Category Archives: Hs2

The curious crossover of Brexit supporters who oppose Hs2 and Twitter trolls.

19 Tuesday Feb 2019

Posted by in Anti Hs2 mob, Brexit, Hs2, Liam Halligan, Politics

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

The past few weeks have demonstrated a curious crossover between the dogmatists who still support Brexit (despite all the evidence of the utter shambles it was always going to turn into) and opposition to building Hs2. Anyone could be forgiven for thinking this is actually collusion. Today we’ve had Andrew Neil add his name to the list, claiming Hs2 money should be diverted to building high speed rail in the North. For the North this is all very touching. It’s also completely false. None of them could really give a damn about the North, it’s just the latest excuse to try and get Hs2 cancelled.

Liam Halligan trotted out the same excuse in Dispatches (which I analysed here). By pure co-incidence Neil is the Chairman of the Spectator, a magazine well know for printing anti Hs2 stories. Who had one in there recently? Yep, you’ve guessed it – Liam Halligan.

The crossover isn’t just through this little cabal of right-wing media types. It’s taken an interesting and rather darker turn. We’re suddenly seeing a lot of Twitter trolls which have been bashing out pro-Brexit propaganda now starting to tweet in opposition to Hs2. Who’s the guiding mind behind this I wonder? Meanwhile, other (long dormant) Twitter accounts have been resurrected to Tweet against Hs2. Here’s some examples.

brexit

pro brexit 2

stratfan

It’s clear that this is now a co-ordinated campaign. The truth is, the anti Hs2 campaign’s getting rather desperate. They’ve been campaigning to stop Hs2 for nearly a decade now and got absolutely nowhere. In that time most of the local Stophs2 groups have collapsed, meaning there’s little in the way of a ‘grassroots’ campaign anymore, just a few isolated people. Even the notionally ‘national’ groups like HS2aa have failed and gone to the wall as the cross-party support for HS2 has remained unbreakable. Now, all that’s left is the Tory right-wingers in the media and their curious contacts with the shady world of social media manipulation through the use of Twitter trolls to further their aims.

Trolls are desperately needed because StopHs2’s own tiny band of Twitter followers are pretty useless. There’s just over 6000 of them. The problem is most of them never retweet or like anything, so they’re as much use as a chocolate fireguard! Foolishly, StopHs2 keep ‘pinning’ tweets to the top of the page, which makes it easy to see how many retweets or likes they get. It’s never over 100 and often far less. I crunch their social media numbers every month. Here’s last month. There’s a very obvious flaw in their troll strategy. Trolls and bots can’t write to their MPs or vote in elections. Oh, you might influence one or two people, but as Hs2 has never been an electoral issue you’re on a hiding to nothing. Also, this is not a referendum. Besides, who would Chiltern or Northern Nimbys actually vote for other than their normal party. UKIP? They’re finished. Try as you might, you’re not going to frighten many MPs in to opposing Hs2 – if any -and it’s MPs who vote on building Hs2.

Here’s a graphic illustration of their problem – all the dead Twitter accounts of people like this who’ve moved away from the Hs2 route after being bought out/relocated of their own accord. Unlike bots, these people could vote but Ms Carter gave up in June 2015. There’s many, many more like her…

caro

I’ve a favour to ask…
If you enjoy reading these blogs, please consider clicking on an advert – or two! You don’t have to buy anything, honest! The clicks just help me cover the cost of running this blog. Many thanks, Paul

More Stophs2 straw-grasping and daft scaremongering.

18 Monday Feb 2019

Posted by in Andrea Leadsom MP, Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Politics

≈ Leave a comment

A copy of a desperate letter being sent round Parish Councils dropped into my email inbox this morning. It’s been composed by some members of Greatworth parish council, which lies in the South Northamptonshire Constituency of prominent Brexit supporting MP and opposer of Hs2 (funny how those two things often go together), one Andrea Leadsom MP. It’s highly likely that Leadsom was the source of the spin about the Cabinet wanting to scrap Hs2 that was reported by Liam Halligan in his poor hatchet job broadcast by Dispatches. It’s also highly likely that this letter (riddled with factual inaccuracies and spin) was approved by her. The covering email from Helen Du Bois, the Clerk of the council, claims ” The  insidious  changes  that  are  being  made  to  the  original  blueprint   for  HS2  need  to  be  made  very  clear  to  Parliament.    The  plans  for   HS2,  presented  in  the  hybrid  Bill  for  this  massive  infrastructure   project,  that  were  put  before  Parliament  in  2013  and  2014,  no   longer  mirror  the  detail  in  the  plans  for  this  railway  today”. No, that didn’t make any sense to me either, until I began to read their letter. Her email ends ” A   prompt  reply  would  be  much  appreciated  as  there  is  an  urgent  need   to  get  this  message  across  before  it  really  is  too  late  to  halt  this   unaffordable  vanity  project”.

Here’s the actual letter.

“HS2 – THE SLOW TRAIN TO OLD OAK COMMON

FROM PARISH COUNCILS ACROSS SOUTH NORTHAMPTONSHIRE, WARWICKSHIRE, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE, WEST MIDLANDS, STAFFORDSHIRE, OXFORDSHIRE and GREATER LONDON.
The all consuming Brexit babble is drowning out major concerns that the Government is failing to address. All over the country the concern that excites the most vociferous condemnation is the HS2 infrastructure project. Mr. Thurston, HS2’s Chief Executive, claims that there is a groundswell of support nationwide for this railway – we do not believe him.

When launched nine years ago, HS2 was heralded as the train that would carry 1,100 passengers every four minutes from London to Birmingham at speeds well in excess of 200mph. A straight line was drawn across England, obliterating anything in its path, in order to accommodate this “high speed” wonder. After nine years of planning and numerous changes of management at senior level, the Government needs to reassess the criteria on which the viability of this project should be judged.

