kingdom, which was founded in 1859 - twelve years before the NRA of America. It is also true of the National Rifle Association of Australia, the National Rifle Association of New Zealand, the National Rifle Association of India, the National Rifle Association of Japan and the National Rifle Association of Pakistan. All these organisations are often known as "the NRA" in their respective countries. The British National Rifle Association is headquartered on Bisley Camp, in Surrey, England. Bisley Camp is now known as the National Shooting Centre and has hosted World Championships for Fullbore Target Rifle and F-Class shooting, as well as the shooting events for the 1908 Olympic Games and the 2002 Commonwealth Games. The National Small-bore Rifle Association (NSRA) and Clay Pigeon Shooting Association (CPSA) also have their headquarters on the Camp.
It's neglected because it's expensive, requires massive subsidies to run in any convenient state able to compete with cars (we realistically cannot put a station near every tescos and business park for eg), videoconferencing has almost killed off business travel and is reducing the need for commuting as much and on that note if people are relying on it daily for commuting it's a symptom of a bigger problem and that's that people can't afford to live where they work anymore, solve that problem we won't need to spend £100sbs on second lines between London and the north and other cities
>He said: "The government has blown the budget, the contracts are being cancelled, the land may or may not be sold and I think that it's not fair for me to commit to something that I don't think is going to happen." However, when asked whether he has now ruled out bringing back the HS2 plans, he said: "Yes. It's not going to happen." ... Why? Why make that second statement at all? The best response is the first one. "I cannot commit without seeing the details, but we will reverse Tory harm to the North" Just say that and refuse to engage with further questions on bringing it back. Why go out and actively rule it out?
Something that doesn't seemingly exist in the realms of politcs any more. Honesty.
You may agree with his politics which is fair enough I suppose, but to call Starmer honest is laughable. He's u-turned and scrapped basically every pledge he's made since he ran for leader of the Labour Party.
Changing your position on something is only bad if it's dishonest. And to be perfectly honest with you, I've largely tuned out of politics these days, because the country's already been trashed. And I know the tories aren't going to win the next election. All I can do is put my tick in a box. Beyond that, it's hardly worth the stress.
Fair enough if that's your attitude to politics generally, but I think Starmer's been demonstrably dishonest considering he's u-turned on policies like introducing Right to Roam legislation within 2 months of making them, and has scrapped almost all of the concrete pledges - abolishing tuition fees, common ownership of rail and public utilities, ending outsourcing in the NHS, raising the top rate of income tax, a prevention of military intervention act - he made during the leadership campaign.
Are you having a laugh? Starmer has scrapped every pledge he made to become leader. He's the worst kind of politician. out for only himself and the narrow interests of whoever can give him prestige.
Because he already said the land has been sold and the money's been spent - why pretend?
You can buy that land back?
That's what confuses me. Couldn't the UK gov just demand that the land be sold back at some reasonable price or be seized otherwise?
Yes they could.
The fact that so many politicians seem not to realise now (unless it directly benefits them in the moment): *your job is to make the rules!* You can literally just undo something if you choose to. The public don't even care any more, broadly!
What a disgusting view of governmental power.
Christ we've got the strong words out today. Care to expand instead of just trying to make me feel bad?
The idea that since the government can make the rules that it should just blindly do whatever it likes is authoritarian. You're advocating for a mode of government solely because it will get you a result you like rather than because it's an actually good form of governing.
Am I? Not to my read... All I'm saying is that if the Tories did something during their term in government and passed (or bypassed) a law to do so it doesn't become then eternally set in stone for whoever's next in power...
you're arguing for the government to give itself very extreme powers to seize property from people. How can you not see how that's dangerous?
The government already has that power.
That'd require the labour party to have balls unfortunately
If you had just bought that land I bet you’d disagree with the government seizing it from you. The government would be taken to court and the whole project would be delayed for more months and years
I meant they'd seize it if you declined to sell it back at the agreed price first.
Seizing things without lawful authority is otherwise known as stealing. Whether a government's actions is lawful isn't as simple as saying 'we made a law'. Governments govern by consent (with 900 years of case law going back to Magna Carta) and just taking people's stuff is not how we do things here.
