Yes, it’s back – after a gap of nearly 18 months! To be honest, there’s been no point in doing one of these for two reasons. One is that there’s so few of these people left nowadays the field is pretty thin and two – the ones left are all pretty much crazy. If you don’t believe me, go and have a look at the comments from people posting on the StopHs2 Facebook page!
But I couldn’t resist resurrecting it after seeing this classic tweet from StopHs2 ‘Chair’ Penny Gaines which went out earlier today. It’s an absolute pearler! The levels of egotism and perspective failure are weapons-grade. Let’s take a look…
“I told them my vote will depend on whether they oppose Hs2” tweets Gaines. Well, I’m sure the canvasser who knocked on her door must be absolutely sick to death of hearing that said to them. Wait, where does Gaines live? That absolute hotbed of anti HS2 activity, otherwise known as err, Bournemouth…
Yes, Bournemouth. Now I don’t know which of the two constituencies she lives in (East or West) but I’m willing to bet that HS2 isn’t exactly high up on their list of concerns. Brexit? Absolutely. The NHS? Almost certainly – but not HS2!
So, how many people in the two constituencies signed that last daft and doomed StopHs2 petition? Here’s the results.
Wow! All of 31 eh? I’m sure that’ll really make Tobias Ellwood MP change his mind on HS2. Oh, wait, he’s a strong supporter of the project as he’s written here as recently as August 2019! Meanwhile, in Bournemouth West…
Oh dear, just 17 signatures, all of 0.016%. I’m sure that’s giving sitting MP Conor Burns and his canvassers sleepless nights! He’s been absent for the past couple of votes on HS2, but then he’s now a Government Minister, so the idea that he’ll vote against party policy is moonshine. It’s also worth mentioning he’s got a healthy majority!
This rubbish from Gaines does show one thing – why no-one takes what’s left of the anti HS2 grassroots campaign seriously anymore. They really are so divorced from reality it’s actually funny! Now we’re in the run-up to an election, expect to hear more nonsense like this as the few remaining antis bluster and try to puff out their chests and flex non-existent political muscle.
I’ve no doubt the election is going to be a fascinating night as I don’t think we’ve had one with these levels of political uncertainty for a very long time, but there’s one thing that isn’t going to be a factor in any of this and that’s HS2. Not in the Chilterns, and certainly not in Bournemouth!
At midnight, yet another StopHs2 turned into the inevitable pumpkin. After a frantic last minute ‘surge’ (well what passes for one in their eyes) it staggered over the finish line with 24,075 signatures, having gained less than 80 in the final 24 hours! The 2018 one managed 28,938. To say this is pathetic is an understatement, especially when you consider this is a national figure. The UK’s current population size is reckoned by the UN to be 67.53 million (as there’s been no UK census since 2011), which rather puts this figure into perspective, it’s just 0.03%. So much for HS2 being a ‘national’ issue! I’ll crunch the numbers here as they make interesting reading when you compare them to the results of the last time Joe Rukin tried one of these petitions back in 2017. I’ll analyse them in detail shortly, but first, let’s look at what conclusions we can draw.
StopHs2 really is just a ‘Nimby’ campaign
Yes, I know they’ve spent years denying this, pretending there’s widespread national opposition to HS2, but these petitions provide the statistics to prove that’s simply not the case. It’s why I love it when Rukin starts yet another one as they provide empirical evidence, not just rumour. These petitions log the number of signatures by Parliamentary constituency, giving a running total and percentage. Here’s the map for England. Those constituencies with the most signatures appear in a darker colour. Now, looking at that map, have a wild guess where Phase 1 of HS2 runs?
Sure, there’s signatures from other parts of the UK, after all, various Green groups and the Brexit party have publicised it amongst their supporters, but they’re statistically insignificant. The fact 4 people in Banff & Buchan in Scotland or 2 in West Tyrone in Northern Ireland have signed is neither here nor there, because 49.64% of all the petition signatures have come from just 9.6% of the UK’s 650 constituencies, the 63 that HS2 just happens to pass through…
Their ‘Grassroots’ campaign is dying
Their 2017 petition managed 28,398 signatures, this one’s only managed 24,075. As you’ll see from the numbers from the different phases, whilst the phase 1 signatures have decreased, the ones for phase 2a and the two phase 2b legs have collapsed. In some cases dramatically.
