On Monday, 29 May 2017 23:14:28 UTC+1, eastender wrote:
Not in Tory manifesto.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/...mment-99392666

I think it was in difficulties long before the manifesto emerged. The lack of impetus, delayed consultation stages and Grayling's dislike of devolving anything to City Hall were all clear warning signs. Grayling then said he wanted to "investigate" the use of a land value capture tax as a funding mechanism. That is just another way of delaying the scheme and postponing the funding because I don't think we have such a tax mechanism in law and you'd need a Budget and a finance bill to introduce it. The Tories are not exactly fans of introducing new taxes and the government is pretty incompetent anyway so it would be hard to get through Parliament.

It is quite clear that the enthusiasm for "infrastructure" held by Cameron and Osborne is not evident in May's administration and even if she wins the General Election there are no obvious advocates for such a scheme in Government. The Chancellor is doing everything he can to avoid expensive pledges because the Exchequer needs maximum flexibility to deal with whatever the impact of Brexit will be. At a minimum, uncertainty about the process, timing and outcome of Brexit will damage the economy and even if there is no slump there will be a weakening and that damages tax income. The government are reluctant to borrow to invest so all they have left as a fiscal tool is to cut expenditure regardless of the impact.

I will be astonished if CR2 starts construction within the next 20 years. We will see a repeat of the nonsense that Crossrail had to endure to get to the point of "spades in the ground". This is because politicians are generally pretty stupid when it comes to transport investment.

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Paul C
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