Everyone knows that the budget is ballooning and out of control. In order to try and regain control we hear that the trains may now go slower – to save cost. The trains may be greatly reduced in number – to save cost. The line may never be built beyond Birmingham – because the cost will be too great. The latest ex-Chairman suggests that the development at Euston should be delayed and the trains should stop at Old Oak Common – to save cost. Local observation of the preliminary enabling work that has been done already shows a total disregard for cost control, and a complete lack of common sense.
There are claims that this whole project is already obsolete. It earned the nickname ”White Elephant” almost at its inception, and it still carries that description today. “White Elephant” projects make people nervous. Improving our existing railways nationwide is so obviously the better option and would be a far more popular plan.
Andrea Leadsom, our Member of Parliament, has put all these points about HS2 to Mr. Thurston and challenged him to review the business case and the value for taxpayers money. He trots out an all too familiar assurance that the project will be “on time and on budget” – a commitment also made by Mr. Grayling. Another major infrastructure project, currently under construction, that boasted to be “on time and on budget” is Crossrail. Now the Government admits that Crossrail will be late and over budget. By the time HS2 is up and running the IT phenomenon will see more and more people working from home – they do already. The whole world can already make instant contact, with eye contact, on screen. The cry for more and more capacity (a necessity strongly advocated by Teresa May) will fade away. Who will need to travel, on an expensive ticket, from Old Oak common to Birmingham, with no stops en route and no saving on time?

Mr. Grayling still labours under the illusion that Phase One of HS2 will cost £27.18bn. We all know that the cost is over £50bn and rising. He also says that HS2 will become the backbone of our national rail network. A backbone is no use to anyone if it only connects a third of the body. If this railway never goes beyond Birmingham, the improvement to connectivity between London, the Midlands, northern England and central Scotland will be greatly diminished.

Every week recently there have been more and more revelations which demonstrate the inadequacy of those in charge of delivering HS2. The source for the considerable amount of electricity needed to power the HS2 trains has long been questioned. The possible, unbelievable answer to this problem at this late stage is wind turbines and solar panels along the route. More land acquisition and much, much more cost, both financial and environmental. There was no mention in the EA of wind turbines powering the trains. Therefore when Parliament gave the go ahead for HS2, there was no knowledge of this huge environmental impact to wildlife and the countryside.

We, the undersigned, urge all those with power and influence to stop this bloated mammoth now, before any more money is wasted, and thus release billions of pounds for far more important, necessary and worthwhile projects”

I had to laugh at the line about ‘Brexit babble’. It shows these people really don’t DO irony, as Leadsom is one of the prime sources of such babble! As for the stuff about solar panels and wind farms along the route powering Hs2 – I’d love to know what these people have been smoking! Quite where they’ve got this idea from is a good question, but it does show how out of touch with reality they are. The very idea that HS2 could be powered from wind turbines and solar panels is (frankly) barking!

The letter reeks of desperation and it’s interesting to see which areas the letter claims to have support from as it (unintentionally) highlights the fact the opposition to Hs2 is very much centred on the route – and on Phase 1. Somehow, I can’t see such a load of nonsense from Parish councils (who’re very much at the bottom of the political food-chain) carrying much weight with the people who actually decide on these matters. MPs and Ministers. It’s also worth noting that whilst Leadsom may still be playing political games, as long as she’s a member of the Government she’s bound by collective Cabinet responsibility – and Hs2 is firmly Government policy…

Channel 4 ‘Dispatches’ on Hs2. A poor hatchet job, not an investigation

12 Tuesday Feb 2019

Posted by in Dispatches, Hs2, Liam Halligan

≈ 27 Comments

Like the other month’s ‘Panorama’ programme, last night’s ‘Dispatches’ programme written and presented by Liam Halligan was puffed for days by the remaining groups opposed to Hs2, who (once again) proclaimed that it would be the ‘smoking gun’ that would finally kill off HS2. As usual, the truth was very different.

What did we actually learn from the 30 minute programme? Nothing that we didn’t know already. Like Panorama it was a rehash of old news and stories spiced up with ‘revelations’ that weren’t, plus an awful lot of un-attributable briefings from anonymous sources where speculation was presented as fact.

In the first part of the programme Halligan spent a lot of time with weary Northern Rail commuters on short-formed or delayed trains who (understandably) were complaining about the service. The Pacer trains came in for particular criticism – but more of them later…

Early on, Halligan is filmed getting off a train at Liverpool Lime St. Was there any mention of the fact the station’s just had £340m spent on it as it’s been rebuilt, had platforms added and extended, extensive track alterations and been resignalled? Of course not.

Halligan goes on to say the cost of Hs2 ‘ballooned’ from £33bn in 2011 to £56bn in 2015. As usual, Halligan doesn’t give any context. He doesn’t explain that this increase was due to the cost of Hs2 being uplifted to reflect inflation and that the 2015 figure includes the cost of the trains (£7bn) which wasn’t included in the 2011 figure. The contingency figures were also adjusted. The spending review in 2015 set the long term funding envelope for Hs2 at £55.7bn (including contingency) So, the actual cost of building Hs2 hasn’t changed, but admitting that doesn’t fit the narrative. Halligan then went on to say that “some experts predict a massive £100bn bill” (note the plural). In fact, only one person, Michael Byng – who came up with the figure – is predicting £100bn, but that doesn’t fit the narrative either.

Halligan then does a piece to camera on the Hs2 Curzon St construction site where he says “Given the vast cost, does Hs2 even make sense. This is a complex question” – so he trots off to for an ‘exclusive’ interview with Prof Stephen Glaister, who’s been critical of Hs2 in the past. So, is the complex question answered? Of course not. Halligan asks “is it (Hs2) good value”? Glaister replies “nobody knows”. Well, that’s cleared that up then! In a tightly edited video, Glaister then goes on to say “You really must put it in the context of an overall strategy about what you think the national problem is” – something Halligan utterly fails to do as the very reason for building Hs2 is never, ever mentioned in the programme. The fact Hs2 is designed to free up capacity on our existing Victorian network because it’s full is completely ignored – despite Halligan mentioning record passenger numbers earlier in the programme!

Halligan then goes on to claim that Hs2 “hasn’t been thought through” and that their ‘might’ be better ways of spending the money. This completely ignores the fact that a huge amount of research into the need for Hs2 has been done.  Proposals examined in great detail by both WS Atkins and Network Rail back in 2012/13 comprised a set of incremental capacity and connectivity improvements achieved by “upgrades to the conventional rail network that could: provide additional capacity and improved connectivity for the set of main centres that would directly benefit from HS2; and also provide benefit to those places from freed up capacity that would be created by HS2 on the conventional network”. The upgrades included “measures relating to commuter capacity on lines around the major conurbations on routes potentially affected by HS2 to ensure compatibility with the wider objectives of HS2 of increasing rail capacity for commuters”.

However, it was found that the schemes necessary would require 2,770 weekend closures, endless bus substitutions and increased journey times for more than 14 years, and achieve far fewer overall benefits.