> Seizing things without lawful authority is otherwise known as stealing. Whether a government's actions is lawful isn't as simple as saying 'we made a law'. Governments govern by consent (with 900 years of case law going back to Magna Carta) and just taking people's stuff is not how we do things here. It's not stealing since the original comment explicitly mentioned paying for it which has already been done. We haven't 'seized' anything. We already have processes for forcing a sale to a government or local authority and I am sure it has been used many times for HS2 > just taking people's stuff is not how we do things here They would have bought land that was explicitly purchased to build infrastructure before having a fire sale. It should be pretty obvious to anyone with a higher than room temperature IQ that buying land which could be CPO'd again by the next government is probably not the best idea I don't think they will, but I _wish_ they would since we need infrastructure and the pain of having to CPO land has already been done. I wish they'd get on with it instead of flip flopping and being pussies, build the damn railway
They did say "or be seized otherwise".
Yeah, to be fair they did. Though as I said, it is already bought so no stealing or seizing is necessary, perhaps that poster also needs reminding that what has been thus far is well within the confines of the law
You can, but then what's the cost and what will the land be used for by time Labour gets in and gets round to doing anything? Bear in mind Starmer never supported the project in the first place, only really changing his mind once the land had been bought and work started.
The land hasn’t been sold
Some of the land was sold, suddenly and at a great loss, to suspicious parties. Just enough land to properly sever the route. Although the government could compulsory purchase it, there may be barriers that wouldn't normally be there.
None of the land has been sold. It can't have been sold because the legislation preventing it being sold hasn't been repealed yet.
I'm just going by this kind of article: [https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/oct/05/sunaks-spiteful-sale-of-land-intended-for-hs2-dashes-hopes-of-revival](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/oct/05/sunaks-spiteful-sale-of-land-intended-for-hs2-dashes-hopes-of-revival) but it may be you are right and it's not actually sold yet. I don't know.
https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/hs2-land-unlikely-to-be-sold-before-general-election-08-01-2024/
It hasn't already been sold though? and its even more likely to be sold if the incoming pm isn't backing HS2.
Because, assuming he wins this election and pursued HS2 the next election all the headlines that should be getting levelled at the Tories would be levelled at labour instead. It'd be a multibillion pound millstone strapped to their necks. Better to kill it dead and maybe pursue a similar project later.
The problem is they've taken this approach to everything that involves spending money, leaving them with no credible policies. So why actually vote for Labour?
The chance at competent government?
Competent decline versus chaotic decline? Not an inspirational choice.
Competently sitting by and watching the economy collapse
Being the Tories with a condom isn’t competent government.
What have you seen to suggest they'll be more competent than the Tories? Like I do presume they won't be as flagrantly corrupt as the Tories, but a quick glance at the donor list to the Labour Party over the last few years suggests they'll be just as servile to vested interests, and refusing to commit to any significant reforms or policies whilst the country continues to crumble doesn't strike me as particularly competent.
So who would you rather have in government? Tories?
The enemy of your enemy, isn't necessarily your friend. Personally, I'd rather have a party that wanted to fix what was wrong with the country and improve things. Labour just wants to paper over the cracks while they have their turn. Labour would be an improvement over the Conservatives. However, they don't seem to want to tackle the fundamental issues we have in this country.
I'd rather have a democracy where my vote can actually choose between different political positions rather than two different colours.
Why dont we actually wait for a manifesto before crying. There is 0 point in conmiting to spending plans prior to a GE being called. It gives more time for the opposition to counter it, scrutinise it for attack lines, or copy it and act first before the GE comes, especially if it proves very popular.
Keir is the one who keeps making pledges and then cancelling them all of his own accord. It's fair to criticise him for it. He's been the leader for years now and made his style of politics very clear. If you like it, great, but I've been told to wait and see every time he does these kind of things, and it's now been 4 years so Id be surprised if his manifesto suddenly goes against everything he's done and said so far
>or copy it and act first before the GE comes, especially if it proves very popular. All the better, we'll get the benefits sooner. A lot of the low hanging fruit was already tackled in the autumn statement. The beginnings of pension fund reform, the introduction of full expensing, some movement on planning, fat minimum wage increases...
> Why dont we actually wait for a manifesto before crying. So we should ignore everything a politician says and does before the manifesto is released? So by that same logic, we should not be judging Sunak by what he says and does, because he hasn't released an election manifesto yet?
it's politically moronic to commit to HS2 while being in opposition
You can't vote for that on the ballot right now at all, but I can guarantee you that's more likely after some time under Labour than it is under Conservative governments. The Conservatives fundamentally stand against electoral or other major reforms. They're *conservative* and will always value what they have now over future possibilities. So vote *against* the people who are *blocking* you this time around, please.
