This morning the House of Commons Public Affairs Committee has published a damning report on High Speed 2. Committee chair Meg Hillier MP says the rail project has gone "badly off course". The report makes it crystal clear that HS2 Ltd show a complete disregard for accountability, transparency and taxpayers' money.
Chief executive of HS2 Ltd Mark Thurston, who receives a salary in excess of £600,000 per year (the highest of any government official), failed “to give an accurate account of the programme’s problems” to the committee.
He is just one of 47 HS2 employees paid more than the prime minister. The committee delivers a brutal verdict, saying they are not convinced that the “Department [for Transport] and HS2 Ltd have the skills and capability they need now or in the future."
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The coronavirus crisis was the perfect opportunity for the government to slam on the brakes but it steamed ahead, promising to stop HS2 coming off the rails.
Given the woeful performance of HS2 Ltd the final bill for Europe's largest infrastructure project could be in excess of £150 billion. The minister responsible, Andrew Stephenson must act. Mark Thurston and the rest of the HS2 gravy train should be subject to proper scrutiny, and if their answers don’t stack up, they should be handed their P45s.
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The Agriculture Bill aims to establish the playing field British farmers will face without EU subsidies and high tariffs on non-EU agriculture imports post-Brexit. In the run-up to a recent vote on the Bill we noticed attempts by MPs to add amendments that would see restrictions on future UK trade, such as tariff barriers.
It's fair to say we are not big fans of the Bill, owing to the numerous taxpayer funded subsidies littered throughout it. But as proponents of free trade we acted quickly to make our case to MPs and ensure amendments were voted down.
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Our team wrote a briefing note for MPs explaining that food liberalisation has benefited rich and poor across the globe. Between 2005 and 2017, the number of undernourished people in the world declined by 136 million people, twice the current UK population. It has also benefited British shoppers, as the variety of goods available at a typical supermarket has increased and prices have fallen. Grassroots assistant Kieran Neild followed this up with an excellent essay detailing the history of free trade and why Britain must continue to embrace competition.
I'm pleased to say the amendments were voted down, despite the chancellor accidentally rebelling against the government! This is an important win for taxpayers in helping to encourage competition and grow the economy in a post-Brexit, post-pandemic Britain.
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TaxPayers' Alliance in the news
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No more tax rises!
On Thursday lunchtime our chief executive John O'Connell was a guest on Mike Graham's talkRadio show to discuss boosting the economy after the current crisis. This followed a leaked report from the Treasury calling for a 5 pence increase in the basic rate of income tax.
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John argued that with the tax burden already at a 50-year high the last thing Brits wants is a punishing tax hike. He called for the government to adopt a "relentless focus on economic growth" to recover from the pandemic.
Cutting taxes and simplifying our burdensome tax code are essential if we are to have a flourishing economy in the next 10 years. Listen to the interview in full here.
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NHS spend £1 million to 'heal' their bullying
NHS Highland has come under fire after senior doctors claimed that staff had endured years of bulling and intimidation. Consequently the health board has been given £1 million of taxpayers' cash to mount its legal defence and manage public relations. The timing couldn't be worse as it comes when front line staff need every penny possible to battle coronavirus.
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Asked for comment by The Scottish Mail on Sunday, our research director Duncan Simpson said, "taxpayers won’t feel they’re getting healed by a process which requires them to fork out for expensive consultants."
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Our team have been merrily typing away all week to bring you another excellent series of blogs. TPA development manager Milly Skriczka has looked at the £1.6 billion bailout paid to Transport for London (TfL). In the current climate, it is inevitable that as passenger levels have dropped considerably, the number of TfL staff essential to keep reduced services on London roads, buses, trains, including underground and overground, and trams has been affected. But as Milly points out, TfL has not spent money wisely prior to this. For example:
"Last year, the mayor spent millions on ‘diversity’ staff at TfL. There were a stunning 30 staff members earning over £50k with the word ‘diversity’ in their title, along with 34 whose job description featured the buzzword ‘inclusion.’ These are generally not frontline functions, so how many of these ‘diversity’ staff are viewed as non-essential and therefore have now been furloughed?" Read more about TfL's wasteful spending.
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As mentioned earlier Kieran Neild has put together a great long read on the history or free trade. From the Corn Laws to the modern day read his piece in full here.
Following a recent TPA publication on Whitehall waste, our digital campaign manager Joe Ventre says the War on Waste has never been more important. He points out that instead of calls for tax hikes to balance the books post-coronavirus, there is an abundance of government profligacy that should be trimmed first.
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Woke Whitehall
As Joe discusses in his blog, a series of freedom on information requests by the TaxPayers' Alliance has revealed Whitehall departments wasting taxpayers' cash promoting personal pet social causes, including the installation of gender neutral bathrooms and the purchasing of LGBT+ flags and lanyards. This is not a question of whether these causes are good or bad, but rather why taxpayers are paying over the odds.
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For example, a total of £6,342 was spent on LGBT+ lanyards, with departments paying between £3.53 and 49 pence per lanyard. But a plain lanyard costs as little as 13 pence online. Since 2013, government departments have also spent over £57,000 on gender-neutral toilets, which by all accounts aren’t even being used. Mandarins should not let the pursuit of right-on social causes see value for money go out of the window.
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Harry Fone
Grassroots Campaign Manager
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