1315 [124 Hrs GMT
London
Thursday
Thursday, October 28, 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Telling Boris Johnson again: ditch Crossrail and seriously deal with the Tube network that is creaking and falling apart! NO amount of hype will make Crossrail be the remedy to the deepening crisis engulfing the Existing tube network and the bus 'service'
1315 [124 Hrs GMT
28 October 2010
[To be continued]
Monday, October 18, 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Evidentially putting on the record our assertion that the Big Biz propaganda onslaught to keep the UK CONDEM Cameron and his finance sidekick G Osborne firmly stooged to serve Big Business has been confirmed on the ITV ‘Daybreak’ programme in the past 30 minutes.
0545 Hrs GMT
London
Monday
18 October 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Evidentially putting on the record our assertion that the Big Biz propaganda onslaught to keep the UK CONDEM Cameron and his finance sidekick G Osborne firmly stooged to serve Big Business has been confirmed on the ITV ‘Daybreak’ programme in the past 30 minutes.
More on this soon.
[To be continued]
Sunday, October 17, 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Diagnostically updating on the dire damage to democracy being done by the couriers and touts of Big Biz agenda scam Crossrail....
2320 [2305] [1955] Hrs GMT
London
Saturday
16 October 2010.
Editor © Muhammad Haque.
Khoodeelaar! Told you so! First off in this update, we, the KHOODEELAAR! “CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE BIG BUSINESS AGENDA SCAM CROSSRAIL ASSAULTS on the inner city East End of London…” are a part of the movement that for the past forty years [FORTY years] has defended the people of ALL backgrounds in what is also known as the London Borough of Tower Hamlets.
In that forty years, we the movement in defence of the East End of London against the corrupting role of the key “seekers and holders of the publicly-paid-for posts and positions” in the same area have witnessed the persistently corrupt role played by the self-seekers we here refer to and mean.
Those self-seekers have been responsible for the denial of the ordinary people in Tower Hamlets [and beyond] of the latters’ democratic, legal, environmental, economic and human rights.
The self-seekers have behaved in line with the only objective that they have sought: to line their own pockets. Many of the faces of the corrupters have changed over the decades. The ones that operate as the cabal of secondary fraudsters [we here cite the phrase that our movement coined in 2007 when the “First Solution” scam was exposed as robbing a large number of people in Tower Hamlets and elsewhere in the UK] today are very much active exactly in the same way as their counterparts and in many cases predecessors had done in the 1970s, in the 1980s, in the 1990s in Tower Hamlets.
[To be continued]
A flashback at a report carried by the pro-Big Biz propagnad apscets of the "London EVENING STANDARD" earlier in 2010:
Crossrail stations may be scrapped in £5bn cuts threat
Paul Waugh and Pippa Crerar
27.05.10
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Crossrail could be slashed by £5 billion under drastic plans being considered by the Government.
In the worst-case scenario, Bond Street or Tottenham Court Road stations for the planned east-west rail link may be axed as part of a package of reforms, sources close to the scheme suggested.
Other options for lowering the £16.9 billion bill include cutting the number of train carriages and scrapping extensions to Maidenhead in the west and Abbey Wood in the east.
Mayor Boris Johnson, Transport for London boss Peter Hendy and City Hall chief of staff Sir Simon Milton were meeting Transport Secretary Philip Hammond for crunch talks this afternoon.
A senior TfL source said: “The Mayor is in there now making the case for continued investment in London's transport network, including Crossrail.
“TfL and London's business community are absolutely clear that Crossrail is vital. We understand that these are straitened economic times but London is not the same as the rest of the country. We've had a Conservative administration here saving money over the last two years.”
The project, scheduled for completion in 2016, aims to ease congestion and slash journey times in the capital, with a high-speed tunnel connecting Heathrow, central London, the City and Canary Wharf.
Building magazine today claimed that an internal Crossrail team, under instruction from ministers to save money on the scheme, is understood to be considering dropping either the planned Tottenham Court Road or Bond Street station.
