Category Archives: Anti Hs2 mob

An unholy alliance (and unholy mess)

09 Thursday Feb 2017

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Politics, StopHs2

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I’ve not bothered blogging about the anti Hs2 campaign much recently, mainly because there’s nothing worth blogging about. Having hit a metaphorical iceberg in the shape of the successful Hs2 Hybrid bill, their campaign’s been sinking slowly ever since. Most groups have already taken to the lifeboats, leaving StopHs2 and a few dozen bonkers (and mostly anonymous) tweeters frantically clinging to the stern as the icy water gets even closer.

Even so, I couldn’t resist mentioning this. On the day that the Lords gave the Hybrid Bill its 3rd reading (passing it by a stonking majority of 360 on a 386-26 vote), an unholy alliance of environmental groups (who should know better), right-wing lobbyists (the antithesis of the green movement) and vested interest groups placed full page adverts in the national media, calling on people to stop Hs2 by writing to their MPs. ‘Friends’ of the Earth even started a petition on their website (here)

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By today, that petition has had a ‘whopping’ 1062 votes!

What’s so laughable about all this is that the whole thing has been a spectacular waste of time and money! Why? Because MPs don’t have another chance to vote on the principle of Hs2! There’s no stopping it now.

It’s true that as the Lords amended the Hs2 Hybrid Bill it will go back to the Commons – but this is only so that the amendments can be considered. MPs decided that Hs2 should be built at 2nd reading of the bill back in 2014. They don’t get a 2nd bite of the cherry, so people writing to their MPs is a complete waste of time. One can only wonder who advised the ‘unholy alliance’ on their tactics and decided that this was a cunning plan as – in reality – it’s both too late and entirely the wrong target.

As the Hs2 Hybrid Bill is due to receive Royal Assent later this month, it looks like the anti Hs2 campaign decided to throw away the last of their money on yet another useless gesture.

All’s quiet on the Hs2 front…

30 Friday Dec 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Hs2aa, StopHs2, Yorkshire

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As it’s the penultimate day of 2016 I thought I’d take one last look at Hs2 and the campaign set up to stop it. To say antis have had a terrible 2016 is somewhat of an understatement. The Lords Hs2 Committee published their final report on December 15th which brought to an end the petitioning process that has lasted since 2014. The report served thin gruel to anti Hs2 campaigners but it did offer support for those on the route who will face genuine hardships. The reports suggested amendments will be debated early in 2017 with Royal Assent being granted soon after. After that, it’s all over bar the moaning as Phase 1 construction will begin.

Meanwhile, back on November 15th, the Government published details of the final phase of Hs2 – 2b, moving the debate on from phase 1 completely.

So, where does that leave the Stop Hs2 campaign? Dead in the water to be honest. Just like UKIP voters, their campaign’s been dying off for years (both figuratively and literally). The only ‘national’ group left by November was phase 1 based StopHs2. If they were to have any chance of survival they would need to be re-invigorated by a massive upsurge in the opposition to Hs2 due to the announcement of phases 2a and 2b. The problem is – this never happened. Let’s crunch some social media numbers. Here’s a look at the StopHs2 and Hs2aa following on Twitter and Facebook, comparing the day after the Phase 2 announcement with today.

scores-30-dec

The usual caveat applies. Not all followers are supporters. Some are there simply to keep an eye on them. The numbers can’t lie. They show that interest in Stophs2 has barely moved. When you consider the amount of people living on the recently announced routes a gain of 149 Facebook ‘likes’ and 69 Twitter followers is appalling. Campaign Manager Joe Rukin and StopHs2 Chair Penny Gaines have done even worse. As for Hs2aa – don’t even go there! For the first time since StopHs2 was established, nothing’s been heard from Gaines, Rukin or any of the StopHs2 accounts in the week since Xmas eve. This doesn’t bode well…

I suggest that these figures and the fact the number of regular stopHs2 tweeters is now below two dozen shows just how badly their campaign has done. There’s been no Phase 2 bounce at all. It can only be a matter of time now before StopHs2 folds, leaving no ‘national’ group to co-ordinate any sort of ‘fight’ on Phase 2.

However, there’s more.

