Latest news with #Euston
Telegraph
a day ago
- Politics
- Telegraph
Maintenance isn't sexy, but Farage on the other hand ...
There was an odd conjunction of stories in Thursday's papers as the European Space Agency declared its goal of establishing a 'plentiful habitat' for humans on Mars within 15 years, while the UK Government admitted that it had stopped trying to guess when trains will ever run on HS2, a project that began (check notes) 15 years ago. Perhaps by 2040, the visions will merge and passengers in London will be able to buy plentiful Mars bars as they wait for a cancelled train. But the past 15 years have not been wasted: they managed to move the departure boards at Euston and put them back again when people complained. One small step for man, one giant leap for Network Rail. Despite Britain's recent track record, Darren Jones bounced into the Commons to announce a new 10-year plan for infrastructure. It will cost £725 billion, so with the usual overshoot we can expect that to pass £2 trillion and involve three potholes being filled and a new light in the gents at Victoria. Yet the chief secretary to the Treasury was full of aspiration and ambition. He is fond of alliteration and promised to go 'further and faster' and act more 'effectively and efficiently' than the Tories. Tall, bespectacled, with a neatly parted hairstyle and a slightly unsettling grin (imagine him played by Mark Gatiss), Jones is not a man who lacks belief. Asked by Jerome Mayhew, a Norfolk Tory, how he could be confident of delivering better value than the last Labour government got under PFI (private finance initiative), he merely replied: 'I am usually confident in my abilities.' He is armed with a 'new online infrastructure pipeline' (not quite ready) and a new acronym: Nista, which stands for the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority. I noted that it was formed on April Fool's Day. 'That's a very shiny title,' sneered John Cooper, Tory MP for Dumfries and Galloway, who said it would be met with an 'eye-rolling sigh'. Jones replied that he had closed two bodies before creating it. 'So it's actually down one,' he said, flashing his fingers to show that he can count. A rare moment in infrastructure planning when a number falls. As more attacks flew in from Welsh and Scottish MPs, who felt they weren't getting enough of the pie, the suave chief secretary showed a touch of exasperation. 'You might want to be a little more grateful,' Jones told David Chadwick, a Lib Dem from Brecon. Generally, though, he was tiggerish, not only about building things but keeping them from falling down. 'Maintenance isn't sexy,' he said, 'but it's really important.' Maintaining a Labour government especially. Speaking of sexy, Richard Tice had risen during the business statement earlier to cry 'phwoar' about his party leader. This is the weekly session when MPs can ask for a debate on any topic under the sun and the Government will pretend (or not) that it cares. Its purpose is to generate tweets and press releases for MPs to send to their local papers about whatever is dominating their postbag. The Skegness Standard will note, therefore, that of all the subjects that its Reform MP could have brought up, he chose Nigel Farage being named Britain's sexiest male politician in a poll for an infidelity dating website. Tice asked Lucy Powell, the leader of the House, to join him in congratulating Farage on being the philanderers' pin-up and also Angela Rayner, who won the women's category. 'Does she recommend that they have dinner together?' he asked. Powell pursed her lips and replied that, tempting offer though it was, she suspected that the Deputy Prime Minister would be washing her hair every night from here to eternity. There's more chance of getting a bypass built on time.
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
ROSS CLARK: The farce of HS2 shows how Whitehall has allowed waste and fraud to flourish on an industrial scale
Year by year, the tale of HS2 grows more wretched. The latest report on the fiasco, by James Stewart, former chief executive of Crossrail, depicts contractors behaving like a gang that tarmacs driveways taking advantage of an octogenarian widow. Endless wheezes have been devised to drive up costs, with HS2 Ltd – the government-owned company set up to handle the project – seemingly too gullible to prevent itself from being ripped off. Some of what has gone on, according to the report, may constitute outright fraud. Contracts were signed off even before aspects of the design were decided upon, effectively giving expensive additions a blank cheque. An elaborate remodelling of Euston station was abandoned, but not before £250 million was blown on design work. It beggars belief not that a firm charged £20,000 to make a model station out of Lego, but that HS2 paid it. In all, costs have been inflated by an astonishing £37 billion since 2012. To put that into context, Rachel Reeves ' eye-watering tax rises in last October's budget were supposed to raise an extra £40 billion. The culture at HS2 is prodigal and woe betide any miser who tries to spoil the party. When risk assessor Stephen Cresswell raised concerns that the ballooning HS2 bill was 'actively misrepresented', he was soon shown the door in 2022. He took the firm to an employment tribunal and was this month awarded £319,000 compensation. His condemnation afterwards was withering: 'HS2 is not an organisation that should be trusted with public money.' And yet, we give it more public money. While the official estimate for its final cost is between £45 billion and £54 billion, many fear it will cost more than £100 billion. One of the many ways in which the project was misconceived