The Department for Transport said the report was “pure speculation” and Mr Hammond told the Standard: “Our challenge is to deliver Crossrail as it was designed at the lowest possible cost.”
A source close to the process said: “The team is being asked to look at the whole scheme. If you took out both spurs and reduced the platforms and stations then they're looking at £4 billion-£5 billion of cuts.”
Mr Johnson last week said Crossrail had to mount a “Stalingrad defence” to guarantee funding.
Steven Norris, former Tory MP and Transport for London board member, said he believed axing a central station and the spurs were being looked at.
“The Government needs to understand the difference between the kind of spending that fills ad pages in the Society Guardian and genuine investment in the country.
“If you're going to cut Abbey Wood or Maidenhead you might as well shelve the whole lot. It only makes sense to dig the tunnel if you do the whole scheme. It's like planning to buy a new car without an engine.”
Shadow transport secretary Sadiq Khan said: “This is bad news for London's ability to bounce back from the recession.”
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Reader views (18) Add your view
This would be a huge mistake. I agree with all those who have called for full completion of Crossrail after the years (decades even) of work that have gone into determining its scope and detail. If we want to have any hope of getting out of the economic doldrums, London must be competitive, and at the moment, transport-wise, it's not.
- Simon, Stratford, London, 28/05/2010 10:36
Report abuse
"The most logical cuts, which could be finished at a later date, would be the second entrances at Bond Street, TCR, Farringdon and Liverpool Street.- Alex Mckenna, South Woodford"
I understand your argument, in particular the stations in tunnels are more expensive than the running tunnels.
I hope they don't choose to leave busy stations with entrances at one end only and blighted surface sites for 12 years to come.
A project this big has to be done properly, and savings sought from improved materials and construction techniques, if there are any.
- Alan Griffiths, Forest Gate, LONDON, 28/05/2010 08:57
Report abuse
The most logical cuts, which could be finished at a later date, would be the second entrances at Bond Street, TCR, Farringdon and Liverpool Street. As planned, each one has an extra station, in effect; complete with surface buildings, escalators, lifts and stairs. These are far more costly than the surface lines to the suburbs. The line could be opened without them, and provide 90% of it's benefit and save billions.
- Alex Mckenna, South Woodford, 28/05/2010 08:30
Report abuse
I can understand maybe cutting the spur to Reading because it is outside of London, but not Woolwich and Abbey Wood. If you look at the London Underground map, South East London has hardly any links. Why? Why was it not considered? South East London is part of the capital and the nearest underground station to residents in the Greenwich and Bexley boroughs is in the relatively isolated North Greenwich. Getting to North Greenwich station is painful with over-crowded buses. I have to get a packed South Eastern train to work into Central London everyday and it is very slow, stops at LOTS of stations and then spends ages waiting outside London Bridge station because there are too many trains and not enough platforms. Don't even mention the problems caused when most routes are closed because of exploding gas cylinders at Deptford and New Cross! Please do not cull the South East London link. It does not make sense in the long run and it is not fair. South East Londoners always get a raw deal. If it does not go ahead I'll have to buy a car to improve getting around, which is not the ideal solution.
- James, Bexley, 27/05/2010 23:08
Report abuse
Cutting the SE spur to Abbey Wood would be crazy. Thousands upon thousands of homes have been built in SE London, Kent, and the general Thames Gateway area due to promises of transport improvements since the 70s and almost every big scheme has been cancelled. Originally the Jubilee line in the 70s was supposed to terminate at Thamesmead not Stratford. There's even an extra plaform built at N. Greenwich when it was finally extended in the late 90s for future extension. That plan is long dead. The road bridges east of Tower Bridge for SE London have all been cancelled, and now this. All while house building has been shooting up based upon improvment promises. The area is already very deprived with high unemployment due to poor transport. BUILD THE SODDING THING.