Also attention to the impact of even further traffic on the WCML (London-Birmingham is now 180 years old!) was referred to by David Higgins in evidence to the House of Commons Transport Select Committee as long ago as 2012, when he described the WCML as “a busy, heavily-used railway, and we’re really pounding it. . . . What we really should be doing when we finish the first stage of High Speed 2 is take the old West Coast route out and spend a year fixing it up, and doing it properly. Because by then I reckon it will be really trashed.”

If Halligan was really trying to answer what he himself calls a “complex” question, you would think he would know about this research and mention why we’re actually building Hs2 in the first place. But doing that wouldn’t fit the narrative either.

Halligan then returns to Liverpool and talks (again) about Pacers, calling them the ‘workhorse’ of the Northern rail network that are “ex-bus chassis bolted onto train wheels – a joke”. It’s complete nonsense of course and the joke’s actually on Halligan as it shows a cavalier attitude to facts to try and project an image. Some Pacers do have bus components (the Class 142s used similar body panels used by Leyland National buses) but the trains were from an original design by British Rail and the Class 142s were built on brand new steel rail vehicle underframes at Workington in 1985-87. The sister units, the Class 144s used by Northern don’t use any bus components. They were built as pure rail vehicles by British Rail in Derby in 1986-87.

Halligan does mention the Pacers are being phased out but snidely remarks that it “hasn’t happened yet”, ignoring that fact it is happening and that by 2020 they will all have gone for scrap. He never mentions that one of their replacements is a £450m fleet of brand-new trains which are starting to be delivered to Northern now – because that wouldn’t fit the narrative either. Nor would talking about the Great North Rail Project a massive investment scheme that’s modernising and electrifying lines across the North. It never even gets a mention. Ironically, the day Dispatches was aired another (albeit very late) milestone was reached as the first electric trains ran between Manchester and Preston via Bolton. Here’s one of them.

DG318763crop

Halligan *could* have talked about this as these electrification schemes are allowing more modern diesel trains to be cascaded to help replace the Pacers he’s obsessed about. But no doubt that didn’t fit the narrative either! So much for answering “complex” questions…

Next up is a long (another two and a half minutes out of a 26 minute programme) piece of film showing Halligan & his crew travelling on another busy Pacer just to show people what a packed Pacer is like. At one point Halligan laments that some people can’t get on the train to get to work “because there’s just no room”. The irony that there would have been more if he hadn’t taken up space filming this pointless stuff and spent more time really trying to answer those ‘complex’ questions hasn’t occurred to him!

At the end of the piece Halligan brings up Northern Powerhouse Rail, which he gives a cursory outline of. Then he goes to see Mayor of Manchester, Andy Burnham. So, are we finally going to see some of those ‘complex’ questions answered? Of course not. It’s a completely pointless and heavily edited interview. Firstly Halligan recounts his earlier journey, only this time emotively saying Pacers were built of out “scrap buses” (another load of tosh). Then asks why “this wouldn’t be allowed in Surrey”? So, no complex questions there then, this is starting to get cringeworthy. Then we come to the crunch – Halligan tries to put Burnham on the spot about Hs2 and asks the most stupid and pointless question so far. He says to Burnham. “If you had to choose between linking up Northern cities or yet another North-South link, what would you choose”?

There you have it, ‘complex’ questions reduced to asking a something as dumb as this. Because it’s a choice Burnham never has to make. It’s not in his power and way above his paygrade – and Halligan should know this. Hs2 is decided on by MPs sitting in Parliament through the Hybrid Bill process. It’s a national infrastructure project, not a regional transport initiative. Burham’s first answer? “we need BOTH”. But then he’s free to say ‘but’ knowing it doesn’t matter.  The whole interview was a waste of time and as Burnham showed on Twitter later, he was less than impressed.

Burnham

Now Halligan reveals that there’s been an ‘exclusive’ Dispatches poll that suggests that 63% of those in the North who were asked wanted Hs2 money spent on Northern Powerhouse Rail instead. The expression ‘No shit, Sherlock!’ springs to mind.

Northerners want money spent in the North isn’t exactly a revelation, is it? I’ll bet if you asked Southerners would they rather see NPR money spent on Crossrail 2 you’d get the same answer! So what does any of this actually prove – and how does any of this answer any ‘complex’ questions?

Next Halligan goes back to Newcastle to interview Prof John Tomaney, another person who’s well known for having been critical of Hs2. What revelations are we to be treated to this time? We get another of Halligan’s pintless pieces to camera in which we’re told that “getting from Middlesborough to Newcastle, just 30 miles, takes almost an hour and a half. That’s an average speed then, of around 23 miles an hour. Slower than a galloping horse.” Really? “almost” an hour and a half? Hmm, let’s see what National Rail Enquiries says. Oh! – an hourly service that takes 1hr 7mins with a change at Darlington. As for that “just” 30 miles, by rail it’s actually 51!

mbro

Halligan has got his facts wrong again either by accident due to shoddy research, or by design to fit his narrative.

Meanwhile, what’s Tomaney got to say? Will Hs2 help “tackle the North-South divide” muses Halligan? Tomaney answers a completely different question – “the idea that Hs2 would be the solution to the economic regeneration of the North is I think, a weak argument. Billions of pounds are being invested in making very short reductions in journey times to London”.

Hang on a minute! Let’s have a look at some sample journey times taken from official HS2 documents.

hs2 journey times,

Knocking an hour off the time between London and Manchester is a 47% decrease! Now, what about times between Northern cities and the Midlands as Hs2 is just as much about connecting those cities as London. From Birmingham to Manchester it’s 54% and from Birmingham to Leeds it’s a staggering 58% decrease. I’m afraid what we’re seeing here is some good old fashioned envy of the South and some Northerners obsession with London, to the exclusion of all else – including fact.

Next up after Tomaney is an interview with Alistair Darling, former Labour Transport Minister from May 2002 to May 2006 and Chancellor from June 2007 until May 2010. Darling repeats some of his longstanding criticisms of Hs2, talking about most people commuting, not “doing the long distance stuff”. This ignores that fact that Hs2 frees up capacity on existing lines for more commuter services, especially around Leeds and Manchester – as well as the corridor from Rugby via Milton Keynes to Euston.

Those of us who remember Darling’s tenure in Transport find his ‘concern’ for the lot of Northern commuters hypocritical, because it was under Darling that plans for tram networks in Leeds and Liverpool were cancelled as he refused to guarantee funding. Oddly, Halligan seems unaware of this. He also seems unaware that the only rail electrification that happened under Darling (either as Transport Minister or as Chancellor) was a paltry 8 miles, from Kidsgrove to Crewe! This was a fill in to create a diversionary route during the horrendously expensive West Coast Route Modernisation (WCRM), which ended up costing £10bn but should have been a lot more before it was descoped. The fact this line is now full is why we started planning Hs2!