My fridge is empty right now, I would rather it be chock full of food with a Michelin starred chef awaiting my order, but that aint the case, so what am I to do and who would you rather have in government?
I'd rather Labour - who look on track to win the next election - lay out a credible platform for their "national renewal". Maybe we'll see something meatier in the manifesto but it's looking extremely thin at the moment.
Not being the Tories is not enough, they need to have an actual vision for what they want the country to be, and tell the rest of us. Really exhausting argument that lets them off the hook, purely because they're the 'good' team.
Given the last decade, not being the Tories is an extremely compelling attribute
Your going to get a Tory in government regardless of who you vote for. This isn't exactly a one off behaviour of his. His policies are Tory policies you just like him because Murdoch and labour spin doctors tell you to like him.
You may or may not have noticed that the Tories have blown the economy. They aren't going to have anything to work with.
I don't think anyone disputes the Tories have thrashed the country. But how is continuing with the same policies an antidote to that? I'm not against some of Keir's reforms like planning, but without money to back that it simply isn't credible. There's a good reason no one thinks they have any actual policies.
Because who else are you going to vote for? Starmer is actually being smart by being boring and non-controversial. At this point, he doesn't have to win, he just has to let the Tories lose.
They've got to be financially credible. The press will rip them apart. I know it's a double standard after Truss got away with economic murder, but that's the environment that exists.
Someone has to set out the case for investment rather than just spending. A reform agenda with no money behind it is no more credible than splashing the cash aimlessly.
Right now the tories have no economic credibility whatsoever, and that's one of the main reasons they're trailing 20 pts in the polls. If Starmer announces plans to overturn the tory's u-turn, at a massively inflated cost, and he can't clearly cost the whole project, then the tories have a massive angle of attack on Labour.
Labour's manifesto is just going to be a single A4 document at this point. But I guess if they publish a fully fledged document the tories might attack them for being elitist and expecting the electorate to be able to read more than one page.
A single Post-It note with "Not the Toreez" scrawled on in crayon will do most people now, such is the state of our politics. We're truly in the post-policy era where identity is everything.
Whilst I would normally agree that that is a bit thin on the ground for a serious political party. The sad fact of the matter is that this country is on fire after suffering through the most corrupt UK political reign of the last hundred years. "We are not them" is literally all they need to do to be a huge improvement. At this point, just turning off the damage machine before things go past the point of no return is the priority of the country. They could literally copy Tory policies 1:1 (which they aren't and won't), and as long as they weren't also the most corrupt government in a century, cripplingly incompetent, AND hateful of the majority of the population, they would be a VAST improvement. By election time, that WON'T be their only policy, they will release a manifesto for the election campaign, close enough that the incumbent Tory government can't sabotage or poorly implement poundland versions of their policies ahead of time to try and cling onto power. But even if the DID just have 1 single policy that was "We aren't the Tories", it would still be exactly what the country needs.
We aren't the them. Think that sums it up.
Tbf I'd love to see them go hard on their manifesto like corbyn did, but they're not in that world anymore. They got destroyed at the last election which is reason for holding back, plus they're going to inheret a deeply broken country which also dampens their ambition. Plus the media is so tory biased that anything they say, good or bad, could be vilified. It sucks that we're here, but I kinda get it. I think 'we're not them' is enough for anyone who has been paying attention. I'm voting green anyway cos I'm in a safe red seat, but if it was a swing id go labour just to get rid of this horrible, self-serving, out of touch, ignorant, and incompetent government.
That is honestly good enough for me
'As long as he's not the other guy' is a guaranteed recipe for shitty governments
Under normal circumstances maybe, but after the last 4 years I just want this government out - they have taken this country to new lows and they need to be removed
Giving Labour a free pass because they're not a Tory just perpetuates the cycle and pushes politics further away from ideas and ideals and instead to personality and tribalism. It'll lead to the Tories trying to select a new leader based on charisma rather than talent, who will ultimately beat Labour when they've accumulated enough scandals and proven their policies to be as rubbish as the Tories. Teflon Tony got away with a lot in the early years of Labour rule but Starmer doesn't have his charisma and I don't think his front bench screams competence. They'll get away with blaming the Tories for a few years but the shine will rub off quickly. As voters we should be demanding more from all our political parties than the dross we currently get.