In reality, this petition is a last gasp from the Chilterns and other areas on phase 1 where minds have been focussed by the fact that workers and machinery are already on the ground, preparing for construction.
Another reason for the collapse is that – because this is essentially a ‘Nimby’ campaign, many of its supporters have been bought out and moved away in the past few years. HS2’s no longer an issue for them. This was always going to happen, but it’s accelerated as the number of homes purchased has accelerated. One only has to look around Euston, where the new homes built to house the people displaced by Hs2 works are now occupied and the old ones are being demolished. This is reflected in the number of signatures to the petition.
Once Phase 1 construction is fully underway, the StopHs2 campaign will fracture and what’s left of its national organisation will collapse
In many ways, this has already happened. Of the three ‘national’ groups, two have already collapsed. AGAHST (Action Groups Against HS2) went to the wall in 2015 and the HS2 ‘Action Alliance’ gave up in 2016. Both were Chiltern based. That leaves ‘StopHs2’ which is a bit of a joke to be honest. It’s Campaign Manager (and I use that term loosely) Joe Rukin runs it from his flat in Kenilworth, Warwickshire, whilst its Chair (of what? Ed) Penny Gaines now lives in Bournemouth! It has little relevance away from Phase1 other than to provide a few campaign materials and Joe’s occasional ‘rent a quotes’ to the national media. In the real world, they never has any involvement in the Phase 2a petitioning process, nor will they have in the phase 2b process when that finally gets off the ground. As much of their funding comes from Phase 1 Nimbys, we can expect that to dry up too. Of course, someone might be foolish enough to offer Joe Rukin a proper job, but he’s been looking for years and his CV isn’t exactly scintillating. Meanwhile, many local ‘action’ groups went to the wall years ago, leaving Facebook and Twitter littered with their remains like an old battlefield.
They still have no political support
10 years on, HS2 still commands enormous cross-party political support. In fact, this has grown, as can be seen the way Northern and Midlands leaders have become an increasingly loud voice in campaigns to ensure that HS2 is built in its entirety. Added to their are the powerful voices of business leaders up and down the country.
In contrast, what do StopHs2 have? A handful of MPs, mostly the same old faces like Cheryl Gillan, the Green Party and now The Brexit party, who are likely to emulate the ‘success’ of their leader’s last chariot for his ego – UKIP – who never managed to get a single MP – even by standing in the Chilterns…
Remember, all these people, along with ‘celebrity’ environmentalist Chris Packham all encouraged people to sign this petition. Packham alone has 356,000 Twitter followers, the Green Party 284,000 and the Brexit party 202,000 – yet they were all spectacularly unsuccessful in getting people to sign the petition. This is why, despite all the bluster you’re seeing from some Nimbys in the run up to the general election, HS2 simply isn’t an election issue.
Right, let’s crunch some numbers!
These are comparison of the signatures between yesterday and when the last petition closed after 6 months in March 2018. First up – phase 1. I’ve highlighted the increases on 2018.
The interesting thing here is that many of the increases are from such a low base number they’re insignificant, especially when you consider what percentage of constituents they are! Their ‘best’ result is in Chesham and Amersham, where long-standing opponent of HS2, Dame Cheryl Gillan MP holds sway. Even there they can’t get beyond 1.9% – and these are meant to be their heartlands! Kenilworth & Southam is their next best number where they have 1.6%, but as this is where Joe Rukin is that’s amazingly poor. Buckingham gets 1.5%, after that the numbers really start to drop.
2,570.105 live in the 23 constituencies phase 1 traverses. Just 0.36% of them have signed the petition – and these constituencies are meant to be the hot-bed of the Stophs2 campaign! Meridian’s the only interesting one, where their number have increased by 256%, but that’s still only 250 signatures and the total’s just 0.32% of all constituents!
