Tories to scrap crossrail?

[Metroland]

Keep in mind just 2 days ago this was in the manifesto. Proof that you cannot trust politician's manifesto pledges.

The future of Crossrail was thrown into doubt today after the Tories admitted they could not commit to the £16 billion project.

Shadow London minister Justine Greening said it was even possible a Tory government could scrap the cross-capital rail link.

She said that although Crossrail was important to London she was unable to give a “line-by-line” budget before winning power. It comes just two days after David Cameron's manifesto “supported” the east-west link, although there was no cast-iron guarantee.

Labour leapt on her words as proof the Tories were considering dropping the project, which will deliver thousands of jobs, cut journey times and be a huge boost for business.

Work has already begun on the line, including at Tottenham Court Road and Farringdon. Transport Secretary Andrew Adonis said: “The Tories' supposed commitment to Crossrail lasted just two days. Now Justine Greening has exposed the weasel words in the Tory manifesto for what they are.”

However, London Mayor Boris Johnson said he had received private assurances from the Conservative leader that it would “almost certainly” go ahead.

Pressed as to whether the Tories might scrap Crossrail, Ms Greening said on LBC radio: “I can't give a guarantee that it will continue. It's possible, but we've always said that we think it's an important project. What we can't do before the election is finished is write a budget when we're not in government.”

Business groups expressed concerns that the Tories had not fully signed up to the link despite their manifesto. But Baroness Valentine, chief executive of London First, said: “Justine is a powerful advocate for London and understands the vital importance of transport investment to economic growth.”

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/stand...r-no-guarantees-for-crossrail-tories-admit.do

http://www.lgcplus.com/briefings/services/transport/tories-could-scrap-crossrail/5013620.article

Labour today accused the Conservatives of breaking a manifesto pledge only two days after launching their election proposals after a shadow minister admitted that a key rail project could be scrapped under a Tory government on the grounds of cost.

The Labour party seized on the comments made by Justine Greening, the shadow London minister, who told London's LBC radio that she "cannot guarantee" that the building of the £16bn Crossrail scheme – an east-to-west rail link across the capital – would continue under the Conservatives.

Her comments appear to contradict a commitment outlined in the Conservative manifesto, published earlier this week, which says: "We support Crossrail and the electrification of the Great Western line to south Wales."

Greening told LBC earlier today that she was unable to give "a line-by-line budget on projects across government, including Crossrail. Everything's up for review but we think it's important," she said.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/...eak-manifesto-pledge-on-crossrail-says-labour

 

[generalvegitable]

I would much rather that they convert the northern part of the circle line and link it to liverpool street therefore saving tons of money and making it much more useful, the current plans are in effect duplicating the central line

 

[Ticket Man]

not the first policy that the tories have changed their mind on but you would have thought they would have waited until they were in power before they start breaking their promises

 

[Greenback]

Is it any wonder people have become dissillusioned with politics and political parties? They don't even bother to wait until they form a government now before they abandon their pledges!

 

[deltic]

Tories have only ever said they "support" (a meaningless term) Crossrail which is not the same as saying they will build it or build it as presently proposed. While not agreeing with their proposals they havent actually reneged on anything

 

[Mojo]

I thought work has already started?

 

[Ticket Man]

I thought work has already started?

it has, they bulldozed a load of buildings on Tottenham court road about four months ago.

 

[Mojo]

So how can it be scrapped? Unless you just leave a load of partially completed building works and parts of London a construction site forever more. And presumably pay back the contractors £Millions?

 

[Metroland]

Cross rail has had a number of false starts, and of course the channel tunnel was started in the 70s, they built so much and pulled out in 1975.

Transport always feels the crunch of government spending cuts. Touchy feely politicians always consider Health and Education more important.

Remember the last attempt at Cross rail was scrapped in the early 90s - by a Tory government.

 

[Ticket Man]

So how can it be scrapped? Unless you just leave a load of partially completed building works and parts of London a construction site forever more. And presumably pay back the contractors £Millions?

It's true that if they scrapped it then millions of pounds will have been wasted on the work already done, contractors will want compensation for cancelled contracts and the final cost could run into the hundreds of millions, and all because of two bickering parties.

 

[Greenback]

So typical of this country! How much money has been wasted down the years by this sort of thing?

 

[Mojo]

I don't think anything is completely safe under any party and I wouldn't be put off voting for the Conservatives because of this. We'll have to see the state of finances under whoever the next Government is.

