The government has this morning issued a new plan for infrastructure investment in the UK. It says:
Let me put that in context. In the three years 2007-08 to 2009-10, or the height of the financial crisis in other words, UK investment totalled £126.1 billion.
In the next five years it is planned to be £100 billion and there has been inflation in the meantime.
This is not a government serious about investment. We have the capacity to do £50 billion a year (we did that in 2009-10). So why aren't we going to do it when interest costs are so low? Surely the time has come to bite the bullet and build the Britain we need?
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
There are links to this blog's glossary in the above post that explain technical terms used in it. Follow them for more explanations.
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
Buy me a coffee!
I agree.
The failure to not follow through on the intention to electrify the Midland Main line for example is a big long term mistake.
We will still be beholden to variations in oil prices (when we know it is running out and becoming more expensive to acquire) and pollution by dirty diesels will continue.
So much for believing in infrastructure. And think of the jobs and tax receipts it would create? Evidence again I would say of the intentional starving of investment by this political party to destroy the role of the State. There is nothing passive about this in my opinion.
Economic vandalism – pure and simple.
indeed, they’re looting and wrecking the country. The good part about that is we’ll be left with a clean slate when they’re done. With imaginative and creative new thinking applied to our social needs and infrastructure the country can be much better off than if the Tories had left it alone.
I think we’ll be left with binding contracts leaving any incoming government with little or no ability to change from a privatised NHS, schools, housing and probably quite a few roads. A very dirty slate, that will have been topped off with TIPP ensuring nothing can be reversed from the corporate takeover.
It’s almost surreal listening to what the government says, compared with what they actually do. THe budget debate yesterday had me marvelling at the well crafted sound bites, the declarations of compassion and integrity, the self-congratulatory confidence, the strength of their convictions, and the marginalisation of the opposition.
To an outsider, the Tories had all the characteristics of a civilised, caring and successful government. But it was all an illusion – what they said bore no relation to reality. They are really good at doing this, and the press don not hold them to account.
“the press do not hold them to account” given most of the Uk press is owned by Tory party supporters/tax dodgers there is zero reason why they would. In the case of a failure to invest – Osborne is trying to do the Brown “off-balance sheet” accounting trick (= PFI). Hinkley being his particualr pet project – get somebody else to fund it (in this case the French state) and then let UK serfs like you, me and others to pay for it ad infinitum. Worked for Brown, no reason it would not work for Osborne.
If Government investment were to be at rates the markets would love (PFI-like) then this is an awful lot of money to payback, I don’t get Tory disinclination to further good-debt. If Green/Peoples QE or EIB funding is used e.g. Welsh Water (Dŵr Cymru), then its neo-People Friendly Investment 🙂
Some local funding would be nice:
1. Why not fund the Tidal Lagoons in south Wales and elsewhere, we need to know how viable this technology is long term — start now. Use EIB funding or even create “community/local banks” to fund such worthwhile projects. (Climate change is running away, Christmas was above freezing in the north pole this winter [1], [2]). I suspect Cameron is pursuing grace and favour as part of investment projects.
2. Why delay electrification of the GWR line at Cardiff (BTW Hitachi have a fully electrified depot in Swansea!) — what’s the delay, politics.
3. Invest in the modern infrastructure required to save the last remnants of UK steel manufacturing and the Port Talbot plant (from Greybull [3]). That plant and its sister strip steel plants could start rolling the future of strip steel — ‘solar cell’ coated strip steels.
4. Invest in north-south transport links in Wales. I suspect few people travel by rail to Aberystwyth from e.g. Port Talbot, 78 miles, typical advertised train time 5hrs equals 15 mph! Stephenson’s ‘Rocket’ train managed 28 mph.
5. Invest in Social Housing — we can see the Tory reasons why not, it reduces the value of the elites “housing bond” holdings. I have colleagues living in Vancouver, try buying a property there.
[1] http://phys.org/news/2015-12-freak-heatwave-temperatures-north-pole.html
[2] http://phys.org/news/2015-12-freak-heatwave-temperatures-north-pole.html
[3] http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/76524d86-a8ab-11e5-955c-1e1d6de94879.html#axzz43iovvJAu
Agreed…..
Why isn’t Labour saying it?
I just do not know
I think that Labour is reacting to the ‘wisdom of crowds’ – in this case the received wisdom that we cannot afford anything anymore and we are bankrupt.
The voter seems to have also swallowed the ‘country is a household’ analogy whole and we should be attacking that now.
Political parties do not like to be seen to be disagreeing with the people they want to vote for them!!
It’s a form of intellectual cowardice and helps to perpetuate the wrong thinking that dominates.
@RM – gave up on Labour silence. Lucas, Bennett and Mhairi Black great voices – building an anti-neolib movement.
I look for such voices too
[2] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jan/20/2015-smashes-record-for-hottest-year-final-figures-confirm
I am not here to defend the current government – heaven forbid. But what we have now that we did not have before 2010 is a plan with more long term visibility to help construction manage workflow. The biggest problem has been maintaining sufficient skills base, employment for graduate engineers and so forth to keep attracting the people we need and keep them in stable employment. This needs infrastructure planning beyond the five year parliamentary horizon. I think we’ve taken a small step in the right direction, which is more important than the total cash involved.
“The biggest problem has been maintaining sufficient skills base, employment for graduate engineers and so forth to keep attracting the people we need and keep them in stable employment.”
That’s because most of what passes for British industry, particularly in engineering, seems to think that you can recruit skilled labour from a bus stop queue, like scrumping ripe fruit off a tree. Training people costs money and unless they are going to get free milk in the form of taxpayers subsidy money from the teat of the government they normally despise to pay for the necessary training they are not really interested as it takes money off the bottom line. Besides which most so called modern management have spent the best part of a generation or more ensuring that jobs and work are deskilled because the only skill these buggers want to exist or recognise is management.
The idea that long term thinking exists is laughable when large swathes of companies are hoarding profits so as not to pay any tax, borrowing money and leveraging those profits and other assets in order to buy back their own stock so as to keep the stock price high to enable the top management to maintain their quarter on quarter bonuses. The name of the game is indulgence today, investment tomorrow, as short term bottom line stats and targets, stove pipe/silo thinking, and next week’s stock price dominate the agenda.
Stable employment? You’re having a laugh. You’re George Mcfly on a visit from the 1950’s and I claim my free cart of manure.
(Apologies to Richard as ever, who has to moderate my nonsense.)
The HS2 Phase 1 bill has just passed in the Commons, with both main parties whipping their MPs and several opposing ministers elsewhere at the time of the vote. Every week reveals more evidence against this project: migrating jobs from north to south, reducing rail services for the majority of rail users, fails to address congestion or add useful capacity, environmental destruction, etc, etc. But if local residents have a congested roundabout, try finding the money to address it. One community adjacent to HS2 is looking to fund its own noise barrier itself.
There is now a National Infrastructure Commission, designed to meet privately and rubberstamp the Chancellor’s pet projects and an Infrastructure & Projects Authority designed to champion government projects. Yet, according to the Public Accounts Committee, ministers & permanent secretaries don’t have the necessary experience of project delivery.
I suggest that this is all capture of infrastucture construction by the private sector, who will build unwanted & unneeded big-ticket items, at the expense of the essential small items.
@Dave Hansell: Three decades in enginering has taught me that the biggest problem facing UK engineering is its own management. The industry has focussed on the easy stuff that is easily transferred to other countries (and this is software/electronics, not textiles) and has focussed on young graduates, laying off experienced engineers. Chronically ageist and not even interested in paying for sponsorships or apprenticeships.