In recent days people have been told by their nationalised Network Rail not to use the train services unless it is essential. Three hot days led to trouble on the tracks. Meanwhile the Minister after a two year wait produced updated budget forecasts for the costs of fully nationalised HS 2. These showed the cost has shot up to over £87bn for less than half the railway line originally planned. Even with construction contracts let and work underway there is a £14 bn variation in the forecasts with an upper figure of £102 bn.
Worse still are the delays. A new trainline first planned by the Labour government of 1997-2010 might be able to pock up its first passengers in 2040 or they might need to wait another three years til 2043. How come successive UK governments and their highly paid Chief Executives of HS2 have so failed? How can it take three decades to build a single rail line? Why do costs escalate beyond belief? Why have none of the senior managers responsible lost their jobs or even in some cases sacrificed their bonuses?
This dreadful performance makes nationalisation a hard sell. It also makes more nationalisation unaffordable for taxpayers. Taxpayers have been mugged by HS2. Why look for other ventures where the same might happen?
June 27, 2026
It’s beyond belief. Your last para is the killer lesson: “This dreadful performance makes nationalisation a hard sell. It also makes more nationalisation unaffordable for taxpayers”.
I’d extend this, though. We need less government, and less government interference in our lives. “The best government is the one that governs least”. I think that’s obvious, but a very large number of UK citizens disagree with me. What can we do to persuade them otherwise, when something like HS2 does not convince them?
June 27, 2026
There are delays and cancellations on rail for all sorts of reasons these days – leaves on the line, the wrong type of snow, subsidence along the track and heat. Why are other countries railways so much better?
We have a skivers’ charter on the railway and we are turning into a ‘nation of melts’ as an article in one tabloid put it.
HS2 is another example of government waste. Defence procurement is the same – paying vast sums of money for stuff that does not work while costs spiral.
However rail privatisation was the cause of many issues – not nationalisation.
Set up a daft fragmented system to replace a joined-up network and pay the consequences. Maintenance is now outsourced to companies without the long term xskills of previous British Rail.
The government brake up of British Rail was a failure. Now they are trying to pin the blame on the newly renationalised Network Rail. Privatisation caused the problem in the first place, for doctrinaire reasons that don’t work in real life.
Reply What a stupid analysis. HS 2 has been nationalised throughout!
June 27, 2026
Well the UK government are useless (and often corrupt) at building or subcontracting or regulating anything. It usually costs £ billion before you even put a spade in the ground. Any project is likely to need £million bat tunnels or fish discos due to English Nature and endless legal challenges. Any agenda supported by nearly all the political parties like Nat Zero, the Covid Lockdowns, HS2, renewable energy, the dire NHS structures, aircraft carrier and defence procurement, the attacks on free speech, HIP packs (initially), the EU, energy performance certificates, over restrictive planning and building regulations is likely to be particularly insane.
So perhaps £200 billion for a railway of perhaps £10 billion value at best (less the costs of all the vast disruption and inconvenience caused). Still Boris and Sunak borrowed and spent £600 billion on Covid (dangerous and ineffective) “Vaccines” and Covid lockdowns which all did vast net harms as is clear for the data. Which is why they are still refusing to release full honest data.
June 27, 2026
For £200 billion we could have build about £2 million small houses. This using less land too. Might that not have been rather more use than a pointless HS train track? Reducing taxes and borrowings by £200 billion would have been an investment at least 200 times better than HS2.