After Darling, Halligan moves on to more emotive videos of Northern passengers and their daily commute. It manages to waste more time into the break and that’s all.

In Part 2 we get more facts and figures about cancellations and yet more videos of passengers travelling – I wonder how many minutes Halligan wasted in total this way? Halligan then goes on to claim that Hs2 will be spending £4bn a year for the next 10 years. Finally, we get to Halligan’s ‘bombshell’ as he confides to camera “But a Senior Cabinet source has told me, with costs spiralling, Ministers have allocated even more than that. £6bn for Hs2 for the next decade”! And the evidence for this is? None. Not a shred. Zip. Bugger all. Halligan expects you to believe that (un-named Ministers) have found an extra £20bn that doesn’t appear on any Government books – anywhere. Not the Dept for Transport, nor the Treasury. The National Audit Office are unawares, as are the Public Accounts Committee. Nobody knows about this apart from an anonymous source, Halligan and now – you!

We now get into the second part of the guff as Halligan informs us that, apparently (due to these cost overruns no-one offers any evidence for), Ministers are “reconsidering” Hs2 and “considering” stopping Hs2 in Birmingham. There’s no evidence offered for this speculative nonsense either, other than un-named ‘sources’.

Now we cut back to Andy Burnham, who addresses the rumours (pointing out that’s all they are), saying “that would be criminal, that would be a complete waste of money” He’s right, of course. Back in Newcastle, Tomany agrees – as does Glaister who points out that just going from London to Birmingham “makes no sense” and that “you have to do the whole scheme”.

Bored with the North, Halligan goes to Oxford to get consultants Oxera to crunch some numbers to prove what everyone already knows. Only building Phase 1 of Hs2 makes no economic sense (cue another few minutes wasted). Halligan also asks if spending the Hs2 money would generate a bigger BCR if it was spent in the North. The answer’s yes – but yet again, this completely ignores why we’re building Hs2 in the first place.

Finally, with just 5 minutes of the programme left to go after all the fillers and time-wasting, Halligan interviews Mark Thurston, the Chief Executive of Hs2. Of course, Halligan can’t resist introducing both him and details of his salary (£650,000pa). The actual interview isn’t much better. Halligan talks about all the wild guesses for the ‘actual’ costs of Hs2 as he asks a series of “what if” questions. Thurston plays it with a straight (factual) bat. “What I am very clear on and Hs2 is very clear on is the budget for this scheme is £56bn” Halligan tries again by quoting the former hs2 Chair who’s said “nobody knows the finals costs” – which is true but Halligan twists this to mean costs can only increase – ignoring the fact the recent contracts for the stations at Euston and Old Oak Common both came in under estimates – but that wouldn’t fit the narrative. Thurston reiterates – Hs2 has to be built for £56bn and a lot of people are involved to make that happen. It was another interview that was a waste of time and Halligan didn’t get what he wanted, so we’re back more spin about ‘spiralling costs’ (with no evidence offered), then another piece to camera where Halligan claims “A Cabinet source has told me the Government’s actively considering scrapping the whole of Hs2”.

Hang on a minute! This same Cabinet ‘source’ also (supposedly) said that they’ve stashed an extra £20bn down the back of the sofa out of the way of the auditors to make sure Hs2 CAN be built! Make your mind up…

We now move on to yet another poll. Apparently on 20% of voters want Hs2 built. Now ignoring the fact that asking anyone in a poll should the Government spend money on anything (bar the sacred NHS) is almost certainly going to get a negative, what’s the point of this? This is a Parliamentary democracy, not the X-Factor. MPs, not polls decide on Hs2.

Now we go back to Darling who says “don’t get me wrong, I want to see money spent on Britain’s rail network” These are hollow words. Did I mention that one of the reasons we still have the Pacers that Halligan hates is because when the Northern Rail franchise was let in 2004 it was done on the basis of Zero growth and no investment in new trains. Who was Transport Minister at the time? Darling. Funny that Halligan doesn’t seem to know that, or wouldn’t that fit the narrative either?

Finally, we end up with Glaister and Tomaney delivering their opinions, neither of which are convincing. Tomaney talks of Hs2 being ‘steamrollered’ through, ignoring the fact it was debated for years before Parliament voted to build it.

The last few minutes are wasted by filling them out with a Manchester poet reciting ‘his thoughts’ on (yes, you’ve guessed it) Pacer trains. Only it isn’t on a Pacer, it’s a newly refurbished Class 150, part of Northern’s commitment to have all it’s existing trains improved!

Now, what hasn’t Halligan told you? An awful lot…

If you thought this was the work of an unbiased journalist, you’d be sadly mistaken. Halligan has form for long opposition to Hs2, as this tweet found by Henri Murison  shows.

murison

There’s something else too. Halligan (who writes for the Telegraph) is also an ardent Brexit supporter, which hardly squares with his supposed ‘concern’ for the North. Like many Brexit supporters he has a background that involves sovereign wealth funds and (according to his Wikipedia entry) links to Russia. Apparently, he also carries an Irish passport, which means the Freedom of Movement he’s helped deny to everyone else he’ll be keeping for himself.

I mention all this because there’s an uncanny crossover between those supporting Brexit  also opposing Hs2. He also has links to the Social Media Foundation, a ‘think tank’ based in Tufton St, London. By a complete fluke I’m sure, Tufton St is also home to another building that holds two other fans of Hs2, the Taxpayers Alliance and the Institute of Economic Affairs. Halligan’s a columnist for hardline Brexiteer Tim Montgomerie’s  UnHerd media platform which was launched last year (see link). ‘Monty’ is yet another opponent of Hs2, as is another of the organisations Monty’s involved in, ConHome, which tries to influence Tory policy. You know, on things like Hs2! Of course, I’m sure all this is a complete co-incidence and that Halligan’s Dispatches piece wasn’t really just a poor attempt at stitching up Hs2 and changing Government policy…

I’ve a small favour to ask…
If you enjoy reading this or any of the other blogs I’ve written, please click on an advert or two. You don’t have to buy anything you don’t want to of course – although if you did find something that tickled your fancy that would be fab! – but the revenue from them helps me to cover some of the cost of maintaining this site (which isn’t cheap and comes out of my own pocket). Remember, 99% of the pictures used in my blogs can be purchased as prints from my other website –  https://paulbigland.zenfolio.com/

Or – you can now buy me a coffee! https://ko-fi.com/paulbigland68312

Crunching the StopHs2 social media numbers. January 2019

03 Sunday Feb 2019

Posted by in Hs2, Railways, StopHs2

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

Slightly later than normal due to having been away for the past month, I’ve finally found time to take a look at the StopHs2 ‘campaign’ (and I use that word very loosely) social media numbers for Twitter and Facebook. Unsurprisingly, they’re as empty as Brexit supporters promises. There’s nothing going on about from the usual moaning and trying to make mountains out of molehills whenever Hs2 appears in the news or before a Parliamentary Committee. StopHs2 are purely reactionary nowadays. If it wasn’t for the odd article in the media they’d have sod all to comment on as they’re doing nothing themselves. The days of them organising events or actually making the news (rather than moaning about it) are long gone.

