Il treno di denaro HS2 ha rivelato: chi ha fatto miliardi?

A very long article, but well worth reading how incompetent and corrupt the whole thing is (was). Archive link: https://archive.is/O07NT

Some highlights:

The government negotiated the contracts very badly or, worse than that, they didn’t negotiate anything at all. They left it to HS2 to negotiate it and then turned a blind eye. They accepted whatever contract price HS2 came up with and then signed it off.

The commercial strategy put almost all the risk on HS2 Ltd, effectively turning the contracts in to cost-plus arrangements.” The contracting model has not driven performance,

When the price of a contract went up, the government would be on the hook for 99 per cent of the overspend, the contractor only 1 per cent.

The construction and engineering industry has been paid more than £32 billion — of which £27 billion has gone to 13 main firms.

A total of 122 media and PR companies have made £33 million, and 44 events and hospitality firms have received £8 million.

Charities, non-profits and community groups have received more than £11 million, including £478,000 to the Dogs Trust to rehome 25 animals for two years.

Utility companies, including Thames Water and Cadent Gas, have received £1.3 billion to replace infrastructure in the way of HS2’s new tunnels.

HS2 bosses spent £8,800 hiring photo booths for career events for young people.

Other payments include £10,800 to the internet forum Mumsnet; £1,100 to a Bikramyoga studio in Primrose Hill; £25,000 to a ceramics charity; and £231,000 to the Royal College of General Practitioners to soundproof exam rooms for doctors.

HS2 referred itself to HM Revenue & Customs after allegations that two companies — said to be providing employees for the Balfour Beatty-Vinci partnership — falsely declared self-employed workers to be directly employed staff and charged inflated rates. It was alleged that “fake payslips” had been submitted to mislead auditors.

In September 2017, a message popped up on Mumsnet, the online forum used by about eight million people a month. The post said HS2 “wants to attract and recruit more women into the industry. In order to do this, they would like to understand your experience of getting back into employment following a period away from work.” Attached was a survey, and anyone who filled it out would be entered into a prize draw with the chance to win a £300 shopping voucher. For running the survey, Mumsnet was paid £10,800.

The Mumsnet spending was just a small part of the £50 million HS2 has spent on communications, market research and events and hospitality to date, across 170 different companies.

The biggest payouts have gone to Williams Lea, which was awarded contracts worth £15.5 million. Although the company’s website says it is a business support services firm, it is described on HS2 invoices as supporting media and communications.

So when it was announced that the Colne Valley viaduct, which will carry trains from Harefield into Buckinghamshire, would be built on land adjoining the centre, the charity decided it had to act. In 2023, the trust received nearly £480,000 to move about 25 dogs to a private kennel in south Oxfordshire for two years because of the noise created by the construction of HS2.

Six golf courses have received money from HS2, mostly for allowing access for planners and having assessments done. Whittington Heath Golf Club, near Lichfield, received £411,000 as compensation because the rail route will run directly through the course.

However, the club, which was founded in 1886 and has about 600 members, also had a new clubhouse built for £7.7 million, paid for by HS2 after the previous one was demolished — one of the most expensive pieces of compensation paid out along the entire HS2 route.

The Employers Network for Equality & Inclusion, which helps “maintain diverse teams”, received £33,000, while the LGBT charity Stonewall received a one-off payment of £9,000 in 2017.

LinkedIn has been paid £588,000 by HS2, is part of a vast recruitment network feeding into the line’s 31,000-strong workforce.

From the moment HS2 was announced it was clear that a massive recruitment drive would be needed, not just for the 2,000 roles at HS2 but in the thousands of other posts being created at firms receiving contracts.

Despite the vast exercise, there is evidence that HS2 has not recruited for all the right roles, which has led to rising costs. For example, there was not enough expertise in awarding commercial contracts and how to manage them.

In total, more than £1.4 billion has been paid to utility companies, including gas and water firms, since 2009. They are the third-biggest recipients, behind construction firms and transport and logistics businesses.