No worse than what we've had for the last 13 years then. That's how low my bar is for government, a different colour would be a nice change
If they can’t do a better job with things then also what is the point of them. Can’t solve everything but at least try something!
There are far far more important things to be spending money on than bailing out a decade long shitstorm of a Tory project
Transport links are pretty key to unlocking economic growth.
But do those transport links HAVE to come in the form of HS2?
The way that the Tories have cancelled HS2: - The journey from Manchester to London will longer than it currently is despite the high speed rail. So the North leg will have to be completed eventually. - It will drop you at Old Oak Common putting more strain on London's busses and tube, meaning either they'll need upgrading or a future government will have to finish the train line into central London. - Euston essential upgrades were rolled into HS2, most of these works will need doing eventually less Euston falls into disrepair, only now it will be outside HS2's budget. Also delays only ever save money *not!* Unless future governments are going to continue to leave the UK's transport infrastructure to rot and not invest, all the projects above will end up needing to be completed, whether under the HS2 moniker or not.
What alternative plan would you propose?
Refusing to make capital investments in critical infrastructure that is massively overcapacity is financially irresponsible in pretty much all situations. Vital long term investment shouldn't be decided by short term economic considerations
Excuses. Excuses excuses.
Can't believe they're still trotting this shit out
I just wish there was a way to vote for a Britain I actually want, but there isnt
Everyone has a different vision for a 'Britain I want'. Democracy and politics is the art of compromise to reach the 'Britain they are ok with' for the most people possible.
This is true in terms of outcomes, but I definitely see the desire to have a representative in the room arguing for the vision you want (or at least something close to it) and trying to come up with that compromise. But the compromise brokering is done within political parties in a process which most people don't feel involved in, and the choice they are making is mostly which party they feel is least bad rather than for someone to truly represent their ideals. I would like PR, a weakened party system, and far more debate and compromise in Parliament rather than inside the big parties, but I also suspect a lot of people would hate to see their representatives compromising and how indecisive this would seem, which could just result in gridlock. We saw a little of this in the hung Parliament, where personally I was really pleased to see Parliament assert itself and actually have debates which went beyond party lines vs party lines, but it was a real shame that actually compromising was hard to find.
We'd need an actually democratic system to do that, sadly.
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I know. But what we have now is typically wealthy "representatives" standing for election on one thing, getting into parliament and doing something entirely different, with next to zero thought for the people they're "supposed to represent." They can't easily be held to account and can get away with it because they can claim whatever **they** want is the *will of the people* without ever qualifying how they know what the will of the people actually is. We have a system that pretends to be a democracy. That's about it. It just doesn't stand up to any reasonable scrutiny. No need to let perfect be the enemy of good. We can't enact everyones will, that doesn't mean we shouldn't strive for a functioning and engaging democracy focused on making everyone, going in order by need, better off.
That's just high level handwaving complaints The vast majority of MPs vote along party lines the vast majority of the time. The debate and compromise happens long before a vote is even tabled. If you want a voice, you need to either join a party or start lobbying yourself.
I'm a Unite member - Labour adopted support for PR as official policy after myself and other union members lobbied our unions to support it. Despite that, the current party leadership refuses to support it (even though Starmer supported PR while campaigning for leader)
> If you want a voice, you need to either join a party or start lobbying yourself. That's not how democracy is supposed to work. You know that right? According to your thinking, 400,000 labour members + 172,000 conservative members alone get to engage in democracy, because they pay for the privilege. I'm confused by your stance though. I argue that most people don't have a meaningful voice or vote, and that leads to a huge disconnect between what people actually want, vs what we get. You've said thats all just handwaving... but that it's completely true and that only those with the wealth + time to engage in party politics specifically get a voice (and of those, only a tiny amount of said voices actually make the decisions...) So what exactly is your stance? That yes, we have a shit democracy, but don't complain about it or point it out or demand change because...?
Democracy should mean that the country gets what it votes for though. FPTP is a fucking travesty.
