Thread by @garius

It currently costs roughly £20m a mile to build a railway.

At that rate, it would cost 100 BILLION POUNDS to 'undo' the Beeching cuts.

So this is a commitment to 0.5% of that total.

Remember: Just because a number sounds impressive, doesn't mean that it is.

https://twitter.com/grantshapps/status/1195414027909894146

Back in 2013, on the 50th anniversary of its publishing, we explored the myth and reality of the Beeching Report (and its REAL impact) on @lonrec

As you might suspect, it is more complex than people like to paint it. And in many cases the cuts it proposed made sense.

Indeed part of Shapps' tweet gives the game away on the fact that the Beeching cuts weren't universally bad.

Beeching was commissioned by the CONSERVATIVE, and infamously corrupt, Transport Secretary Ernest Marples.

Marples was the MD of Marples Ridgway, and somehow forgot to divest himself his shares when he became a transport minister.

This turned out to be rather lucrative when the firm won contracts for Hammersmith Flyover, the M1 and much, much more.

'Poop! poop!' Said Marples (probably)

From his Vineyard in Monte Carlo.

Which he fled to after it was discovered his companies had been dodging tax for 30 years.

The treasury tried to freeze his assets. But he'd already shifted them to tax havens abroad.

Anyway. I digress. Back to Beeching. And the hint in Shapps' original tweet.

Ask yourself: why would WILSON implement a bunch of cuts that were the pet project of Ernest Marples, Lord of Tarmac, Fraud of Fraud Hall?

Because, as I say, many of them were necessary and overdue.

Indeed for LONDON, at least (and remember London is what we write about on @lonrec) they were either mostly harmless, or only look like a tragic waste of capacity WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT.

Because we now live in a world where we have learned that the car CANNOT be the king

Does that mean they didn't hurt communities?

No.

Does that mean that there aren't hundreds of miles of railway that SHOULD be rebuilt and reopened?

No.

But it also doesn't mean that Beeching was somehow a malicious government plot to 'kill' railways. Labour OR Conservative

I would suggest that Mr Shapps, who has until now demonstrated himself INFINITELY superior to his predecessor, would do well to remember that transport is complex

And that sinking to Johnsonian levels of misinformation is beneath both his office and the example he has set so far

Anyway, if you wish to read the pieces we wrote on Beeching at the time of the 50th anniversary, you will find them here:

londonreconnections.com/2013/the-beech…
londonreconnections.com/2013/the-beech…
londonreconnections.com/2013/beeching-…

/ends