Here’s their latest Facebook scores. I’ve added November and December’s as a comparison.

stophs2 Facebook

As the figures show, it’s all pretty moribund. 9229 followers from a population of 66 million where 6.5 million live in constituencies Hs2 will pass through is tiny – as is the number who actually respond to anything. On average, just 0.73% of their followers shared any of their Facebook posts, that’s appalling. After 10 years of campaigning it’s all a bit of a joke, they’re hardly teeming with activists as the comments show – it’s always the same few names who churn out carbon copy responses like this:

stophs2 FB

fb 2

Not exactly a group with gravitas or credibility, are they?

Meanwhile, over on Twitter, the numbers are just as bad. I’ve used the same 3 month comparison here.

twitter

Yet again, the numbers are flat, despite a frantic burst of Tweets from Rukin (as StopHs2) on 24th January! He frantically tweeted 24 times when Hs2’s former Chairman was giving evidence in Parliament – for all the good it did. The stats show that fatigue soon set in amongst their supporters, the more he tweeted, the less retweets he got! Even retweeting themselves (as they did on a number of occasions) couldn’t bolster the poor numbers!

Nowadays, Rukin’s ‘style’ has descended into abuse and flat out lies, his Twitter tactics have more in common with the high-vis fascists who insult MPs outside Parliament than anyone respectable and whose opinions would carry weight. In the past month an average of 20.09 of their 6484 followers can be bothered (or still exist) to retweet his rubbish. That’s even worse than Facebook at 0.30%! Does that sound like an active and vibrant campaign to you? The #hs2 hashtag used to be a hive of activity for Hs2 antis with a 100 plus, regularly Tweeting to criticise Hs2. Nowadays that’s shrunk to a few dozen regulars and a noticeable bunch of bots who all tweet from the same script that includes support for Brexit and a penchant for Islamophobia.

To be honest, their Twitter ‘campaign’ is a complete waste of time as it descended into childish name-calling and fantasy years ago. All the remaining Tweeters to is show why no-one takes them seriously anymore, they’re more tinfoil hatters than anything else. Here’s a couple of examples.

duck

Oh, and (apparently) UKIP will cancel Hs2 when they get into Government! *sniggers*

ukip

So, as you can see. It’s all over bar the moaning now…

 

 

 

Crunching the StopHs2 social media stats: December 2018

01 Tuesday Jan 2019

Posted by in Hs2, StopHs2, Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

,

Happy New Year folks!

I’ve had a bit of time on holiday to crunch these numbers, so here’s the final series of the year (predictable as they are). Remember that the final few months of 2018 was meant to see the ‘relaunch’ of the anti Hs2 campaign? It never happened. Not only that, but their last ‘great white hope’ – a BBC Panorama programme that they’d worked themselves up into a frenzy about as it would provide the ‘killer evidence’ that would see Hs2 off once and for all turned out to be a damp squib. Aired on the evening of the 17th of December, it made barely a mention in the wider media – manly because there wasn’t a single new thing in it! You can read about it here.

After that, to quote Marvin the Paranoid android, they ‘went into a bit of decline’. It’s clear that the majority of politicians minds are elsewhere in the run up to 2019. Even Stophs2 gave up posting and tweeting before Xmas as it’s obvious they’re wasting their time.

Anyways, Here’s a look at their social media stats. First up is Facebook.

stophs2 facebook

As you can see the only real improvements are to their headline numbers due to people desperately trying to draw attention to the Panorama programme – although many comments on their Facebook page make it clear people were disappointed with it. They have managed to increase their Facebook followers by nearly 3% but as that’s from such a small starting number (after 10 years) it’s not something to boast about.

Meanwhile, over on Twitter, numbers remain flat.

stophs2 twitter

It’s becoming clear that Twitter’s a complete waste of time for them. The only thing it does is show how few of their followers actually bother with it. Remember that headlines behind these numbers. 6.5 MILLION people live on the route of HS2, so 6363 ‘followers’ (and how many of them are real I wonder?) are a tear in an ocean.

As with previous months a browse of their tweets/posts show that the majority are copies of media articles about HS2. Not a single one of them is news about the StopHS2 ‘campaign’ for the simple reason that – there is no news. They’re not actually doing anything! Sure, the media still trot out Rukin & Gaines for interviews, but they always have. There’s not even any news from (the increasingly scarce) local groups anymore. What both social media accounts show is that StopHs2 has little in the way of heavyweight support – and that’s putting it politely! In fact, both their accounts are refuges for the old ‘green ink’ brigade. who (in an earlier age before social media) would’ve had their ranting, batshit letters spiked by the newspapers they wrote to!

That said, there is one bit of news they’ve ignored reporting completely! Instead, it was slipped out by lawyers. Hs2aa, the ‘real’ brains behind the stophs2 campaign (StopHs2 were always strident, student politics types due to Rukin’s background) folded In 2017, but before they did they mounted a last gasp legal challenge under the Aarhus convention. Last month that was finally rejected, hammering the final nail into HS2aa’s coffin.

2019 is going to be a very bad year for StopH2, if they can be bothered to come back off their rather long Xmas hols…

 

Panorama on Hs2, what a damp squib!

18 Tuesday Dec 2018

Posted by in Hs2, Politics, Railways, StopHs2

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , ,

After much hoo-ha from the tiny anti Hs2 campaign who did their best to build up the programme, Panorama aired at 19:30 last night. The 30 minute episode, titled “Hs2; Going off the rails?” was billed by Hs2 antis as a smoking gun that would herald the downfall of the project as it would ‘lift the lid’ on the (supposedly) massive cost overruns and shaky finances.