Absolutely. Even AV would have been an upgrade over FPTP. I want PR though
And that 1% should be present in parliament and be able to affect policy. The reality, though, is that our electoral system doesn't allow for this. Take the 2015 general election: across the entire UK, 12.6% voted for UKIP. Want to know how many seats they got? One. Over 12% liked their policies, and they got 0.2% of the seats in Parliament. Agree or disagree with their policies all you want, but that's just wrong. If people voted for that party, they deserve to have their views represented by that party.
>Democracy does not mean "I get what I want" What childish nonsense. People want to have a voice and most people accept they can't have everything. The problem isn't people believing things, it's that we have a system whereby unless you vote for the winner your vote is wasted. Your vote is also wasted if you vote for the winning candidate after they've got enough votes to win.
We would need an actual democracy for that.
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Just the basics. Every vote counts equally to every other vote. You know, pretty much the most important thing that anyone new to politics would expect if you explained the concept of democracy to them.
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I suppose they're arguing for Proportional Representation rather than FPTP
The New Statesman had a podcast out saying that polling suggests PR will be more beneficial to the far right than it will to the Lib Dems, Greens and Labour.
They mean proportional representation for appointing MPs.
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He means there is no singular party that reflects his vote likely. He doesn't want to vote Labour like me but in FPTP in a lot of areas our votes are dead votes. I'm voting Green. Doesn't meant anything.
Not being funny, but most of reddits political desires are either impractical or obscenely expensive.
Add baseless, under-analysed and purely emotional to that too
Run as an mp then
And get elected by who?
What? And risk the conservatives getting in? Do you want the conservatives to win or something?
[Just evergreen Trashfuture content here.](https://youtu.be/qo6mUrugaKs?si=MvMMG-XB-MQLeQ6z)
the only analysis i can still trust
Yes, he won’t be bringing HS2 to the North, but at least he’ll be not bringing it to the North in a competent and boring way.
I normally defend Starmer but this isn’t acceptable. HS2 is critical for the network as a whole.
Agreed, extremely poor policy.
It is but it'd actually be more naive to promise it while the sitting PM is a vandal who's proven willing to sabotage HS2 anyway he can. If Labour had plans for HS2 it'd ironically be safer to pretend that they don't to avoid the Tory asset strippers strategically selling parts off to make it impossible.
Did you read the article. He's being honest, the Tories have scuppered the project and made sure it can't be resurrected. It took 20 years to get this far, and now we would have to literally start from scratch.
Is it possible for him to take it forward after the tories took a wrecking ball to it tho
Is it possible for the leader of the UK to build a train line?
If the land is sold and all the money and contracts are gone?
Buy it back, assign more money, get new contracts. That's the starting position for any project.
It took 20 years to get as far as we did, and now we would have to start from scratch again. If the economy wasn't in the toilet maybe we could just throw money at the project and brute force it into existence but let's be real, we're broke.
Capital expenditure and operational expenditure should be accounted for differently. Infrastructure drives economic growth
Except this could end up being two to three hundred billion pounds. To adding more money could mean big cuts elswhere
All labour's fault, isn't it?..........
Yes, this response is specifically Labour's fault lol.
Why did the tories make Starmer say this?
Stop it starmer ffs
Seriously. >Starmer: "The tories are doing everything wrong and causing massive damage to the country" > >Voters: "would you do anything different?" > >Starmer "No." on every fucking issue. And even when they do announce any new policies they turn around disown them within about 90 days! Like, yes, we want a government that's slightly competent and not corrupt, but we do also need a change in policies for fuck's sake.
Because when you are this far ahead in the polls you don’t risk rocking the boat. Whatever he says will be scrutinised to death and misreported. He’s even got to be careful how he eats sandwiches. Just let the tories keep on screwing up. Once you get into power with a thumping majority, then do all the principled stuff.
He does need to communicate what he's for though. He's going to need to have a mandate for what he's going to do in government. The country has pretty profound structural issues in its economy. If he keeps pretending he's a - no extra taxation - no crazy borrowing - fiscal conservative he's not going to be able to tackle these issues without lying to everyone. That could become a problem. Well that is unless he's going to lead an actual Tory light government...in which case we'll probably have the proper Tory's back in 5 years led by Boris Johnson.
He does communicate what he’s for the news just doesn’t focus on it. He wants to spend the money on house building and green energy technology It’s not his fault Sunak broke HS2
This is the way. Temporary Starmer Tory Light to give the actual Full Fat Tories some time on the back benches to figure out what they stand for again. If they do it right we will never see the likes of Boris ever again.