I’ve always pointed out that social media is a double-edged sword for pressure groups and campaigns. It exposes their weaknesses as much as any strengths – especially on Phase 2, where their Facebook groups are pretty revealing. If you track the different new phases you find there’s no discernible organised ‘action’ groups on phase 2a to Crewe and only a handful of moribund groups on the Western branch to Manchester. Here’s an example. This is from the CADRAG (Culcheth and District Rail Action Group) page.

cadrag

No doubt this inertia and lack of interest is shared by other groups which is why you never hear anything about them anymore (eg, Mid Cheshire and Warrington StopHs2). It’s only the route change on the branch to Leeds via Sheffield that’s generated some new groups, but what they’re saying on social media is hardly a defiant or united message. Here’s some to watch; Erewash Crofton Mexborough and here’s the optimistically named Yorkshire against Hs2 which features appeals for people to attend two national demonstrations,  neither of which ever happened!

demos-that-never-happened

All told, the stophs2 campaign in Yorkshire is a mess. It’s riven by opposing views as many people want Hs2, whilst some just want to move the route back to Meadowhall. They don’t have the same political support as Hs2 opponents did on Phase 1. For a start, there’s no 51M group of councils, nor do they have any MPs who’ve come out to directly oppose Hs2. In fact, of the 51 MPs in Yorkshire only 2 voted to oppose Hs2 – and they were away from the route in Huddersfield and Shipley! Despite some trying to replay the phase 1 campaign, they can’t use two of the main arguments as phase 2 doesn’t pass through an AONB and it’s clear that people living near the route benefit from a station in Sheffield, the training college in Doncaster and a potential parkway station elsewhere in Yorkshire.

I predict that 2017 will see a very different situation surrounding Hs2. Once Phase 1 construction starts and thousands of people take up jobs building the route I expect public opinion towards Hs2 begin to change – especially as the anti campaign will have faded away. Phase 2 will still remain an issue but the level of opposition is very different in type and scale. Don’t expect it to receive the same media attention either.

I’ll still be keeping an occaisional eye on Hs2 matters, but for the first part of 2017 expect to see a lot more blogs appearing. I’m off out to SE Asia for a couple of months, so I’ll have plenty of time to write. In the meantime, Happy New Year!

An Hs2 update

22 Tuesday Nov 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, StopHs2, Uncategorized

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Despite my hopes I’ve not had as much time for blogging as I’d wanted, but here’s a quick update on Hs2 as we’ve had an interesting few weeks.

On November 15th the Government make the long-awaited announcement on the phase 2 and 2a sections of the route. These have now gone out for consultation. The only really contentious issue was the decision to adopt a change to allow Hs2 trains to run directly through Sheffield Midland via a loop off a section of Hs2 which has been shifted Eastwards through South Yorkshire. The announcements were greeted favourably by the vast majority of politicians (nationally and locally) and by the business community. As usual, the only fly in the ointment was getting the folks of Yorkshire to agree on anything! There’s currently a battle between the counties politicians as towns like Barnsley and Doncaster wanted the original Meadowhall route, whilst Sheffield had lobbied hard for a city centre route. A new housing estate outside Mexborough (Shimmer) has been caught up in the furore and provided an classic example of  just how disorganised, fractious (and deceitful) the Yorkshire StopHs2 campaign is. Some campaigners tried to claim that Hs2 wanted to knock down all 215 properties. Here’s the claim on the blog page on the website of one of the main Yorkshire groups.

215-demolitions

There’s only one problem. It’s a complete fabrication. The Higgins report contains no such figure! Not only that, but H2 Ltd confirmed in an interview to the iPaper yesterday that the figure is actually 16, not 215 properties!

ipaper.PNG

The article’s a very good example of balance and unsensational journalism that reveals not everyone on the estate is anti Hs2 – a fact often ignored by more sensationalist sources. You’ll see the same levels of division if you visit the Facebook pages of some of the Yorkshire Stophs2 groups. What comes across is that some people are using the campaign  as a vehicle for their 15 minutes of fame, leaving other residents feeling they’re doing more harm than good. The fact cracks have appeared so early, plus the inability of local politicians to agree, doesn’t bode well for the Stophs2 campaign in Yorkshire.