The reality? It told us nothing new at all. Not a single thing.

The main thrust of the programme was an interview with a former employee of H2 who’s turned “whistleblower” and made all sorts of allegations that Hs2 had grossly underestimated the costs of purchasing land and property needed to build the line. None of these allegations were new, they date back to 2015. In fact, they’d been investigated by the National Audit Office who published their report into the matter back in September (link). The full report is 36 pages long and looks into all aspects of land and property purchase. Here’s the opening.

Part One Introduction to HS2 Ltd’s acquisition of land and property 9

Part Two The cost of land and property 16

Part Three Performance of HS2 Ltd’s land and property function 27

Appendix One Our investigative approach 32

So, what were the NAO’s conclusions and key findings?

Key findings
1 The estimated cost to acquire land and property for Phase One has increased significantly since the start of the programme.

2 The estimate has increased for a range of reasons, such as scope increases and the introduction of additional compensation schemes.

3 HS2 Ltd’s estimate of the cost to acquire land and property has improved, and now provides a reasonable basis for monitoring the cost of the property acquisition programme

4 HS2 Ltd forecasts that costs will remain within available funding, but it is still very early in the property acquisition programme

5 The Department deposited an estimate of the cost to acquire land and property, and a list of the property it expected to acquire, with the hybrid Bill, as required by Parliament

6 The property acquisition programme is currently on track but there is a long way to go and risks remain

7 HS2 Ltd’s land and property team has become better established since 2015

8 Only half of advance payments to claimants have been completed within the required three-month period from HS2 Ltd receiving a claim request

Now, the headline “half” of advance payments needs putting into perspective. Here’s what else the NAO said.

” Under compulsory purchase, HS2 Ltd is required to pay claimants 90% of HS2 Ltd’s valuation of the property within three months of receiving a claim, or the date of possession, whichever is later. The remainder is then paid upon agreement of the final value of the property. Between March 2017 and August 2018 payments have been later than the three months or forecast to be later in 52 out of 108 cases. HS2 Ltd has analysed the causes of delays. It considers that in 35 cases, the main reason is that claimants have not provided the required information in a timely manner. HS2 Ltd considers that the remaining 17 cases have been caused, at least in part, by HS2 Ltd (paragraphs 3.14 to 3.15).

So, just 17 cases of delays (out of 108) due to Hs2 Ltd, in other words 15.74%. Undoubtedly room for improvement, but hardly the scandal some try to pretend.

The NAO then go on to their concluding remarks
9 It is understandable that concerns have been raised with us about HS2 Ltd’s land and property acquisition programme given that it affects so many individuals and businesses. Although HS2 Ltd has made efforts to improve its land and property function since 2015, there is work to be done to support claimants to receive timely compensation where they are due an advance payment.

10 While HS2 Ltd’s estimate of the cost of land and property has increased significantly over time, cost estimates, particularly in this sort of major land acquisition programme, are inherently uncertain and subject to change as more information becomes known about both the design and operation of the railway, and the nature of the land and properties required. HS2 Ltd’s current estimate is within its agreed funding envelope from HM Treasury and provides a reasonable basis from which it can monitor the potential cost to compensate property owners and tenants affected by the construction of the railway. However, it is still very early in the property acquisition programme and too soon to determine with certainty what the final outturn will be.

So, no evidence of corruption, malfeasance or any other shenanigans. The NAO report is measured and balanced. It highlights the difficulties for such a major project as Hs2, pointing out that, “in order to build Phase One of the railway, the government will need to acquire approximately 70 square kilometres (more than 17,000 acres) of land along the route of the railway. HS2 Ltd estimates that it will have to compensate between 6,000 and 10,000 claimants who have land and property interests affected by the route, including property owners, leaseholders and tenants, and issue and process up to 50,000 compulsory purchase notices between 2017 and 2023”

All of this puts Panorama into perspective. As well as the ‘whistleblower’, they had a short interview with Surveyor Michael Byng, who trotted out his (long known about) claim that Hs2 would spend it’s entire budget on building Phase 1. No evidence was offered to support his claim, which wasn’t explored in any detail and it was rebutted by Hs2’s Chief Executive, Mark Thurston, and err – that was it. All a bit of a waste of time really.

The final part of the programme involved interviewing several people who were complaining that Hs2 wasn’t offering them enough money for their homes so was ‘robbing’ them, or that payments were late. None of them were new, in fact most of them had been featured in the media regularly over the past year. Such as this one.

All in all, Panorama was nothing more than a rehash of old stories and allegations – hardly a smoking gun that was going to bring down the project. The NAO had already addressed and dismissed the main complaint, and the fact they could find just 5 from 6,000 to 10,000 claimants who were complaining was never put into perspective.

You could almost sense the disappointment amongst the remaining Hs2 antis. StopHs2 didn’t even get a look-in and the reaction on social media was muted. Hs2 didn’t trend on Twitter and there was no ‘Twitterstorm’ just a few dozen people tweeting their outrage – many of whom were the usual suspects! The Stophs2 Facebook page was equally muted. Here it is this morning. Just 16 comments and 172 shares!

stophs2 FB

The reaction to the programme on social media and elsewhere reflects what I’ve been saying for a very long time. The anti Hs2 campaign’s a busted flush. Its influence is as insignificant as the actual number of people still protesting and programmes like this are no smoking gun. If his is the best they can go, it’s all over bar the moaning. Stop Hs2 is dead. Ironically, Joe Rukin himself gave the game away with this pompous but utterly misguided tweet

rukin. 17 dec

“Thousands” of people on Stophs2’s mailing list? Not tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands, just thousands – despite 6.5 million people living on the route of Hs2?

On another matter, a little bit of other news slipped out unseen yesterday. Remember the High Speed 2 Action Alliance? They used to be the main Stophs2 group until they gave up the ghost way back in 2016 after a long and futile campaign of legal challenges, including Judicial Reviews. Their last action was to allege a failure by the United Kingdom to comply with its obligations under article 7 generally, and article 7 in conjunction with article 6(3) and (4) of the Aarhus Convention by failing to ensure public participation in relation to the decisions issued by the Secretary of State for Transport on 10 January 2012 in the Command Paper “High Speed Rail: Investing in Britain’s Future – Decisions and Next Steps”

Yesterday, their legal people, Landmark Chambers, announced they’d failed as there was no breach, thus driving the last nail in the coffin of Hs2aa!