from the start was that it was needlessly designed to be the fastest train service in the world, even though all the cities it connected were less than 200 miles apart. Consequently, far more earthworks were required and far more properties had to be demolished than if the line was built for a lower speed. Even at its original estimate, HS2 was going to cost, per mile, multiples of what the high-speed line from Paris to Strasbourg – its first phase was completed in 2007 – cost. It is bizarre that then-prime minister David Cameron and chancellor George Osborne waved through HS2 as a fully taxpayer-funded project in 2012 at the same time they were taking a scythe to public services to try to close Gordon Brown's gargantuan spending deficit. In their hubris, they imagined that Whitehall would make a better fist of HS2 than was made of HS1 – the line from London St Pancras to the Channel Tunnel – which was built with private money and sailed over its budget by around 20 per cent. An HS2 worker stands in front of tunnel boring machine Karen at the Old Oak Common station box site during preparations for completing the 4.5 mile HS2 tunnelling to London Euston How could they have not noticed the lousy record of cost control in almost everything run by the state? Time and time again, we find ourselves paying through the nose for things that other countries seem able to build for far less. Just look at the Stonehenge tunnel, a billion-pound project that has been 30 years in the making but was cancelled last year because of its mushrooming costs. And the less said about a third runway at Heathrow, the better. While other countries build things, we spend billions talking about it, holding endless inquiries, backtracking and redesigning the whole thing. We are about to go through the whole tortuous process again with the construction of Sizewell C. Like HS2, the Suffolk nuclear power plant follows a similar private sector project – in this case, the Hinkley C station in Somerset, which has itself been delayed and overrun its budget. Even by nuclear reactor standards, its design is complex, as the same plants in Finland and Normandy have proved with 14-year and 12-year delays, respectively. It's little wonder that the private sector judged Sizewell to be too risky, but that has not stopped the Government ploughing taxpayer money into the scheme in the deluded belief that, yet again, the public sector will manage it better. Don't believe it. Private enterprise doesn't always manage things well, but at least it has a strong incentive to keep a lid on costs and avoid extravagance. Let spending spiral out of control and you can crash your company – taking your bonus and pension with it. In the public sector, on the other hand, you just run off to the Treasury with a begging bowl, assured that the Government has invested so much of its political capital in it that it won't be brave enough to pull the plug. That is what has happened with HS2. Contractors know that ministers are desperate to get the project over the line, and behave accordingly. We are never going to solve the problem of infrastructure unless we first tackle the culture of the public sector. Public officials need proper incentives and penalties pegged to performance, and have it drummed into them that they are spending our money, not a bottomless pit of funds. Yet introducing a dash of private-sector dynamism into Whitehall is anathema to this Labour administration more concerned with union demands that civil servants continue to run the country from their sofas. Rachel Reeves sees spending on infrastructure as key to future growth, but with more projects on the horizon – such as building small modular nuclear reactors and updating the National Grid – there's little hope that these won't become very expensive millstones around the taxpayer's neck.
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Politics
- Daily Mail
HS2 scheme 'will not be completed on time' as report highlights 'litany' of failures behind '£100billion white elephant' railway line
The disastrous HS2 scheme was delayed again yesterday, as a scathing report identified a 'litany' of failures and the rail line was labelled a '£100 billion white elephant'. Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander told MPs the gargantuan project was an 'appalling mess', with an audit revealing endemic overspending, hundreds of millions of pounds wasted and poor decision-making. Ms Alexander said there was no hope of meeting the current completion target of 2033, without putting a deadline as to when it would eventually be finished. Critics last night urged the Government to abandon HS2 altogether. The project has been a totem of waste in recent years, with taxpayer cash squandered on frivolities including a £100 million bat tunnel to protect local wildlife, and £20,000 for a Lego replica of Old Oak Station, the west London hub connecting HS2 with the Elizabeth Line. Yesterday's 130-page report revealed yet more liberal spending, with £250 million blown on the cost of just two failed designs for a revamped Euston station. Tory grandee David Davis, a long-term critic of HS2, told the Mail: 'It's a £100 billion white elephant, and it's still moving. 'It's going to cost a lot more than £100 billion. I would rather have 50 small, effective railways than one HS2.' Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, led the calls for the project to be abandoned completely. He said: 'Has the moment not come to recognise this is a failure? Let's scrap HS2, let's use the tens of billions of pounds we can save in the next decade to upgrade railway lines... and spend the rest on other national priorities.' The review, carried out by infrastructure expert James Stewart, found there was 'no single reason' for HS2's dismal failures to date, but identified political turmoil, prioritising 'iconic' design over practicality and indecision at a senior level among the problems. Mr Stewart said the HS2 board lacked the requisite skill needed to deliver Europe's largest infrastructure project, while suppliers 'largely failed to deliver' what they promised. There were even claims of fraud by subcontractors in the supply chain, which the Government said would 'be investigated rapidly and rigorously'. The report said HS2 was 'in a state of flux and uncertainty', and a 'fundamental reset' was required. Ms Alexander admitted: 'It's an appalling mess but it's one we will sort out.' Labour backbencher Dave Robertson said people were 'absolutely sick of HS2'. HS2 was originally due to run between London and Birmingham, then on to Manchester and Leeds, but the project was severely curtailed by the Conservatives because of costs. In 2013, HS2 was estimated to cost £37.5 billion (at 2009 prices) for the entire planned network, including the now-scrapped extensions from Birmingham. In June last year, HS2 Ltd assessed the cost for the line between London and Birmingham would be up to £66 billion. Budgeting was not helped by HS2 Ltd's 'consistent inability' to produce reliable cost and timeframe estimates, the report found. Ms Alexander also highlighted an assessment by Mark Wild, the chief executive of HS2 Ltd, which described 'the overall situation with respect to cost, schedule and scope' as 'unsustainable'. She added: 'Based on his advice, I see no route by which trains can be running by 2033 as planned.'
The Guardian
3 days ago
- Business
- The Guardian
Reviews show Tories wasted billions of pounds on HS2, transport secretary to say
The Conservatives wasted billions of pounds on HS2 through poor management, badly negotiated contracts and constant design changes, the transport secretary will say on Wednesday. Heidi Alexander will tell MPs the last government overspent on the high-speed rail line in multiple ways, including signing contracts even when advised not to and drawing up expensive plans for redesigning Euston station in London before scrapping them. She will announce the findings of two reviews into the troubled project, even as ministers brace to swallow another increase in the projected price tag to a reported £100bn. 'Billions of pounds of taxpayers' money has been wasted by constant scope changes, ineffective contracts and bad management,' Alexander will tell the House of Commons. 'It's an appalling mess. But it's one we will sort out.' Referencing recently reported claims of fraud by contractors supplying workers, she will add: 'There are allegations that parts of the supply chain have been defrauding taxpayers, and I have been clear that these need to be investigated rapidly and rigorously. If fraud is found, then the consequences will be felt by all involved.' A Labour source said: 'The cost inflated out of all control, billions were wasted due to political indecision. There was a failure of ministerial oversight from the then transport secretary and a delivery company not fit for purpose. It's a comedy of errors, but no one's laughing.' The Conservatives were contacted for comment. Alexander will lay out the results of two reviews into the scheme: one by James Stewart into what went wrong and what it can teach ministers about how to run future infrastructure projects, and an initial assessment by Mark Wild, the chief executive of HS2 Ltd, looking at how and when to construct the rest of the phase one line from London to Birmingham. The problems identified in those reports go beyond the escalating costs of tunnelling and environmental mitigations such as the £100m bat tunnel, which has been singled out for criticism by the prime minister, Keir Starmer. Phase one of the HS2 scheme was projected in 2012 to cost £20bn, but more recent estimates now put that figure at as much as £57bn. Wild's review, according to sources quoted by the rail expert, Christian Wolmar, could lead to the full budget being restated at current prices at more than £100bn. Alexander will tell MPs that among the mistakes made by the previous government was the decision to sign a series of construction contracts despite having been advised by a review in 2020 not to do so until the scope of the project had been fully decided. The Oakervee review, which was commissioned by Boris Johnson as prime minister, recommended in 2020 that the government renegotiate key contracts to build the scheme and hold off signing further ones until making political decisions about its future. The transport secretary will tell MPs on Wednesday that contracts continued to be signed even when those decisions had yet to be made. Ministers were also commissioning two sets of designs for a new station at Euston at a total cost of over £250m, only to scrap both of them. They also spent £2bn on the northern leg from Birmingham to Manchester before it was cancelled by Rishi Sunak as prime minister in October 2023. Sign up to Business Today Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning after newsletter promotion Soon after the northern arm was axed, Sunak announced a Euston ministerial task force to oversee improvements to the station. That committee was due to include ministers from the Treasury, the transport department and the levelling up department, but government sources now say it never held a meeting. More recently, HS2 Ltd has begun an investigation into claims that one of its labour suppliers on the project charged overinflated rates for staff. A spokesperson for HS2 Ltd said at the time: 'We treat all whistleblower