- James, SE London, 27/05/2010 20:07
Report abuse
"Make do and mend" is the classic British disease. Cuts now will only lead to future expense. Crossrail is an investment for the capital. Lets get it built, and properly.
- rjb, London, 27/05/2010 19:56
Report abuse
As a symbolic gesture, I suggest the Mayor voluntarily reduces his salary to £1.
This would be a powerful signal to central government and the TFL bureaucracy that he is serious about maximising value for money and will give him the moral high ground in fighting for Crossrail. He describes his £250k from writing for the Telegraph is "chicken feed", so he hardly needs a £143k mayoral salary.
Sacking all his taxpayer funded political advisors and spin doctors would also be smart politics.
To raise serious cash for Crossrail, how about:
* Keeping the western extension to the congestion charge
* Abandoning the Borismaster
* Leave the bendy buses in place
These are all frivolous spending pledges which are unaffordable in the current climate.
- Keith, Bromley, 27/05/2010 19:28
Report abuse
The extensive Cross-Rail building works in Oxford Street are already far-advanced:
Surely, it cannot be stopped now!-
The Astoria Cinema has been demolished,
and Soho Square is littered with Cross-Rail works.
Boris killed Cross-River Tram, losing £19 million.
The C-Zone Western Extension exists, yet the £55 millions Income will be lost from next December.
Millions LOST in the Costs of Abandoning the BENDY-BUSES.
The UN-NECESSARY, very expensive New 'Routemaster' is WASTEFULLY, costing MILLIONS MORE.
To NOW threaten to SHORTEN THE CROSS-RAIL ROUTE is TOTAL LUNACY!!!
- Ernest Beeching, London, 27/05/2010 19:02
Report abuse
The underground part has to be done properly from the start - you can't add a station later! Omitting one station in the West End and causing perpetual overcrowding at the other one (where people will be forced to change to the overloaded Central Line) would be really stupid.
If money has to be saved, losing the "extension" to Maidenhead won't hurt so much. People can change trains at Hayes or Paddington, and the line can be extended later. Similarly to the East.
- Nigel, London, 27/05/2010 18:26
Report abuse
Why not look at something like a convertible bond Boris, or something similar along private funding lines, but definately not PFI. As long as the yeild is reasonable I don't see why it wouldn't attract large support.
- Jose Luis, London SW18, 27/05/2010 17:44
Report abuse
Just scrap the lot and use the big holes as car parks.
- Kimberley, London, 27/05/2010 17:39
Report abuse
I think there's a lot of scaremongering going on here, if they are going to axe some stations, I doubt that it would be TCR or Bond St.
If they need to cut it back then fine but they should build it so that it doesn't then become prohibitively expensive to extend/improve it later on.
The platforms should be built for future growth, you can't extend an underground platform easily once the service is running but you can add more carriages at a later date.
Unfortunately though a lot of the politicians involved lack common sense when it comes to public transport because they're totally out of touch with it.
- Will, Oval, 27/05/2010 17:22
Report abuse
Oh gawd not again! History has shown us that cutting back public transport schemes always leads to problems in the long run!
It's almost like a repeat of the Victoria Line in the 60's, cheap tunnels, basic stations with small platforms and a shortened route... which have been it's downfall with today's huge passenger numbers.
- Ryan, London, 27/05/2010 17:09
Report abuse
Oh dear not again,
They agree a price to build the Crossrail, plus a little bit extra in case it goes over budget. And now we have to cut back on some of the stations to keep within the budget. Why do start to think that this will end up as a Crossrail link of single track, with stations at each end like Paddington and Liverpool Street, and a shuttle service that makes the Waterloo & City line look like an express service.
- Gazza, London, 27/05/2010 17:09
Report abuse
The Government needs to either continue with it or scrap it!....Oh enough is enough! No more messing around with this project have a backbone forget half measures we know what required - do it or don’t!
