The Observer
Comment & Analysis 25.08.19 47If Johnson wanted Britain to lead the world,
he’d stop hedging his bets and back HS2
The thinking behind
his new inquiry into
high speed rail is
political, not economic
The foundations
of the dynamic economies of
the 21st century will be massive
agglomerations of people. In the
new era of the learning machine,
anything that is routine – from a
production line to the legal processes
surrounding buying a house – will be
performed by a robot. What will drive
economic activity instead are myriad
face-to-face interactions, from
education to medicine, which can’t
be done by machines but can be done
people living in large urban areas.
This trend is already clear –
think San Francisco Bay, the M25
area in London, the Beijing orbital
rings. In an age of capitalism with
robots, the advantage of such areas
is going to become even more
marked. Essentially, the more an
economy can agglomerate, the
more it will take off, especially if it is
supported by fi t-for-purpose public
interventions and investment.
Crucially, success will depend on
people being able to move quickly,
cheaply and in great numbers,
one of the reasons for the great
worldwide boom in rail transport
and high-speed rail in particular.
For one of the iron rules of human
behaviour is that we will invest
only so much time in travelling and
commuting: more than an hour and
the willingness to travel falls away.
In this worldwide race to capture
the benefi ts of agglomeration,
Britain has one extraordinary
and potentially transformatory
possibility, as important in the
fourth industrial revolution as the
possession of water and coal was
in the fi rst. If we can bring London,
Birmingham, Manchester and other
great cities together in an interlinked
urban network with travel times of
about an hour or less between them- the aim of HS2 – we will possess
a world-beating agglomeration. If
on top we have access to the world’s
biggest market – the EU and its
network of trade relationships –
alongside a smart industrial strategy,
Britain could be Europe’s number
one economy in the century ahead.
There is however a massive
obstacle: a fantasist populist
right, in thrall to American ultra-
libertarianism. Of course Jacob Rees-
Mogg thinks HS2 a “complete waste
of money” , while Nigel Farage has
dismissed HS2, the building block
of an autonomous economically
dynamic future, as “ludicrous”.
Farage’s vision is for a small-
government, hyper-free-market,
non-networked Britain dependent
upon American corporations and
US regulations to survive – a new
form of vassalage, as we are pitilessly
coloni sed by our ex-colony.
Boris Johnson’s decision to launch
a third inquiry into HS2 can only
be understood in terms of his vital
need to neutrali se the Brexit party
in the election obviously planned for
the autumn, as well as assuaging his
own Brexit right and Tory activists.
The future of HS2, he can say, is
under review and his commitment
to Brexit cannot be doubted. If
he can do this – and not give
Labour the time to replace Corbyn,
whom he badly needs to remain
Labour leader – he has a chance of
converting his 10-point opinion poll
lead into a parliamentary majority.
It’s worth a throw.
However, while he may have
appointed HS2 sceptics Tony Travers,
Stephen Glaister and AndrewSentance to the review team , the
chair is Doug Oakervee , a long-
standing HS2 advocate and a loyal
Johnsonian creature. He and team
members Network Rail chair Peter
Hendy , West Midlands mayor, Andy
Street, and Dudley council leader,
Patrick Harley , understand the
strategic arguments over connectivity
and agglomeration.Indeed, Street correctly
rests his strategy for reviving
the West Midlands economy on
HS2’s completion. If Johnson tells
Oakervee he needs it dead to beat off
his know-nothing right, Oakervee
will look for a way. But in part, the
review gives Johnson political cover
over this crucial autumn – and
afterwards the rationale to drive the
project forward.
The review will nonethelessmean expensive delay and it could
dismantle some of HS2’s overall
coherence to save small sums.
But there may be compensating
long-term benefi ts. Oakervee
is a longstanding critic of the
accounting processes Britain uses
to assess infrastructure spending- too much accent on cost and very
limited assessment of rewards. The
approach is stultifying; because of
the high discount rates deployed,
there is zero value placed on
benefi ts beyond 12-15 years – and
there is no attempt whatsoever to
capture civilisational, spatial or
strategic benefi ts, like the rewards
from agglomeration. It is a system
that knows the price of everything
and the long-term value of nothing.
The Romans built 11 vast
aqueducts to supply their million-
strong city with water, some of
which are still used today, such
as the Aqua Virgo that supplies
the Trevi Fountain, an incredible
feat of engineering, ambition and
durability. However, using British
accounting techniques, they would
not have built one. The likes of
Rees-Mogg, Farage and Travers
would have congratulated them for
their sagacity in not wasting public
money. But then Rome knew its
civilisation and prosperity rested on
the capacity to deliver water.
Oakervee and his allies on the
review team know the same about
high-speed rail and its future
importance. If they can frame an
argument that shows how HS2,
notwithstanding inevitable cost
overruns, makes strategic sense for
the whole of the UK as it is planned ,
they will have done a great service. It
will unlock not only HS2 but a host
of other projects.
However, we live in what’s
looking less like a democracy than a
Tory-only state. If Johnson decides
the project has to go to protect his
fl ank from the right, it will go. More
important a Tory government than
prosperity. Meanwhile, the rest of us
can do little more than look on and
hope that reason triumphs sooner
rather than later.
An artist’s impression of an HS2 train on the Birmingham and Fazeley viaduct. Photograph by HS2/PA Wire4 17
The Audit
Non-stop
London to
Sydney
Qantas will test non-stop
direct fl ights to see if
passengers can tolerate
the 19-hour journeyThe distance
in miles
between
London and
SydneyThe number of
hours by which
the shortest fl ight
time will be cut
hours – currently the
longest non-stop fl ight
(from London to Perth)The year in which Qantas aims
to introduce the new fl ightWill
Hutton
^ @williamnhutton10,557 2022