Trams, trains and automobiles
Thursday, 13 November 2008
It’s a month to go until the result of the referendum on the Transport Innovation Fund and peak-time congestion charging in Greater Manchester - and the debate is moderately warm!
Stockport council, led by Liberal Democrat Dave Goddard, is opposed to the TIF bid and has been a target of particular attention from the Yes campaign. Driving past Stockport town hall the other day, I noticed the council has stuck up a load of posters that mention the congestion charge (the bad bit) but not the preceding £3bn in public transport funding (the good bit). This is a devilish massaging of the facts that dumbs down the debate - and, as such, is entirely par for the course in local political campaigning.
It’s amusing that whenever I speak to anyone in business who’s in favour of TIF (which is just about everyone), they invoke some high-falutin’ waffle about the “business case” and how £3bn spent on buses and trams will “drive GVA growth for the city region”. This, despite the fact that they have clearly not travelled by bus since at least the late-1970s and don’t intend to start any time soon.
It seems fairly clear that people voting in this referendum will be expressing a gut reaction to a measure that will result in them eventually having to pay a fiver to drive to work and back. That’s why I think a vote against the proposals is the most likely outcome next month.
However, the strange thing is that while a Yes vote will be trumpeted as a mandate to implement the proposals, a No vote isn’t going to bury them. The government has admitted that it will assess the bid even in the event of a vote against. In other words, the Yes side can’t possibly lose the referendum - in the short term at least.
Which begs the question: Is the Yes campaign effectively “gearing up for a replay”, having already accepted that a No vote is as good as a first leg score-draw?
No. 1 — November 14th, 2008 at 8:46 am
Why are they going to the expense of a vote in the first place? On these sort of things you are rarely going to get the public to agree. Should follow the London model and just get on with it.
No. 2 — November 14th, 2008 at 8:47 am
PS There is a clock wrong somewhere on the system because my comment is being recorded an hour later than I actually wrote it, unless the pixies put my clock back by an hour last night.
No. 3 — November 14th, 2008 at 9:00 am
I’ve sorted this now. According to Wordpress: “Unfortunately, you have to manually update this for Daylight Savings Time. Lame, we know, but will be fixed in the future.”
No. 4 — November 14th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
Anyone would think it was the 21st century.