 

[deltic]

Work at Tottenham Court Road is also for new LUL booking hall etc - so still needed if Crossrail dropped

 

[Metroland]

Well I still haven't decided what I'm voting for, so I'll resist being political. But unlike some of the younger members of the forum I do remember what the Tories were like: 4 million unemployed. In our school consisted mostly of a bunch of portacabins, we shared books (or had to buy our own), had 1950s desks, and leaking roofs. I had to drop out of A levels and go to work when my parents lost their house thanks to Tories messing around with the ERM.

Then of course there is Brown's lot. Kowtowing to the unions, and throwing £890 billion of our money at the banks he failed to regulate, and promoting the big companies and authoritarian state at everyone's expense.

I'm highly likely to vote for none of the above as it stands.

 

[WatcherZero]

Sheesh, first 20 entries on my news aggregator this afternoon are 'tories to cancel crossrail'.

Personally I think they will keep it (since governments only paying 1/3rd the cost) and instead cancel the other electrification schemes and perhaps try and clawback some of the local transport schemes awarded collectivley £2bn of funding over the last couple of months. Now they may do what Labour may do and put some requirements in the new franchises to fund infrastructure as well as rolling stock procurement, so it may not be all bad though ticket prices may suffer to pay for it.

 

[Oswyntail]

As has been noted, it was "support" rather than "commitment". And, given the way that the Conservatives are still being denied access to Treasury information (against the rules, I think) it would be stupid of them to commit to any massive capital development. And besides, Crossrail as it currently stands is hardly the most useful or important project, designed as it has been to get the barrow-boys from Berkshire to the City more quickly (Well, that little lot should get me flamed out of existence )

 

[WatcherZero]

The official ministerial 'shadow' does have access to files and information. The civil service like before any election have spent the last couple of months drawing up how they would implement each parties policies so they can hit the ground running after an election so to speak.

 

[Drsatan]

Admittedly Crossrail is flawed, but that's no reason to scrap it especially when construction work has already started.

Hopefully someone, somewhere may see sense and decide to extent Crossrail all the way to Reading, and scrap the current plan to turn around half of all Crossrail services at Paddington. Maybe, just maybe, someone will decide that extending Crossrail to Ebbsfleet (providing an interchange with Eurostar services) would be a brilliant idea instead of terminating trains at Abbey Wood, which from what I've read is in the middle of nowhere.

But don't bank on it though: chances are even if the Tories win the railways will still be run by civil servants rather than railwaymen...

 

[CosherB]

Well I still haven't decided what I'm voting for, so I'll resist being political. But unlike some of the younger members of the forum I do remember what the Tories were like: 4 million unemployed. In our school consisted mostly of a bunch of portacabins, we shared books (or had to buy our own), had 1950s desks, and leaking roofs. I had to drop out of A levels and go to work when my parents lost their house thanks to Tories messing around with the ERM.

Then of course there is Brown's lot. Kowtowing to the unions, and throwing £890 billion of our money at the banks he failed to regulate, and promoting the big companies and authoritarian state at everyone's expense.

I'm highly likely to vote for none of the above as it stands.

If you thought the Tories were bad, pity you're not old enough to remember the last Labour government - Jim Callaghan's presiding over the UK falling apart. The Tories were luxury compared to that!

 

[WatcherZero]

Admittedly Crossrail is flawed, but that's no reason to scrap it especially when construction work has already started.

Hopefully someone, somewhere may see sense and decide to extent Crossrail all the way to Reading, and scrap the current plan to turn around half of all Crossrail services at Paddington. Maybe, just maybe, someone will decide that extending Crossrail to Ebbsfleet (providing an interchange with Eurostar services) would be a brilliant idea instead of terminating trains at Abbey Wood, which from what I've read is in the middle of nowhere.

But don't bank on it though: chances are even if the Tories win the railways will still be run by civil servants rather than railwaymen...

It may be good to extend the services in either direction, but economics have to be answered. Will they fill these very frequent and very long trains or will they be practically empty?

 

[moggie]

Camerons job creation scheme for his tory chums in law firms everywhere - contract lawyers!

I suspect that just like HS2 they'll look to see if they can't add a few years delay while they 're-examine' the plans to get 'better value for the taxpayer' - never mind the money wasted when the plug is lifted and the money already spent / committed drains away down the plug hole.

We'll see soon enough.

 

[Oswyntail]

The official ministerial 'shadow' does have access to files and information. The civil service like before any election have spent the last couple of months drawing up how they would implement each parties policies so they can hit the ground running after an election so to speak.

That's how it should be - and is in many areas - but I understand there is still some wrangling over what information should be handed over.