A Favour…

I use ads to help pay for the cost of this site. If you’d be so kind as to click on one (or several, if you feel that way inclined) I’d be grateful. You don’t have to buy anything if you don’t want to, but every click helps. Thank You!

Crunching the StopHs2 social media stats: October 2018

01 Thursday Nov 2018

Posted by in Hs2, StopHs2

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

,

It’s that time again when I wade through the Stop Hs2 ‘campaign’ social media stats to revel the truth behind the ridiculous claims and the hyperbole that this tiny bunch actually have huge public support. Stophs2 is still essentially two people: Penny Gaines (who’s been living in Bournemouth for several years now) and Joe Rukin who lives in Kenilworth. Despite having been trying for quite some time to find a proper job, no-one’s been daft enough to give him one. But then, as Joe’s a very strained relationship with facts (or the truth) it’s hardly surprising.

So, it’s been a busy month for them as their ‘campaign’ was ‘relaunched’ at the end of September, just in time for the conference season. Well, when I say relaunched, I mean they managed to drag some people together from a couple of the remaining local (in)action groups to send half a dozen people to leaflet outside the Tory conference (for all the good it did). Gone are the ‘glory’ days when they could afford to have stands inside the conferences, it’s all hand to mouth now…

OK, let’s crunch some numbers. I’m not going to post tables of individual tweets as there’s too many to bore you with (although I have the individual numbers if anyone wants them). Here’s the headline numbers. Let’s do Twitter first with a chart comparing their metrics over the past 3 months.

Hs2 tweet metrics Oct 2018

Despite the huge increase in Tweets in the last month (257%) and a 2% gain in followers, their numbers have hardly changed! In fact, the averages are worse than in August, as is their best number. Here’s their most popular tweet this month. As usual, it’s linked to Private Eye.

stophs2 most popular tweet Oct 2018

Herein lies a tale – both on their Twitter accounts and their Facebook page. Most of the stuff they Tweet or publish is linked to articles in the media, especially if it’s seen as critical of Hs2. But there’s no campaign news. There’s bugger all about what they’re doing, because most of the time that’s nothing. It’s the same with ‘news’ from the remaining (in)action groups, there’s so little going on there’s nothing to post. Stop Hs2 are almost entirely reactive, not proactive.

To be honest, both their feeds are mind-numbingly boring. Twitter is full of Rukin’s school of student politics: sweary and insulting. Nothing that resembles a campaign with intellect or gravitas. They’re reduced to moaning about Hs2, not organising to stop Hs2. If you’re suffering from insomnia have a browse of the #hs2 hashtag and see the sort of people who post anti Hs2 messages. It’s the last refuge of the green-ink brigade. There’s a couple of dozen regulars who are a mix of Nimbys, UKIPpers who think that Hs2’s a dastardly EU plot, right-wing libertarians and a few hand-wringing Greens who’ve been painted into a corner to oppose Hs2 but clearly have no alternatives to offer.

Facebook is very much the same. Here’s the last 3 months.

stophs2 FB Oct 18

Let’s put all these numbers in perspective. There’s 6.5 million people who live in constituencies Hs2 will pass through, yet the sole surviving Stop Hs2 group’s only got 6302 Twitter followers and 8745 Facebook followers. That’s pathetic frankly, especially when you remember not all their followers will be sympathetic to them. What the numbers show is that their activist base is minute. Not only that, but many of their followers are clearly as mad as a box of frogs! One only has to read the comments to see that some people’s grasp of reality is tenuous, to say the least. Take a look at these few posted on Facebook recently…

FB1

fb2

fb3

fb3

As usual, it’s always the same small band of people posting exactly the same stuff they’ve been doing for years. It’s a ‘campaign’ that seems to spend most of its time chasing its tail.

Another obvious sign that there’s nothing going on is Stophs2’s own website. Up to 2017 they would be churning out 30 plus posts as month (I crunched those numbers here). Now they’re down to just 3 or 4. You can check out their archive here. They contain so much bluster and dodgy predictions they’re actually quite funny.

Now the conference season’s come and gone and the dust over the recent announcements about the Phase 2b Environmental statement and phase 2a contractors search has settled. It’s clear that the much hyped MP’s ‘rebellion’ over Hs2 was just that – hype. Meanwhile, construction of Hs2 continues across the phase 1 sites as the archaeological digs continue. In the meantime, demolition work around Euston will be speeding up. In 2019 construction of phase 1 will begin in earnest. I wonder of Joe Rukin will have found a real job by then?

Digging up graveyards for Hs2. It’s not as if it hasn’t been done before…

30 Tuesday Oct 2018

Posted by in History, Hs2, London, Railways, StopHs2, Travel

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

, , , , ,

There’s always synthetic outrage and hypocrisy surrounding Hs2, none so more than around the issue of old graveyards being built on and the dead being exhumed and reburied.

Anyone would this this is somehow unique. In fact it’s very common. Many stations were built on old graveyards – including Euston itself. Between 1887 and 1892 the station was extended Westwards. This meant diverting Cardington St over the burial ground of St James’s, which had closed to 40 years earlier. Each corpse was provided with a new coffin and reinterred at St Pancras cemetery, Finchley, at the expense of the London and North Western Railway. This was done sympathetically due to the furore over an earlier graveyard clearance at nearby St Pancras in 1866 which rather puts today’s building into perspective.

During the first half of 1866 several thousand houses in Agar Town and Somers Town were demolished to make way for St Pancras. some 10,000 people were evicted (without compensation) and crowded into adjoining slum areas, making conditions even worse. Meanwhile, a corner of the graveyard of the old St Pancras Church was cleared. Like most old graveyards, it was packed with bodies to a considerable depth. Working conditions were appalling and the disinterred remains were treated with scant respect. Bones were left lying around and open coffins could be seen on the worksite. A furore arose in the newspapers and influence from high quarters led to more care being taken. The problem was twofold. The sheer amount of bodies buried in poor conditions and the fact the graveyard was making way for a cut and cover tunnel for the link between the Midland and the Metropolitan railway.

Nowadays, this has let to one of the more unusual local tourist attractions; the Hardy tree. The work of removing gravestones was delegated to one Thomas Hardy (yes, *that* one) and he arranged them in a rather interesting art installation. Here’s how it looked a few years ago.

T14164. Gravestones stacked around a tree. St Pancras churchyard. London. England

You can read more about it here.

When Broad St station was built in 1864-66 similar problems occurred. Excavations revealed layers of human remains several feet thick. This was thought to be either a plaque pit or the burial ground of the old Bethlehem hospital.

