HS2 Action Alliance Blog
Challenging the case for HS2
HS2 to cost every family in the UK £1000
Professor David Begg, Director of Yes to HS2, denies that the project will cost every British family £1000. He suggests this figure ignores the revenue from fares, and broader gains to the UK economy.
Yet the Prof’s analysis is not foolproof. In reality the only reliable figure provided by the Government is that the scheme will cost at least £32 billion. Once built, HS2 would most likely run at a loss, so that far from fares revenues off-setting the capital cost, they will be insufficient to cover running cost – as is the case for most of the UK’s railways today.
Begg’s denial is based on Government figures that greatly overestimate demand, ignore competition, and value benefits with an out of date view of gaining productivity from journey time savings and are against a completely artificial ‘do minimum’ comparator. Once time savings are viewed sensibly and the comparison is made against a realistic comparator, the claimed economic benefits are fundamentally undermined.
Far from overstating the cost, saying it will cost over £1,000 per family could turn out to be an understatement since there is a real prospect of annual subsidies being required to support services. And given most construction projects end up costing more than originally planned even that figure could rocket…
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