Now for the phase 2 routes. First up is the leg to Manchester. This contains 18 constituencies and includes phase 2a to Crewe.
Their numbers here have plummeted by over 27%, in one notable case (Tatton) they’ve dropped by half! Tatton is one of the few places on the Manchester leg where there’s ever been an active ‘action’ group (Mid Cheshire) but even here they’re obviously struggling! Their ‘best’ result here is in Tatton, with a miserly 0.3%. It’s the only constituency off phase 1 that’s highlighted on the map in a darker colour.
Out of all 1,811.397 constituents, a measly 0.08% have signed the petition, down from 0.12% in 2018. Just like the other phases of HS2, it’s worth noting that what these figures show is that the StopHS2 ‘campaign’ get the vast majority of it’s tiny support from rural areas and has virtually bugger-all influence in the cities. There’s never been a single ‘action’ group in urban Birmingham, Leeds or Manchester.
Next up, the 18 constituencies on the phase 2 leg to Leeds, which produces some very interesting results…
The numbers signing have collapsed from 4793 in 2018 to just 1246 now. That’s a huge drop of 74%! Not a single constituency has registered a raise. Look at Rother Valley, down from 1650 to just 121, a drop of 92.6%! Hemsworth’s dropped by 73% and Bolsover by 69.1% whilst NW Leics is down 69.89%.
The route to Leeds was always an interesting one as the anti Hs2 campaign on that leg was always fractious and also full of bluster. They spent a lot of time fighting amongst themselves as some wanted Hs2 cancelling whilst others actually wanted Hs2 but fought against the final route selection. It also suffered from a fair few personalities who could best be described with the old expression, “all mouth and no trousers”! How quickly the ‘action’ groups have collapsed on the Leeds leg has surprised even me, but they’d sown the seeds of their own destruction right from the start.
So, what’s next for the stophs2 ‘campign’? Limbo. Now that a general election’s been called the Oakervee review is almost certainly going to be put on ice until afterwards. Of course, they could always resurrect their daft ‘no votes for you with HS2’ Twitter hashtag, but they’re firing blanks. They’re no political threat to anyone and the electorate has rather more pressing matters to vote on than building a new railway!
For reference, you can find a previous blog looking at the long failure of StopHs2 petitions here. There’s also this blog which crunched the numbers in their 2017-18 petition.
After a wonderful few days in Belgium and the sanity of being in a country that’s not tearing itself apart both politically and economically, I’m back in Brexit Britain where the madhouse continues.
The good news? We’re not leaving the EU on October 31st and Johnson’s not going to end up dead in a ditch (appealing as that idea may be to more than a few people). The bad news? In an act of monumental political stupidity, ‘Magic Grandad’ Jeremy Corbyn has given Johnson exactly what he wanted and has agreed to a December general election, claiming that he’s succeeded in getting a ‘no-deal’ Brexit taken off the table. It’s nonsense of course. Instead, he’s now mixed up Brexit (but no second referendum) with a general election. A general election he cannot win. What the fall-out from this will be is incalculable, as the old political tribal allegiances have completely broken down. All we do know is that there’s going to be a lot more MPs around that won’t be from either the Tory or Labour party. My sincere hope is that Corbyn’s just signed his own political death-warrant, but the problem is the collateral damage to the country his decision to agree to an election could cause.
Make no mistake, this is going to be a very nasty campaign. The Brexiters are going to throw everything at winning this and getting their ultimate aim, a no-deal Brexit, and Corbyn’s just handed them that opportunity. The only thing the rest of us can do now is vote tactically for any anti Brexit candidate who has the best chance of winning. What we also need is for an outbreak of common-sense and willingness to co-operate between the anti Brexit parties so that they don’t split the vote with competing candidates, the way the Brexit party is offering to with the Tories.
Whilst the parties haggle over the exact date of the election (December 9th or 12th) there’s only one thing looking certain, whenever the election is, it’s going to be a rollercoaster night. Many Remainers are sick to the back teeth of Corbyn’s shenanigans and they’ve no trust in the man left at all. At the same time Johnson has made Teresa May actually look competent!