Worse news was to come on the national political stage with the news that the one party that’s really exploited the Stophs2 campaign (UKIP) is continuing to implode. They’ve lost yet another Leadership candidate, plus the EU is demanding back 400,000 euros in funding that UKIP have ‘misspent’ on UK campaigns. There’s now the delicious irony that Stophs2 and UKIP appear to be a race to see who can implode first…

As if this wasn’t bad enough, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn addressed the CBI yesterday. His speech restated Labour’s commitment to building Hs2.

corbyn-cbi

So, who’s going to stop Hs2 now? No-one. Phase 1 will have Royal Assent within weeks. £900m of enabling work contracts have been let and work has already started on ground investigations and re-routing services. The consultations over the phase 2 routes will continue for a year or two now, but the political will behind the project remains steadfast and solid.

It’s going to be a cold, cold Christmas without any cheer for the anti Hs2 campaign.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stophs2: Telling porkies about people telling porkies…

03 Thursday Nov 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Yorkshire

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Yesterday the Yorkshire against Hs2 campaign launched a ‘report’ which claimed to have exposed Sir David Higgins and Hs2 Ltd of ‘telling lies’ to the Transport Minister in Sir David’s July 2016 report into altering the route through Yorkshire. Sadly, this report isn’t available anywhere on their website, or that of the groups they claim to be the umbrella for – or on the *cough* ‘national’ STOPHs2 website.

Here’s the Yorkshire against Hs2 website. The accusation is contained in the link to their blog page. It claims that; yorks-lie

“Entirely demolish” eh?

Here’s a link to Sir David Higgins report.  So, where did the report ‘admit’ they would demolish all 215 homes on the Shimmer estate? Nowhere. The nearest you get is this, on page 22;

hs2-report

Spot the difference between the antis unequivocal “entirely demolish” and the far more measured “an impact” from Hs2 Ltd.

Yorkshire antis seem to have forgotten another of their claims which they tried to plaster all over the media earlier. This was a claim that Hs2 Ltd had admitted in a FOI request that they had no idea how many homes were to demolished on the revised Yorkshire route (see link)! Oddly, this FOI request has never been published by the group who claim to have received it (Bramley) or by Yorkshire against Hs2. In fact, no FOI requests have been published. The irony of anti Hs2 groups not publishing Freedom of Information requests and replies but keeping them secret is obviously lost on them!

Someone is telling porkies here, and it ain’t Hs2…

 

 

The Yorkshire Hs2 antis battle each other

02 Wednesday Nov 2016

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I mentioned in an earlier blog that the Yorkshire Stophs2 campaign’s doomed to failure as they’re singing from different hymn sheets from the beginning. This is very evident from the plethora of petitions different groups have started – with different aims. For example, here’s one started by one Julie Pile, which says that:

mexborough-hs2-petition

Apart from the obvious nonsense about failures of “statutory duty” and the usual catastrophic language about “wrecking” the environment, it’s clear Julie doesn’t mind if this happens, as long as it happens elsewhere. This puts her on a collision course with other campaigners on the route, but also the City of Sheffield and other who campaigned long and hard to have the Hs2 route changed from Meadowhall in the first place. So far, the petition’s gathered 3343 signatures, 1643 of which (or 50.85%)are from the Hemsworth constituency of Jon Trickett MP. To put this in perspective, it’s just 1.73% of all his constituents. The only other people to have signed in any number are the 418 signatures from Ed Miliband’s neighbouring constituency, Doncaster North. What’s noticeable is the tiny number of supporting signatures from elsewhere, like Sheffield, or even Rother Valley, another constituency on the new Hs2 route.

There does seem to be an embarrassment of riches (well, petitions really) amongst people in Yorkshire as a John Haith, a Rother Valley resident from Bramley has started this one, which has 3,202 signatures (but little support from Hemsworth). Meanwhile, Stephen Simcox (also Rother Valley) has started a “spend Hs2 money on the NHS” petition which has a paltry 763 signatures.

In truth, none of them have a cat in hell’s chance of success, but they do show a very Yorkshire trait – a lack of agreement over anything! The fact that there are obvious tensions and different interests across the county (even amongst anti Hs2 groups) demonstrates why any campaign to try and Stop Hs2 is doomed from the start – especially as these small local groups are pitted against the metropolitan areas of Leeds, Sheffield and York (all very pro Hs2) as well as the majority of the wider Yorkshire business community. Plus, can anyone seriously think the good Burghers of Doncaster (home to one of the two National Colleges for High Speed Rail) will want to kiss goodbye to the thousands of skilled people who will be trained there? Or for that matter, the hundreds of skilled jobs that will be created by the Hs2 rolling stock depot at nearby Crofton?