- James, London, 27/05/2010 17:06
Report abuse
What a load on speculative nonsense. Has anyone spotted the bloody great holes at Tottenham Court Road or Canary Wharf? Cut TCR and the south eastern spur? You're having a laugh!
Crossrail will be built. It will be built in full beacause the funding is in place. Any fule can see that! What Philip Hammond, Boris etc have to make sure is that this fanatsic railway - which will revolutionise travel in London - is delivered on time and within budget.
Stop knowcking it and get on and build it. 20,000 jobs depend on it and London's economy will be nearly £50 billion better off when it finished.
- Luke, London, 27/05/2010 17:04
Report abuse
Agree; how about 6+ million Londoners all chip in £25 each and we get this built properly, then get small businesses to pay £150 each, SME's £500, and the banks and hedge funds a few million each. In fact, let's set up a JustGiving Page. The countless meetings to discuss 'cost efficiencies' will probably cost £25 million alone! People power; just build it ourselves.
- We need a new line!, London, 27/05/2010 16:59
Report abuse
Please do it properly. A halfhearted job will cost more in the long run. For example, the DLR stations have been extended twice over to accommodate 2, then 4, and now to 6 carriages.
- East Londoner, London, 27/05/2010 16:17
Report abuse
Add your comment
Name:
Town and country:
Crossrail stations may be scrapped in £5bn cuts threat
Paul Waugh and Pippa Crerar
27.05.10
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Crossrail could be slashed by £5 billion under drastic plans being considered by the Government.
In the worst-case scenario, Bond Street or Tottenham Court Road stations for the planned east-west rail link may be axed as part of a package of reforms, sources close to the scheme suggested.
Other options for lowering the £16.9 billion bill include cutting the number of train carriages and scrapping extensions to Maidenhead in the west and Abbey Wood in the east.
Mayor Boris Johnson, Transport for London boss Peter Hendy and City Hall chief of staff Sir Simon Milton were meeting Transport Secretary Philip Hammond for crunch talks this afternoon.
A senior TfL source said: “The Mayor is in there now making the case for continued investment in London's transport network, including Crossrail.
“TfL and London's business community are absolutely clear that Crossrail is vital. We understand that these are straitened economic times but London is not the same as the rest of the country. We've had a Conservative administration here saving money over the last two years.”
The project, scheduled for completion in 2016, aims to ease congestion and slash journey times in the capital, with a high-speed tunnel connecting Heathrow, central London, the City and Canary Wharf.
Building magazine today claimed that an internal Crossrail team, under instruction from ministers to save money on the scheme, is understood to be considering dropping either the planned Tottenham Court Road or Bond Street station.
The Department for Transport said the report was “pure speculation” and Mr Hammond told the Standard: “Our challenge is to deliver Crossrail as it was designed at the lowest possible cost.”
A source close to the process said: “The team is being asked to look at the whole scheme. If you took out both spurs and reduced the platforms and stations then they're looking at £4 billion-£5 billion of cuts.”
Mr Johnson last week said Crossrail had to mount a “Stalingrad defence” to guarantee funding.
Steven Norris, former Tory MP and Transport for London board member, said he believed axing a central station and the spurs were being looked at.
“The Government needs to understand the difference between the kind of spending that fills ad pages in the Society Guardian and genuine investment in the country.
“If you're going to cut Abbey Wood or Maidenhead you might as well shelve the whole lot. It only makes sense to dig the tunnel if you do the whole scheme. It's like planning to buy a new car without an engine.”
Shadow transport secretary Sadiq Khan said: “This is bad news for London's ability to bounce back from the recession.”
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Transport in east London
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Trans Siberian Railway
Once in a Llife Time ForAll Budgets 70 Years Experience. Book now
www.IntouristUk.com/Transiberian
Reader views (18) Add your view
This would be a huge mistake. I agree with all those who have called for full completion of Crossrail after the years (decades even) of work that have gone into determining its scope and detail. If we want to have any hope of getting out of the economic doldrums, London must be competitive, and at the moment, transport-wise, it's not.