The gang’s had a brilliant couple of days in Belgium but now it’s time to make our way home. After a leisurely breakfast at our hotel our merry band piled into a taxi to the railway station and we’re now on the train back to Brussels. Despite the fact it’s a Sunday morning the double-deck push-pull set that’s working our train’s busy, mostly with people dozing! That said, we’ve managed to find some seats up on the top deck today, which is giving us all chance to catch up on news from home and the world via a plethora of portable devices.
We’re not heading back the the UK straightaway. Instead, we’re having a few hours break in Brussels. Today’s my 60th birthday, so we’re going to have a few drinks in the city to celebrate first before catching our Eurostar.
Today the six of us are off on our own private trip (hosted by Quasimodo tours) to some of the major First World War battlefield sites around Ypres. Despite four years of bloody fighting and all the lives lost, the front line around the town moved back and forth littke more than 4 miles between 1914-18. Here’s the map we’ve been given as a guide.
10:30.
Our first stop. The German war cemetery at Langemark. 44,000 Germans (and two British) soldiers are buried here. 1000s of the Germans are 18 year old volunteers who had less than a months drill training before being sent to the front
19:33.
To be honest, today has been too much to absorb and try and blog about at the same time. We’ve visited a vast array of sights on what was a fantastic and informative tour, but that was also deeply moving. The sheer scale of the slaughter and destruction is hard to take in. I’ll blog about this in detail in the future. Right now I’ll just leave you with a few pictures from the day.
Just some of the names of the German soldiers at Langemark.The Canadian war memorial.Row upon row of memorials at the main British cemetery at Tyne Cot.The excellent and informative museum at Hoodge Crater which is packed with memorabilia from the war. Just some of the recovered artefacts at Hoodge Crater, which is actually built atop the remains of the crater itself. Hill 60 has lain untouched since the end of the war and gradually been reclaimed by nature. It still bears all the scars and shell craters left behind. Hill 60 sums up the futility of the fighting. 10s of 1000s died fighting over the land which swapped hands several sides.
There’s not much of a blog from me today as we’ve been far too busy exploring Bruge. We went out at 08:00 this morning and didn’t get back to the hotel before 6. After a short break and chance to freshen up we were out again to enjoy a lovely, relaxed Greek meal at the Olive Tree restaurant. I’ll write about our experiences at greater length in the next couple of days, but tonight it’s time for an early night as we’re off on a tour of some of the places with links to World War 1. I’ve never visited places like Ypres, or any of the battlefield sights, but all of our group want to and for me it’s more than a passing interest, as my maternal Grandfather fought in that war as a soldier in the Scottish regiment known as the ‘Black Watch’. I’ll try (if I can) to post a few bits from the day, but if not. It can wait until another time. In the meantime, here’s a couple of pictures from today.
We’re both up, scrubbed, fed, packed and waiting for the taxi to take us to Halifax station to meet up with our friends for the first leg of our trip to Bruges in Belgium….
08:30.
Leg one. Having met up with the others we’re now on Grand Central’s 08:09 from Halifax to Kings Cross, a direct train service from Bradford that started running in 2010. Nowadays their 4 five- car trains are packed, even in First Class. Don’t let this picture fool you, just look at how many seats are reserved which will be occupied in the next few stops…
The six of us are spread throughout the train as tickets were booked separately. It’ll be the same on Eurostar, so the only time we’ll meet up is between trains or in the buffet on the Eurostar!
12:55.
We had a mad scramble in London as some people had breakfast (which was late coming) then confusion at Eurostar check-in as they were overwhelmed by the weight of numbers. With the amount of baggage folk carry nowadays the number of staff and machines available were overwhelmed, leading to stress all round. Passport control was just as swamped. Despite checking in the required 45 mins before we still had to be ‘fast-tracked’ to get to our train on time. This led to confusion as the group got split up. Despite this, we made it and we’re just pulling out now.
Our train is one of the original Alstom built TMST sets, albeit a refurbished one. Our coach (16) only has a handful of empty seats
16:00. (Belgium time).
About to arrive in Brussels. It’s been an interesting trip I’ll blog more about shortly once we change yrains, but suffice to say these old trains are tired, despite the refurbishment.