No doubt there will be a few awkward moments for some MPs as they try and balance the wider interests of their constituents with the impossible demands of a minority, but does anyone seriously think they will actually vote to stop Hs2 coming to Yorkshire or carrying on to the North-East, or for that matter Notts?

There’s another consideration too. The Hs2 Hybrid Bill for phase 2 will also contain the line onwards from Crewe to Manchester (another Labour heartland).  I’m sure there will be some very interesting meetings of the Parliamentary Labour Party if a handful of Labour MPs in Yorkshire were seen as putting the whole of the Phase 2 scheme under threat!

StopH2 campaigners in Yorkshire have made the same mistake that those on Phase 1 did. They’ve fallen into the trap of thinking their purely local concerns should be put ahead of national ones, and that others will give way to appease them.

Why Hs2 antis should finally give up on petitions.

19 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Railways, StopHs2, Yorkshire

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I’ve often said that the Stop hs2 campaign never learns from its mistakes. I’ve been provided with another great example of this today when one of the campaigns long-standing Walter Mittys’ (the fantasist Nicholas Batty) tweeted a link to yet another daft petition on the Government’s website.

batty-oct-19

Here’s a link to the actual petition.

Needless to say I went to have a look. The petition was started by a Stephen Simcox from Rotherham on the 26th July 2016 & closes on the 21st January 2017 (all petitions are set to close automatically after 6 months) It’s gathered a grand total of 467 signatures since. It hasn’t got a cat in hell’s chance of success but what I found really interesting was that someone in the Civil Service has been expanding the data these petitions carry. Not only do they tell you the number of signatures from each of the 650 Parliamentary constituencies, now they also tell you what percentage of registered voters have signed. This is extremely useful as it tells you how much people in that constituency care (or rather, don’t care) about an issue. However, for the Stop Hs2 campaigners it’s a disaster, as it allows you to define just how little support they have!

Here’s a screengrab of the constituency map.

petition.PNG

This shows that the greatest number of signatures (a ‘whopping’ 121) come from the Rother Valley constituency on phase 2 of Hs2. 2nd is 62 signatures from the Doncaster North constituency. Now this can be put into context thanks to the new feature.

Rother Valley has 94,959 constituents and a *cough* massive 0.13% of them have signed the petition! In Doncaster North that’s 0.06%. Somehow, I don’t think any MPs are going to be losing sleep over this.

Phase 2 StopHs2 campaigners are running a carbon-copy of the campaign that failed to stop Hs2 on phase 1 in the South. It’s crazy as they don’t have the money or support that their Southern counterparts had. Not only that but the two surviving umbrella groups (Hs2aa and StopHs2) are both based in the South. Neither of them are likely to survive beyond Phase 1 receiving Royal Assent – which will leave phase 2 protestors without any logistical or technical support. The Yorkshire stophs2 campaign is isolated anyway as it doesn’t even have the support of its local MPs (for example, Doncaster North’s Ed Milliband is a firm supporter of Hs2). They’re also up against Yorkshire business groups who’re strong supporters of the project. There’s also the problem of a lack of unity between old and new groups in Yorkshire as some are campaigning for the Hs2 route to be moved back to Meadowhall!

In short, the Yorkshire Stophs2 campaign’s over before it’s even started.

The sad thing about all this is that the people who are genuinely affected by Hs2 are being led up the garden path by the likes of Joe Rukin from Stop Hs2. Instead of campaigning for  the best route possible, maximum mitigation and benefits to their communities from new facilities funded by Hs2 Ltd, they’ve been conned into wasting their time fighting a battle they can’t possibly win by trying to stop Hs2 altogether.

UPDATE.