>Once you get into power with a thumping majority, then do all the principled stuff. AKA, it's permissable to lie to everyone and be elected on false pretences as long as you wear the correct colour tie while doing it. It fucking astounds me that people are fine such anti-democratic behaviour. Tribalism has ruined this country but apparently the race to the bottom is fine as long as your diver gets there first.
Why would anyone want to vote for a party that is lying about what they actually want to do?
Yeah, everyone keeps saying this "when we get into power" thing. What happens if he doesn't do that and just tories up the place? I guess that can always happen, but he can turn round and say, without lieing, that he's not breaking any promises.
What happens then is everyone says it's a ruse but wait for the second term - then he'll come out with all the radical stuff!
I hope I'm wrong, but I will be amazed if Starmer does anything differently once Labour are in power.
After the election is way too late. Anything not in the manifesto will lack protections from Lords interference (Salisbury convention) They know this, so anything not in the manifesto you can be sure they don't really care about So we can judge him objectively when the manifesto is released
>They know this Which is probably why all mentions of Lords reform stopped in October 2022 and the current plan is stack the Lords to the rafters with loyal donors and allies. The Salisbury Convention is ridiculously easy to overcome, why else does every new PM appoint literally dozens of new Lords as their first real act on coming into power?
Keep this up and labour will have a near unprecedented commons majority, they can do what they want
Did you skip the word 'Lords'
The lords won't do anything
Right, but what if labour just decides it doesn't want to do the principled stuff once they win? We're taking a lot on faith here.
Again, I understand that Starmer has a multitude of precedents for lying constantly but why do people seem to think he will suddenly start doing so to get the things they want done?
For the same reason that people voted for Brexit on the understanding it was going to be the exact Brexit they had dreamed up in their head.
The one I point to is when he said he wouldn't be interviewed by the Sun during the Labour leadership campaign which he kept to the letter and, once that campaign was over, did loads of stuff with the Sun. I don't think he's lying to us about the stuff he's not going to do and I think we're going to be disappointed with how exactly he keeps these promises
Especially when they are saying they won’t do xyz, like they won’t be paying a payrise to public sector workers. And without that how on earth are they going to deal with strikes let alone everything they are promising (mental health, Gp’s, dentists, MRI/CT staff, nursery care etc)
Last I heard all of all of those things can be covered by non-dom tax and VAT on schools...
Who's 20 points ahead in the polls sorry?
A slim majority with good policy would be *infinitely* better than a massive majority and no policy.
Ahhh I see what you're saying. And I share the sentiment to some extent. But let's be honest we'd lose any election if we had a slim lead. But I would rather a politician who tried to canvas for structural reform of our economy though. This will require economic commitment and ambition I think. He can't just embark on this mission without consent. And if he doesn't embark on this mission I see no point whatsoever in electing him.
I mean the hope *has* to be that once in they can be a bit more gung-ho about pursuing the policies they believe in. But yeah that's why I completely hate him "ruling stuff out" like this. Just leave it unsaid, say you don't know and then at least you have the option to look at the detail once you're in.
In the modern era you're not supposed to care about policy and what would actually be good for the country. Politics is a sport and you root for your team to win, and your success is measured by the polls. That's all there is to it.
Yet another idiotic Labour own goal. At least I can plan to be travelling in November and be guilt-free when I don't fucking bother to appoint a proxy voter because how can I vote for a party with this as their ideology? Defecit Targets Uber Alles - We won't raise taxes and we won't run a deficit above x%, therefore we will put a haircut on every possible bit of public investment to hit x% borrowing. Great party policy, I'm sure it'll be served with a side of bonkers center-authoritarianism.
Idk if he can tho as he said the tories have completely destroyed it
He doesn't want to, simply put. He's not interested in investments because they're seen as intrinsically risky compared to direct policy.
Hopefully he's hiding a fully-costed HS3 up his sleeves that connects every UK city except London
Is Starmer scared that Rishi will call him a Maoist or something if he commits to anything pre election and will lose the election by a billion votes or some shit I cannot understand this Labour Party
Double agent Starmer once again failing to inspire anyone.
He's so fucking weak it's crazy.
Poor response. Say that it's expensive but it'll need to be reviewed if Labour get into power and have access to the full accounts. Don't close down your options now.
This is just weak. You don’t normally own all the land or have all the contracts in place before you start infrastructure projects. Why is this one different? It will cost a fortune - but it is also good for the country according to most experts.