17:00.
So much for updating the blog on a nice, quiet Belgian train. This is us on a double-deck train from Brussels Midi to Brugges. It’s rammed!
18:12.
– and relax! We’ve arrived at our hotel in Brugges, checked in and freshened up. Now it’s time to explore. First stop is a liytle var kbown to Tony (Allan) that I’ve just heard some very good things about. According to anither friend it’s like walking into “The Leaky Cauldron” from the Harry Potter films. Expect pictures shortly!
Today’s really been a mixture! My plan was to spend most of it at home catching up on picture editing and paperwork but the weather was so good this morning that I kiboshed that idea after a few hours. Admittedly, I was in the office at 6am, so I didn’t feel too guilty as I’d got a lot done already.
I stayed locally as there’s enough of interest at the moment because of the new trains we’ve got in the area, plus the abundance of woodland which makes for a fantastic backdrop this time of year. In fact I was in two minds about which locations to choose, but a changing forecast made my mind up for me.
My first port of call was half an hour’s walk away, which was a really pleasant stroll as the weather was so balmy. I headed down to an overbridge near Dryclough Junction which is where the line from Halifax splits into two routes. One heads West through the Calder Valley, the other heads to Brighouse and Huddersfield. Here’s how it looked today.
A splash of autumn colour as 195107 passes Dryclough Junction whilst working 1D77, the 1238 Leeds to Chester. Timekeeping’s improved today, this was only seven minutes late! The lower lines in the background lead to Greetland Junction and the route to Brighouse. Halifax town is behind the train.
This time of year the sun doesn’t hang around. I only had a 30-40 minute window at Dryclough before heavy shadows crept in, so I moved on to a very different location and a completely different kind of shot in the hills above Halifax, helped by the fact the weather completely clouded up in the afternoon, otherwise I’d have been shooting straight into a low winter sun. I do like the views around Halifax and beacon Hill as they can really reflect the era when the Industrial revolution (and a colonialist empire) transformed the landscape in both Lancashire and Yorkshire.
The first of the class, CAF’s 195001 leaves Halifax, past the famous confectionary factory in the background that produces such well known items as ‘Quality Street’ before the unit disappears off the Beacon Hill viaduct into the 1105 yard long tunnel of the same name. Back in the 1980s this picture would have been impossible as all you’d have been looking at was a huge multi-storey mill that was blocking the view. It’s long gone and the site’s now occupied by a low height ‘Matalan’ shop. Here’s a slightly different view as 195104 arrives into Halifax station whilst working 1D79, the 1438 Leeds to Chester which was (almost) on time! To the right of the picture you can see the old Halifax signal box which was decommissioned last October. The stone wall in front of the white van was once the start of the series of viaducts that carried the old Great Northern Railway line to Bradford via Queensbury. It closed to passengers in 1955 but remained open for goods traffic until 1963.
Tomorrow we shift tempo – and country – as Dawn and I are off to Belgium by train from Halifax with a small group of friends from our local pub, the ‘Big 6‘. Six from the 6 are off to Bruges for three nights of fun and frolics, food beer and culture – as well as some history, so expect a rolling blog tomorrow as we make our way to London by train before catching the Eurostar to Brussels, then an internal service to Bruges. It’s going to be wonderful to be back on the European mainland in a civilised country and away from the continual and utter shambles that’s Brexit – which I promise not to mention, (well, not much, anyway) Stay tuned!
After yesterday’s excitement about the arrival into service of the new trains, today’s been back to business very much as usual with lots of late running, trains terminating short and cancellations. I popped down to Sowerby Bridge for an hour to see what was happening. It wasn’t great. Several Leeds – Southport and Chester services were cancelled with some Southport trains terminated at Wigan Wallgate. Here’s a look at some of the days services.