allegations seriously and are continuing to conduct our own investigation. Furthermore, HS2 Ltd has formally reported the allegations to HMRC.' One of the measures Alexander is taking to try to get the project back on track is to appoint Mike Brown, the former commissioner of Transport for London (TfL), as the new chair of HS2 Ltd. He will replace Jon Thompson, who stepped down in the spring after a series of colourful public interventions, including disclosing the bat tunnel saga. Brown worked under and then succeeded the current rail minister, Lord Hendy, in running TfL. Meanwhile, Wild has written to Alexander setting out the broad terms of a 'reset' for the project to keep costs down and get construction back on track. He carried out a similar role with TfL on the Elizabeth line to eventually deliver it successfully within a revised timescale and budget. However, in the short term it is likely to mean that HS2's full opening, even on the reduced network, is pushed back further into the 2030s, while the budget is likely to soar in real terms.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
WorkWhile, flexible labor platform, raises $23 million Series B
At 16, Jarah Euston landed her first job at a Party City—on the better days, as the balloon person. 'It was my first job ever, and I blew up the balloons with the helium,' she said. 'But the worst possible job you could have at Party City was called go-backs—take a shopping cart full of tchotchkes that parents didn't actually want to buy and put them back on the pegboard. You have to find, say, where this Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle goody bag goes, and hang it back up.' Euston, who grew up in Fresno, Calif, is now the CEO and cofounder of flexible labor platform WorkWhile. The startup, which she founded in 2019 after stints at Yahoo and Nexla, focuses on people working the 'frontline,' hourly jobs that she says are the norm in places like Fresno. 'I want to build something for the people I grew up with, the people who work frontline jobs in Fresno,' she told Fortune. 'And not just the people in Fresno, but the 80 million Americans working hourly jobs. It's more than half of the U.S. labor force. And globally, 80% of all workers are working these types of jobs. So, how do we apply technology to improve their situation?' For Euston, part of the solution lay in flexibility—technology that sets up a marketplace where workers can be matched with temporary jobs, adjusting their roles, schedules, and locations to better shape and control their workweek. Six years in, the platform now serves over one million users and employs 63 people. Now, the startup has raised a $23 million Series B, Fortune has exclusively learned. Rethink Impact led the round, with participation from returning investors Khosla Ventures and Reach Capital. Citi Impact Fund, GingerBread Capital, and Illumen Capital also invested. Simon Khalaf, ex-CEO of fintech Marqeta, also recently joined WorkWhile as COO. The startup has worked with vendors serving Taylor Swift's Eras Tour, the Super Bowl, NASCAR, the NCAA Final Four, Comic-Con, Edible Arrangements, Thistle, and Worldpac. WorkWhile's rise signals that the gig economy is maturing—but many of its long-standing controversies remain. In 2024, the company became tangled in a familiar legal battle for gig companies: it was sued by the San Francisco City Attorney, who alleged WorkWhile had misclassified the workers on its platform as independent contractors, denying them the rights and benefits afforded to employees. The case is part of the ongoing fallout from California's Proposition 22, the 2020 ballot initiative that classified most gig workers as independent contractors. In December 2024, WorkWhile agreed to a partial $1 million settlement and committed to reclassifying its non-driver workers as employees. Litigation over the classification of delivery drivers, however, is still ongoing. 'Prop 22 is the law of the land and was upheld by the California Supreme Court, affirming this important right of drivers to work as independent contractors,' Euston added via email. 'Our platform users have been very clear with us: they want flexibility. We respect our users' right to work flexibly and will continue to advocate for it.' Josh Queenan, a WorkWhile user the company connected me with, said he deeply values the flexibility the platform offers—and that it's helped him transform his financial life. He told Fortune he earns an extra $5,000 to $6,000 a month, which he puts toward stock investments and is looking to use to buy investment property. 'If I want to cancel a shift, I just give a 24 hour notice, and press the cancel button,' said Queenan. 'I have peace of mind, I know that somebody else is going to pick up the shift and that the company we work with isn't going to be screwed. That's a huge selling point for WorkWhile.' For her part, Euston still regularly works shifts via WorkWhile. 'It keeps you up at night, I want to make sure workers on the platform feel they're the center of WorkWhile,' she said. 'That's why we're at a startup. The whole point is to help people earn a better living and live better lives. If we don't put them front and center, that won't happen. That's why we try to work shifts.' So, in some ways Euston's Party City days are long gone, and in others they're close—lots of the shifts she works are similar kinds of jobs. With one exception: last year, she took a gig at the Eras Tour last year. 'My job was crowd control,' Euston laughed. 'I was telling people 'you can't dance on the chairs.' And as the night went on, the moms got progressively more loosey goosey!' This story was originally featured on Sign in to access your portfolio