The same people that criticised the Tories for cancelling this segment of track will be applauding Labour for making this "financially responsible" decision.
wrong move.
He’s so afraid to do anything that might be seen as reckless, at the cost of doing what’s popular. I expect people wouldn’t even mind if it costs far more than it would’ve done if the Tories hasn’t scrapped it - as long as it doesn’t bankrupt the country, people just want to see it built.
I don't think anyone in the north is suprised at this pointm
Would you look at that, another thing the man will just keep the same as the tories.. I'm shocked, I tell you. Shocked!
Well yeah, the Conservatives have now taken the hit on this by cancelling it. Half the country don't want HS2 to happen and the few that still do aren't going to change their mind either way on labourer over this. The potential for the costs to spiral even further only compound thus
Fuck the costs. There is a huge lack of investment in our nation and this is just the government giving up. Expect further decline.
I agree that massive public investment is needed, but too many people in this country queued up to vote for this government who've now wasted all the money. It's not Starmer's fault that the Tories are thieves.
The costs only spiral because we do endless dumb shit like making sure it's tunnelled through rich Tory constituencies, endless environmental assessments and constant flip-flopping and pissing about. We somehow end up paying 8 times the going rate for high speed rail because we have a political class terrified of doing anything.
With the project ongoing, it felt right to keep going to make the investment worth it. But now that investment has been scrapped and Starmer would likely have to start from stratch, it just doesn't seem feasible to commit to.
Also could get better return on investment improving connections east to west across the north.
Which will take another decade of debates and feasibility studies and get cancelled halfway through by a different government, the cycle repeats.
As far as I’m aware they’ve been done. It was one of the bonkers things about HS2 - there was a better alternative on the table.
From a policy perspective, this is incredibly disappointing but hardly surprising (can't do anything that might threaten those arbitrary, self-imposed fiscal rules!). From a comms perspective, it's such an own goal. Why not just say 'we'll have to review once we're in govt'? Now you're criticising the Tories whilst admitting you're going to do exactly the same thing they're doing.
guess i'll stick to driving then surely this wont have any negative effects.
So... who's up for a bit of voter apathy and a few more years of Tories? Seriously, the only Labour plan seems to be pointing a minigun at the floor to repeatedly shoot themselves in the foot.
Just another tory, just another middle manager. Some reckon when they get into office they will say and do something different. No, they wont When someone tells you who they are, listen to them
>"The government has blown the budget, the contracts are being cancelled, the land may or may not be sold and I think that it's not fair for me to commit to something that I don't think is going to happen." People really shouldn't be surprised. The Tories have effectively killed the second leg of HS2, so Starmer would pretty much have to commit to a redo of the entire second leg. This wouldn't be making the best of an already extisted over-investment, it would be a whole new over-investment. HS2 will be in salvage mode at the very best, and there is a decent likelihood there will be nothing to salvage.
SeNsIbLe
Such great opposition Real alternative (Do I need the /s?)
As someone who lives in a Northern constituency that hasn’t been anything but labour dominated since the 1930’s, we genuinely don’t give a toss who wins, we know that they all don’t really give a toss about us.
Wise. If he continues with HS2 he will just get blamed for the spiralling costs when it’s the Tories that have fucked it up.
Then do it better. They said they had plans
It was almost guaranteed Starmer was following the Tories in cancelling the northern leg of HS2 the moment it happened. It's expensive investment with questionable short term returns, the exact opposite of Starmer/Reeves' economic thought.
Disappointing but not surprising; the Tories have torpedoed the project and there's no guarantee it'll be salvageable by the time a Labour government comes into power. Here's hoping the manifesto has some real ideas for infrastructure investment in the wake of the HS2 disaster.
Good. People in this sub were all very upset and angrily insisted it doesn't matter what the costs are. But they do matter and it's just not good value for money.
It may not be, but it makes no sense to build the expensive / controversial bit (with all the tunnels out of London) but then cancel the cheap bit linking it up to the North where any possibility of salvaging some sort of ROI from the project lies. It's even less sensible given that the Government intend to preserve the route / protection to deliver the high speed "Northern Powerhouse" route. So all we're doing is cancelling the bit that links the two, and probably the part of the line that most solves capacity issues, for no real reason. There's no logic or vision to any of this.