195119 worked 1E60, the 1124 Chester to Leeds which was one of the few trains I saw that actually ran to time. The 195s superior braking and acceleration should help when there’s only a few minutes delay involved, as there was on this service earlier in the run.This service wasn’t so lucky. 195107 passes at speed whilst working 2M14, the 12:18 Leeds to Manchester Victoria. It got as far as Hebden Bridge before being cancelled with a door fault. Door problems appear to be a recurring theme with the new units. This seems to be a mixture of mechanical and human problems. Hopefully, the bugs will be ironed out quickly.The next 195 to appear was 2-car 195002 which had been allocated to 1D77, the 12:38 Leeds to Chester. It also suffered from late running, arriving at Sowerby Bridge 3 mins down. It dropped another 5 mins before arriving in Manchester. Another service with problems was 1J10, operated by a pair of 2-car Class 158s, 158859 and 158851. This should have been the 11:24 from Southport to Leeds but it was terminated at Wigan Wallgate on its Westward run, so formed an 11:57 Wigan Wallgate to Leeds.Close on the heels of 1J10 was 195007 working non-stop through Sowerby on 2E15, the 12:58 Manchester Victoria to Leeds which was running 10 minutes late. On its return it formed a Chester service. The last observation of my short stint was 195111 non-stop on 2M16, the 13:18 Leeds to Manchester Victoria which was only a minute late!
As this is early days and there’s always teething problems with new fleets I’m hoping these issues will be sorted out quickly. What’s harder to sort out is the cancellations and delays that have nothing to do with the new trains. After the heartache and hassle passengers and businesses have suffered over the past few years due to the rail strikes, punctuality needs addressing as a matter of urgency. It’s easy to see how the Northern TOC can become a political football when the service is so unreliable. It could be very tempting to politicians desperate to curry favour and secure a ‘cheap win’ and political plaudits by taking back the franchise. Add in the fact that Sowerby Bridge and Mytholmroyd are due to lose many of their services from the December timetable (I understand they’re due to be cut by a third during the week and by half on Sundays) and you can understand local displeasure.
It’s disappointing on another level too. Network Rail have invested in the route, having spent over £100m on new signalling track upgrades and line-speed improvements in the past few years, but this isn’t reflected in punctuality improvements. Why? What’s the route cause of the problems? I’d love to know…
Northern’s new CAF built Class 195s have entered passenger service through the Calder Valley today on the routes from Leeds – Chester and Leeds – Manchester Victoria. Needless to say, I’m out with the camera to capture pictures of this important milestone. It’s the culmination of improvements to the line that have seen the route resignalled, linespeeds increased and platforms lengthened.
I’ll be adding pictures throughout the day. Here’s the first as 195123 picks up passengers at Sowerby Bridge whilst working the 10:22 from Chester to Leeds.
10.35.
I’ve caught a late-running Chester service which is worked by 195110. These trains are certainly a step-change to the old BR built units we’ve been used to since the 1980s! They’ve far superior acceleration and braking, not to mention all the facilities that passengers have come to expect nowadays, such as power sockets and free wifi. They’ve also got far more seating bays with tables.
22:36.
Sorry folks, It didn’t turn out to be much of a rolling blog as I was too busy taking pictures! Since I got home earlier this evening I’ve been busy editing them, so here’s a small selection. You can find the full gallery here on my Zenfolio website.
1J06, the 0957 Wigan Wallgate to Leeds worked by 150275 and 158901 passes 195002 just outside Todmorden. The 195 was working 2M10, the 1018 Leeds to Manchester Victoria. 1J06 should have run from Southport but was cancelled due to late running. Sadly, that’s something the new trains are having no impact on!A few hours later 195002 passes Gauxholme whilst working 2E13, the 1158 Manchester Victoria to Leeds3-car 195123 arrives at Walsden with 2M12, the 1118 Leeds to Manchester Victoria.Another late runner was 195103 on 1E60, the 1124 Chester to Leeds which was 21 mins late by the time it reached Todmorden at 13.06. Meanwhile, at Halifax, here’s a couple of shots of 2M20, the 1518 Leeds to Manchester Victoria, worked by 195110.
For the number crunchers, the list of units seen in passenger service is as follows. Two car 195002 and 195007. Three car 195103. 195110. 195111. 195119. 195121 and 195123.
Paul Bigland 