The never-ending fiasco of HS2 is a case study in how not to build

The Independent has taken a close interest in the HS2 scheme since it was proposed by Andrew Adonis, transport secretary in the last Labour government, in 2009. We were cautiously in favour of the idea, but worried that the British state’s record of managing large infrastructure projects has been patchy at best.

As the costs mounted and the rationale for the scheme became less strong, our concerns grew. Much more of the route between London and Birmingham than expected was put in tunnels because of pressure from residents through their mostly Conservative MPs. The bat tunnel in Buckinghamshire later became symbolic of excessive environmental regulation. And the critical part of the route, from the marshalling yards of west London to Euston station, has still not been finalised or financed.

So news that the company building the high-speed HS2 railway line has spent £37m of taxpayers’ money buying up properties on the two routes north of Birmingham long after those routes were cancelled is of further insult and injury to everyone who applauded the vision behind this wasteful white elephant.

An investigation by The Independent has found that money continued to be spent on the main route to Manchester after it was scrapped two years ago by Rishi Sunak as prime minister. Further sums have also been spent on the eastern leg to Leeds, part of which was cancelled four years ago.

Meanwhile, the growth of electric vehicles and the prospect of decarbonising the entire transport network of the country took away much of the argument that HS2 would help mitigate climate change.

When Mr Sunak cancelled the northern phases of the scheme – a news story broken by The Independent, incidentally – the arguments for and against the project had become balanced. If anything justified the decision to call a halt, however, it was the history of the appalling project management of a scheme that had become a boondoggle for construction companies and a vast secondary economy of consultants.

Our report today confirms that such “madness” continues. Buying land for a project that has been cancelled seems to be the very definition of weak financial control. Needless to say, the government must complete purchases to which it is legally committed, and HS2 claims that some of the land may be needed for other less ambitious rail schemes in future. But it is hard to avoid the conclusion that money and time is still being wasted.

In the scheme of things, £37m is also a small sum compared with the billions that have been wasted on HS2, but it is emblematic of a project that has been badly handled and stuck in the morass of planning and regulation law from the start.

It is not a one-off. Britain’s failure to build nuclear power stations is the product of the same chronic problems: the inability to make the right strategic decisions and stick to them, and the difficulty of cutting through the thicket of planning law and environmental regulations. The same applies to house building, airport expansion, roads and reservoirs.

It is tempting to throw up our hands and to declare that Britain cannot build anything anymore. But that would be defeatist, demotivating and untrue. The London Overground network and the Elizabeth line are two projects that have been delivered, and which have made life easier for hundreds of thousands of people.

It is unfortunate that both of them are in and around London – and indeed that the part of HS2 that will be completed is the part that is closest to the capital. And it is doubly unfortunate that a scheme such as the Leeds tram, outside the southeast of England, should have fallen victim to the Treasury in the Budget.

It is the rest of the country that urgently needs better infrastructure, but because the productive economy is already concentrated in the South East, the Treasury’s cost-benefit analysis is always going to be biased in favour of projects there. This bias must be reversed.

The right response to the failures of HS2 is to treat them as a case study in how not to run a railroad. We can build things in Britain if the economic and environmental case for them is strong, taking regional inequality into account, and if there is the political will to overcome the sticky web of planning regulations.

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has said many of the right things about making it easier to build things. The HS2 farce is a reminder of the importance of following through on her words with actions.