 

[BlythPower]

Then of course there is Brown's lot. Kowtowing to the unions, and throwing £890 billion of our money at the banks he failed to regulate, and promoting the big companies and authoritarian state at everyone's expense.

Kowtowing to the unions whilst at the same time promoting the big companies is a difficult one to pull off. Most people are of the opinion that (mainly via Blair) Labour's done far too much of the latter and none of the former.

And as for not regulating the banks, well the Tories are known for their fondness of strict regulation for business... :roll:

The alternative to not bailing them out would have have a financial meltdown which would have decimated people's savings and pensions and resulted in a massive number of reposessions.

 

[Oswyntail]

Kowtowing to the unions whilst at the same time promoting the big companies is a difficult one to pull off. Most people are of the opinion that (mainly via Blair) Labour's done far too much of the latter and none of the former.

And why should the Unions be any different from any other interest group? They do not represent the political wishes of their members (many of whom have to join as a condition of employment), and should be treated on a par with the CBI - a group that has knowledge, experience and advice, but not a right to influence. But Labour does give them a soft ride (admittedly less so recently) because it desperately needs their donations. if that isn't using money to try to buy political influence i don't know what is :roll:

The alternative to not bailing them out would have have a financial meltdown which would have decimated people's savings and pensions and resulted in a massive number of reposessions.

That is one view, and one that Brown is resting his whole "reputation" for firm action on. There were alternatives, one of which might have been to consider the disparate nature of the banking system, analyse where the problems lay, get the full picture and taking appropriate action. This would probably have resulted in a long-term solution and stability, rather than the eggshells we are still walking on. But Brown panicked. Not a good experience for someone seeking election!

 

[Stuart Galbraith]

Well I still haven't decided what I'm voting for, so I'll resist being political. But unlike some of the younger members of the forum I do remember what the Tories were like: 4 million unemployed. In our school consisted mostly of a bunch of portacabins, we shared books (or had to buy our own), had 1950s desks, and leaking roofs. I had to drop out of A levels and go to work when my parents lost their house thanks to Tories messing around with the ERM.

Then of course there is Brown's lot. Kowtowing to the unions, and throwing £890 billion of our money at the banks he failed to regulate, and promoting the big companies and authoritarian state at everyone's expense.

I'm highly likely to vote for none of the above as it stands.

We were lucky enough to avoid the leaking portacabins, but I can certainly relate to the schoolbooks problem. Ours were so old, there was a special section on the empire of which we still seemed to own significant parts.:roll:

As for canceling Crossrail, we seem to be under the misconception that its only in this country things like this can happen. If it is binned, at least its at a fairly early stage. Look at this.
http://www.kynerd.com/Tunnelbanan/Kymlinge.html

http://www.lostplaces.de/u10-berlins-unvollendete-u-bahn-linie.html

http://www.lostplaces.de/vergessene-autobahn-strecke-24.html


When you pay off all the canceled contracts, you may as well just continue with it. Otherwise when its resumed in 10 years time (assuming they dont sell the land at Old Oak Common) then thats just increasing the end cost of the project. Its absurd.

 

[gordonthemoron]

Stuart, the difference from those three examples, is that Crossrail is needed urgently, whereas those developments were speculative

 

[Capybara]

And why should the Unions be any different from any other interest group? They do not represent the political wishes of their members (many of whom have to join as a condition of employment)

No they don't.

 

[jon0844]

In Moorgate, there's another huge building that has closed down for Crossrail. I guess there are loads of compulsory purchased buildings along the route.

Surely they can't pull the plug now! If they did, they'd have to sell the properties and then start all over again (losing even more money along the way) if/when it does go ahead.

 

[Polls]

After Camerons performance last night I have absolutely no faith in anything he says as he kept on being caught out on blatent lies from the other two parties. He is a complete tool and will no doubt ruin most plans for progression in this country including the Crossrail, whilst happily lining his and his pals pockets. Blimey, he makes my blood boil.

 

[thegrich37423]

The Crossrail project is one big smokescreen. It is designed purely to suggest that the current government has any interest in investing in the broken railways of the UK. I mean, who exactly is going to use it? If I understand the proposed route of Crossrail, it is going to run from Shenfield through the West End of London, ending up in Maidenhead? Why do the government think that such a route is going to be a success? It won't, mark my words. It's an expensive way of giving the UK another route which will lead to the same old problems of overcrowding.
The Tories should scrap Crossrail, and HS2 for that matter, and focus on the existing lines and improve their respective services. I fear this will not be the case with an uninspiring performance from a leader hell bent on becoming the UK's answer to Jimmy Carter.