Since this blog was written (6 days ago) signatures have gone up by 253, from 464 to 720 – or 42.1 a day. The problem is, a petition like this needs an average of 556 signatures per day to stand any chance of getting past the magic 100,000, and each day it fails, that number increases…

StopHs2 rearrange the deckchairs on the Titanic…

05 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2 Bow Group, Hs2aa, StopHs2

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These days, observing British politics is a surreal and scary experience. The Tory party conference especially so. I actually thought I’d switched on a repeat of an old UKIP one by mistake when I heard the anti foreigner rhetoric and the plans to make companies ‘register’ all their foreign workers. and ‘name and shame’ them if they don’t employ British workers. After all, the idea is crass enough, xenophobic enough and stupid enough to have come from UKIP, but no. It really is the party of Government who have suggested it.

However there was another surreal event at conference, which was to do with the StopHs2 campaign and it was more comical and farcical than anything.

Campaign group StopHs2 ‘launched’ a new ‘briefing paper’ at a fringe meeting yesterday. Laughably they tried to pretend it was bigger than just them by roping in other old names, namely Hs2aa and AGAHST, which is rather amusing as AGAHST bit the dust some years ago, as you can see from their abandoned website   Nothing’s been heard from them for years but their former Communications Director, Deanne DuKhan did attend for appearance’s sake. Poor Deanne never did get much right during her time at AGAHST, as this missive she penned in April 2012 shows. A search of the internet doesn’t reveal any trace of her in relation to Hs2 and AGAHST since 2013, which is rather odd as she’s the sole remaining Director!

The ‘briefing paper’ that was launched by StopHs2 can be found here.

It’s essentially a 16 page rambling rehash of anything and everything (and anyone) that they can find that’s ever been critical of Hs2. It also contains some outright lies which (despite them having been exposed) they’re still trotting out – like this one:

lie

I exposed that one way back in February 2015 (see here)

StopHs2 say “The paper will be circulated to all MPs and Lords following party conferences”. Talk about a waste of time! There’s not a cat in hell’s chance of anyone stopping the phase 1 Hybrid Bill this late in the day. MPs won’t be debating it again and the Lords can’t stop Hs2 at 3rd reading, which is expected in November-early December. Plus, if this regurgitation of old arguments couldn’t stop Phase 1, there’s no chance of it stopping phase 2 (even if anyone remembers it by then).

Even everyday anti Hs2 protestors seem to have twigged this, as this comment on the StopHs2 Facebook page reveals.

kinch

Which rather says it all. Today Teresa May closed the Tory party conference with a clear commitment to build not just phase 1 but also phase 2 of HS2. “We will press ahead with plans for HS2” she said, echoing the earlier statement to conference from of her Transport Minister, Chis Grayling.

Stophs2 might as well have saved their money and chucked their ‘briefing paper’ straight into the recycling bin. All they’re doing is rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic…

 

 

The ‘great Guido’ gets it wrong – again.

28 Thursday Jul 2016

Posted by in Andrea Leadsom MP, Anti Hs2 mob, Guido Fawkes, Hs2, Victoria Prentis MP

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Hs2 antis have got very excited by a story on the execrable ‘Guido Fawkes’ website. The great ‘Guido’ has tried to make out that the appointment of a prominent anti Hs2 MP as a Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Ministers in the Department of Transport somehow causes problems for the HS2 project, leading to a “tough circle to square”. The problem is – the truth is exactly the opposite. Victoria Prentis’ opposition to Hs2 has been neutered. Why? Because as a PPS she is bound by the same rules on collective responsibility as the Cabinet are. This means she can’t speak out against Government policy as she is deemed to have collective responsibility for it! The delicious irony is that this is the second anti Hs2 MP Teresa May has effectively muzzled – the other being one Andrea Leadsom, who is now Minister of State at the Department of Energy and Climate Change!

Still, when has the Fawkes camp ever let the facts get in the way…

The anti Hs2 mob live on another planet…

08 Sunday May 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, House of Lords, Hs2, Hs2 petitions, StopHs2

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When is applying the long-established rules of Locus Standi (The right or capacity to bring an action or to appear in a court) and the letter of the law “undemocratic”, “dictatorial” or trying to “over-rule 750 year history of representation”?

Never – unless you live in the weird parallel universe inhabited by Andrew Gilligan and the rest of the anti Hs2 mob!

As I predicted in my last blog, the petitions to the House of Lords are facing far more Locus Standi challenges than the earlier petitions to the Commons. 414 of the 821 are subject to challenge. This has provoked squeals of outrage from stophs2 campaigners and the usual fact-free rubbish from Andrew Gilligan (see here) and Joe Rukin (here).