The same problem was encountered when nearby Aldgate station was built in 1875. This was described by Daniel Defoe in his book “A Journal of the Plague Year” As an aside, did you know several London parks are old plague pits – including Green Park?

When the viaducts on the approach to Charing Cross station were being constructed in 1863 well over 7,000 corpses were removed from the College Burial Ground of St Mary, Lambeth and reburied at Brookwood, on of the seven great satellite cemeteries established by an Act of Parliament between 1832-41 because London’s dead were buried in small urban churchyards, which were so overcrowded and so close to where people lived, worked and worshipped that they were causing disease and ground water contamination.

It’s not just something that happened in London either!

Manchester Victoria occupies Walker’s Croft which was once a 19th century church and graveyard linked to a nearby Victorian workhouse. As recently as 2013 remains were found when the station was being rebuilt. They were removed and reburied. A plaque at the station records this.

DG261981. Remembering the graveyard. Manchester Victoria. 11.12.16

Of course, nowadays, exhumations and reburials are conducted with far more care and attention than our Victorian forebears did, which rather puts the fake fuss into perspective, also, building Hs2 has archaeologists and historians genuinely excited as 1000s of them will be working on the course of the railway for the next two years. You can learn more here.

If you want to learn more about London’s plaque pits, visit this link.

UPDATE.

Since I wrote this blog, John Bradley (@flypie) has been in touch via Twitter with this interesting link to an 1828 road widening scheme in Liverpool that led to the exhumation and reburying of several thousand bodies.

5th October 2020.

HS2 Ltd has now announced that the bodies from the Euston cemetery are to be reinterred at Brookwood cemetery near Woking.

UPDATE:

Here’s a story that slipped in below the radar but that helps put HS2 in perspective. In 2014 a road scheme in Hull meant that an old graveyard had to be dug up, affecting up to 16,000 bodies. The Yorkshire Post billed it as “one of the country’s biggest ever mass exhumations”. But, as it wasn’t HS2 there was no outcry!

 

 

A fascinating day…

25 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by in Hs2, London, Travel

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

After the past few days working at home I had to head back to London today to have a business meeting with a potential new client. Fortunately, I didn’t have to be on the very early train from Halifax, just Grand Central’s 08:08 which was a bit of a luxury. I had a very productive few hours aboard, writing part 3 of my rail rover for RAIL magazine (part 1 came out yesterday) on the way to the metropolis. On arrival I met up with a new client for a fascinating chat about new technology and a demonstration of the potential of augmented reality for the rail industry which left me both fascinated and enthused.

After the meeting I spent an hour or two wandering around Camden, looking at how much the area’s changing because of HS2. It’s clear from that there’s no visible opposition to the project nowadays. There’s no banners, placards, posters in windows – nothing. What there is instead is a huge amount of people in Hs2 branded hi-vis changing the face of Euston (and beyond) – although some Muppets still try to pretend it’s not happening!

Now I’m heading North aboard Grand Central’s 16:27 to Bradford. It’s packed – even in First Class, but then many of their services are nowadays. To paraphrase the actor Roy Scheider’s famous line in the film ‘Jaws’ – “We’re gonna need a bigger train”…

Expect some pictures later..

The fantasy world of Joe Rukin and Stophs2

11 Thursday Oct 2018

Posted by in Hs2, Joe Rukin, Railways, StopHs2

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

, , ,

I’ve been a bit busy recently so I hadn’t seen this load of rubbish from StopHs2’s pet windbag. No, not ‘Ellie’ the inflatable elephant, but their laughably titled ‘Campaign Manager’ Joe Rukin!

Stophs2 have been punting this YouTube video of Rukin lying through his teeth on ITV – not that it’s doing very well as it’s only had 70+ views.

Rukin doesn’t ‘genuinely believe’ any such thing. He’s a practised liar who’ll claim anything and he’s lots of form for trotting out outrageous porkies in the hope people are gullible enough to fall for it. Remember his previous lie that Hs2 will cause £8.3bn of ‘cuts’ to rail services that I exposed here?

So, no rail investment for the next 20 years “anywhere on the network”eh? That will come as a huge surprise to Network Rail who’ve already got an ambitious programme of work planned for Control Period 6 (CP6) which starts in 2019. Back in October 2017 the DfT published the SoFA (Statement of Funds Available) which says “we expect around £47.9 billion to be spent on the railway across control period 6”. Earlier in July 2017 they also published the High level output specification (HLOS).

Not that Rukin will have ever read any of these of course. I doubt he even knows they exist as they show what a liar the man is. The SoFA contains this statement.

enhancements

Oops! Joe’s fallen at the first hurdle here. The announcement of ‘new enhancement’ schemes rather gives the game away.

Meanwhile, what’s in Network Rail’s Strategic Business Plan which was published earlier this year? Well, lots of enhancements actually. There’s a huge investment in digital signalling for a start. Oh, then there’s the £237m remodelling of Kings Cross station approaches, which is planned for 2020. Not to mention the £3bn Trans-Pennine route upgrade which begins next year.

Did I mention Scotland? The Scottish Government has committed to a rolling programme of route upgrades and electrification, including Aberdeen-Inverness. and bringing high-speed rail to Scotland. In Wales the new franchise is introducing lots of improvements between now and 2024 which includes new trains, stations and depots.

Oh, there’s also a small matter of fact that there’s 1000s of of new train cars either already being delivered or on order. So, as you can see, Rukin’s bare-faced lies sinply don’t stand up to any form of scrutiny – and that’s without me shredding him any further by mentioning East-West rail, the ECML Peterborough ‘dive-under’ at Werrington Jn, the Midland mainline upgrade and many, many more…

Rukin reminds me of the old joke about politicians. How can you tell when he’s lying? His lips move! Even his ‘fans’ must be getting sick of being deceived by now.

But it’s not just that. This highlights why I’m unhappy with some of my fellow journalists and their standards. Rukin was allowed to broadcast this travesty of the truth thanks to ITV who had no-one ask him the slightest question – much less any of the one’s I’ve highlighted in this blog. Where was the professional (informed) journalist challenging him on camera and saying “but hang on Joe”…This is why we’re in such a mess now. When did the mainstream media like the BBC and ITV let this rubbish pass through their filters? Since when did journalism get this lazy?

That said, we’re in the throes of the Brexit shambles, which the BBC seems to have aided and abetted, so maybe I shouldn’t be too surprised….