- Simon, Stratford, London, 28/05/2010 10:36
Report abuse
"The most logical cuts, which could be finished at a later date, would be the second entrances at Bond Street, TCR, Farringdon and Liverpool Street.- Alex Mckenna, South Woodford"
I understand your argument, in particular the stations in tunnels are more expensive than the running tunnels.
I hope they don't choose to leave busy stations with entrances at one end only and blighted surface sites for 12 years to come.
A project this big has to be done properly, and savings sought from improved materials and construction techniques, if there are any.
- Alan Griffiths, Forest Gate, LONDON, 28/05/2010 08:57
Report abuse
The most logical cuts, which could be finished at a later date, would be the second entrances at Bond Street, TCR, Farringdon and Liverpool Street. As planned, each one has an extra station, in effect; complete with surface buildings, escalators, lifts and stairs. These are far more costly than the surface lines to the suburbs. The line could be opened without them, and provide 90% of it's benefit and save billions.
- Alex Mckenna, South Woodford, 28/05/2010 08:30
Report abuse
I can understand maybe cutting the spur to Reading because it is outside of London, but not Woolwich and Abbey Wood. If you look at the London Underground map, South East London has hardly any links. Why? Why was it not considered? South East London is part of the capital and the nearest underground station to residents in the Greenwich and Bexley boroughs is in the relatively isolated North Greenwich. Getting to North Greenwich station is painful with over-crowded buses. I have to get a packed South Eastern train to work into Central London everyday and it is very slow, stops at LOTS of stations and then spends ages waiting outside London Bridge station because there are too many trains and not enough platforms. Don't even mention the problems caused when most routes are closed because of exploding gas cylinders at Deptford and New Cross! Please do not cull the South East London link. It does not make sense in the long run and it is not fair. South East Londoners always get a raw deal. If it does not go ahead I'll have to buy a car to improve getting around, which is not the ideal solution.
- James, Bexley, 27/05/2010 23:08
Report abuse
Cutting the SE spur to Abbey Wood would be crazy. Thousands upon thousands of homes have been built in SE London, Kent, and the general Thames Gateway area due to promises of transport improvements since the 70s and almost every big scheme has been cancelled. Originally the Jubilee line in the 70s was supposed to terminate at Thamesmead not Stratford. There's even an extra plaform built at N. Greenwich when it was finally extended in the late 90s for future extension. That plan is long dead. The road bridges east of Tower Bridge for SE London have all been cancelled, and now this. All while house building has been shooting up based upon improvment promises. The area is already very deprived with high unemployment due to poor transport. BUILD THE SODDING THING.
- James, SE London, 27/05/2010 20:07
Report abuse
"Make do and mend" is the classic British disease. Cuts now will only lead to future expense. Crossrail is an investment for the capital. Lets get it built, and properly.
- rjb, London, 27/05/2010 19:56
Report abuse
As a symbolic gesture, I suggest the Mayor voluntarily reduces his salary to £1.
This would be a powerful signal to central government and the TFL bureaucracy that he is serious about maximising value for money and will give him the moral high ground in fighting for Crossrail. He describes his £250k from writing for the Telegraph is "chicken feed", so he hardly needs a £143k mayoral salary.
Sacking all his taxpayer funded political advisors and spin doctors would also be smart politics.
To raise serious cash for Crossrail, how about:
* Keeping the western extension to the congestion charge
* Abandoning the Borismaster
* Leave the bendy buses in place
These are all frivolous spending pledges which are unaffordable in the current climate.
- Keith, Bromley, 27/05/2010 19:28
Report abuse
The extensive Cross-Rail building works in Oxford Street are already far-advanced:
Surely, it cannot be stopped now!-
The Astoria Cinema has been demolished,
and Soho Square is littered with Cross-Rail works.