The large majority of the money has been spent on moving and upgrading infrastructure.

The big four accountancy firms — PwC, Deloitte, KPMG and Ernst & Young — have received £292 million to date. But this is not just for keeping HS2’s accounts in order.

> PwC comes out on top, with £129 million. A 2018 report by PwC found that HS2 will cost an average of 25 per cent more than similar rail projects in 32 other countries including France, Spain, and China.

Deloitte, having been paid £120 million to help develop “capability improvement activities”. The company says its role was to look at the structure of HS2 and analyse whether it had the key people and skills to deliver the project.

> It also produced a damning report in 2015 that showed how cost estimates for the number of properties that needed to be bought were outdated and undervalued.

The Law Society Gazette reported that legal costs had soared at HS2 as it became bogged down by court proceedings. Since 2018, HS2 Ltd has been named as the defendant in litigation in 45 separate cases.

The HS2 gravy train. An example of Tory Britain. No plan, nothing delivered, no accountability. Spaffing tax payers money up the wall, and us left paying for the cock up, plus interest.

As someone who worked in civil engineering and bid to work on HS2, it became a well known thing that the contracts were not being managed approximately and I don’t know if it was by design or as a result, but people stopped bidding it because it was simply too expensive to bid to win the work because of all of the mistakes and delays made. It meant that there was a monopoly on who would deliver the work or who was willing to even involve themselves in the mess because it because a significant business risk to be attached to HS2.

Im talking companies with billions in turnover, thought the project was too risky and declined to bid based on the tendering processes and contractual management. Nothing about the build itself, pretty straightforward methodology. Just the organisation was so poor and delays so lengthy it became a risk. Also security was a significant contract cost.

Only business I know that was involved with HS2 went into administration due to the project.

Constantly changing specs, millions invested in product development and no orders due to delays.

I’m always amazed at how UK has been convinced that “private enterprise is better”.

Even more, private enterprise with public money.

So incredibly disassociated from reality…

Near where I sometimes work in China, a new stretch of 242 kilometer, 350 kmph+ high speed train line just opened: [https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202506/27/WS685e4f28a31000e9a5738fd8.html](https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202506/27/WS685e4f28a31000e9a5738fd8.html) . I heard about it from the fact it was front page news for one day, the day it opened.

I realise this isn’t completely relevant, but just found it upsetting China is still knocking out quality high speed rail, and a line longer than all of HS2 wasn’t news for longer than one day, even locally!

I worked for one of the big contractors on HS2 for 5 years. From an engineering point of view HS2 is doing some absolutely amazing work and for a young engineer it’s a brilliant place to work where you will learn and experience so much.

However that doesn’t outweigh all the bureaucracy and politics at management level. The amount of jumping through hoops we required to do just to please just one person, whether from an external organisation or within HS2 because they just didn’t like something was ridiculous.

All the upper management are laughing their way to early retirement with their constant 10% bonuses, where the engineers were getting nothing.

The way the contracts were drawn out to the contractors were built in a way no matter how they performed commercially as long as they met certain specific targets (which were chosen by the contractors!), they would get paid regardless of how much it cost them.

There’s so much more to rant on about, but I’ve left that project and I’m all the more better for it. There will be so much more that’ll come out of the woodwork on this project as time progresses, the potential labour supply and suspect fraudulent activity is just the tip of the iceberg.

as there is already much discussion about failings of hs2 management I want to add what hs2 is up against when it tries to get truck routes for construction sites. (warning this site has a lot of ads) [https://www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk/transport-and-highways/443-transport-and-highways-news/51176-high-court-refuses-council-judicial-review-bid-over-routeing-of-lorries-to-hs2-construction-sites](https://www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk/transport-and-highways/443-transport-and-highways-news/51176-high-court-refuses-council-judicial-review-bid-over-routeing-of-lorries-to-hs2-construction-sites)

Darius Emanuel Grouch… III. Better known as…

The Rumble.

MONEY TRAIN