Of course, what they all neglect to say it that whilst this is the Govt and Hs2 Ltd bringing the challenges, it’s up to the House of Lords Committee to judge if those challenges should be allowed. The Committee is Chaired by Lord Walker of Guestingthorpe, who just happens to be a QC with a long history of senior judicial appointments which include being a High Court judge, Justice of Appeal, Lord of Appeal and Justice of the Supreme Court of the UK. With such an august legal mind Chairing the Committee it’s going to be almost impossible for Hs2 antis to get away with screaming ‘foul’ on this one – hence their anger.

StopHs2 campaigners know this was their very last throw of the dice. Yet again, they’d hoped they could bog-down the process of the bill with repetitive petitions only this time, they weren’t going to be allowed to get away with it. The Govt and Hs2 Ltd had been very generous in the commons by challenging so few petitioners. In their final report the House of Commons Ctte had this to say about Locus Standi;

audience

So, what’s happened shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. The Govt and Hs2 Ltd are simply exercising their legal right to challenge petitioners standing and a very senior and experienced legal mind is chairing the Committee that will rule on their validity.  Expect the majority of the challenges to succeed.

 

That’s all folks!

24 Thursday Mar 2016

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Hs2aa, StopHs2, Twitter (and how not to use it)

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Well, the end of the stop Hs2 campaign, not this blog!

As I mentioned yesterday, the Hs2 Hybrid bill sailed through Parliament yesterday by 399 votes to 42. That’s a stonking cross-party majority of 357, or – to put it another way – 61.38% of the UKs 650MPs voted to build Hs2 and only 6.46% to stop it.  Such a large political consensus lays bare the claim that Hs2 is a Tory ‘vanity project’ (or a Labour one for that matter). The vote has also exposed UKIP, who never even bothered to turn up and vote (no change there then, Ed). The result is a final humiliation for the Stop Hs2 campaign as they only gained one extra vote since the 2nd reading of the bill back in 2014. It effectively kills their campaign.

The antis reaction has been to claim that the decision was somehow rushed as the debate in the Commons didn’t last longer. It’s a ridiculous claim when you consider that we’ve been talking about Hs2 since 2009! There’s been numerous debates in both the Commons and the Lords – plus hundreds of hours of discussions during the petitioning process. If this is “rushing” things, no wonder the rest of the world has left us far behind when it comes to modern infrastructure. I’ll bet the Chinese (who’ve built thousands of kilometres of high speed line since 2009) will be having a right old laugh at this!

Needless to say, the StopHs2 campaign is in complete denial. If you want to see how badly, check out the comments on the StopHs2 Facebook page. The amazing thing is, everyone but the antis could see what was coming. Their campaign’s only success has been in lying to itself. It’s consistently lied about the need for Hs2, the level of opposition to Hs2 and that the vast majority of those who object to Hs2 are in fact, Nimbys who live in the way of the route! Some are still refusing to accept the truth. They’re taking to Twitter to condemn MPs as “traitors” who’ve let them down. They make empty threats that MPs will “pay” through the ballot box – which shows both denial and amnesia – as they’ve obviously blanked out what an ineffective disaster their “no votes for you with Hs2” campaign was before the election. In fact, as their votes are concentrated in constituencies of MPs who opposed Hs2 all this would do would be to shoot themselves in both feet!

How much longer the anti Hs2 campaign can keep going now is a good question. Hs2aa have been conspicuous by their absence these past few weeks. Not a peep was heard from them at all yesterday. StopHs2 managed a few desultory tweets & a moan on the website but that was it. There was no demonstration outside Parliament, no full page adverts in the newspapers, just a few dozen people moaning on Twitter. Their campaign has nowhere else to go. It’s exhausted the political route, failed on the legal front and run out of money. It’s bereft of ideas and it’s activist base is dwindling daily. In short – it’s finished.

All that’s left now is for the House of Lords to carry out their scrutiny of the bill. Whether this will cause the Hs2 timetable to slip slightly or not is a matter of conjecture. What isn’t open to doubt is that Hs2 will receive Royal Assent. In the meantime the Hs2 project team will be getting on with preparing for spades in the ground sometime in 2017.

In the meantime, I’ll look forward to blogging less about the campaign to stop Hs2 and more about building Hs2. Watch this space…