Boris killed Cross-River Tram, losing £19 million.
The C-Zone Western Extension exists, yet the £55 millions Income will be lost from next December.
Millions LOST in the Costs of Abandoning the BENDY-BUSES.
The UN-NECESSARY, very expensive New 'Routemaster' is WASTEFULLY, costing MILLIONS MORE.
To NOW threaten to SHORTEN THE CROSS-RAIL ROUTE is TOTAL LUNACY!!!
- Ernest Beeching, London, 27/05/2010 19:02
Report abuse
The underground part has to be done properly from the start - you can't add a station later! Omitting one station in the West End and causing perpetual overcrowding at the other one (where people will be forced to change to the overloaded Central Line) would be really stupid.
If money has to be saved, losing the "extension" to Maidenhead won't hurt so much. People can change trains at Hayes or Paddington, and the line can be extended later. Similarly to the East.
- Nigel, London, 27/05/2010 18:26
Report abuse
Why not look at something like a convertible bond Boris, or something similar along private funding lines, but definately not PFI. As long as the yeild is reasonable I don't see why it wouldn't attract large support.
- Jose Luis, London SW18, 27/05/2010 17:44
Report abuse
Just scrap the lot and use the big holes as car parks.
- Kimberley, London, 27/05/2010 17:39
Report abuse
I think there's a lot of scaremongering going on here, if they are going to axe some stations, I doubt that it would be TCR or Bond St.
If they need to cut it back then fine but they should build it so that it doesn't then become prohibitively expensive to extend/improve it later on.
The platforms should be built for future growth, you can't extend an underground platform easily once the service is running but you can add more carriages at a later date.
Unfortunately though a lot of the politicians involved lack common sense when it comes to public transport because they're totally out of touch with it.
- Will, Oval, 27/05/2010 17:22
Report abuse
Oh gawd not again! History has shown us that cutting back public transport schemes always leads to problems in the long run!
It's almost like a repeat of the Victoria Line in the 60's, cheap tunnels, basic stations with small platforms and a shortened route... which have been it's downfall with today's huge passenger numbers.
- Ryan, London, 27/05/2010 17:09
Report abuse
Oh dear not again,
They agree a price to build the Crossrail, plus a little bit extra in case it goes over budget. And now we have to cut back on some of the stations to keep within the budget. Why do start to think that this will end up as a Crossrail link of single track, with stations at each end like Paddington and Liverpool Street, and a shuttle service that makes the Waterloo & City line look like an express service.
- Gazza, London, 27/05/2010 17:09
Report abuse
The Government needs to either continue with it or scrap it!....Oh enough is enough! No more messing around with this project have a backbone forget half measures we know what required - do it or don’t!
- James, London, 27/05/2010 17:06
Report abuse
What a load on speculative nonsense. Has anyone spotted the bloody great holes at Tottenham Court Road or Canary Wharf? Cut TCR and the south eastern spur? You're having a laugh!
Crossrail will be built. It will be built in full beacause the funding is in place. Any fule can see that! What Philip Hammond, Boris etc have to make sure is that this fanatsic railway - which will revolutionise travel in London - is delivered on time and within budget.
Stop knowcking it and get on and build it. 20,000 jobs depend on it and London's economy will be nearly £50 billion better off when it finished.
- Luke, London, 27/05/2010 17:04
Report abuse
Agree; how about 6+ million Londoners all chip in £25 each and we get this built properly, then get small businesses to pay £150 each, SME's £500, and the banks and hedge funds a few million each. In fact, let's set up a JustGiving Page. The countless meetings to discuss 'cost efficiencies' will probably cost £25 million alone! People power; just build it ourselves.
- We need a new line!, London, 27/05/2010 16:59
Report abuse
Please do it properly. A halfhearted job will cost more in the long run. For example, the DLR stations have been extended twice over to accommodate 2, then 4, and now to 6 carriages.
- East Londoner, London, 27/05/2010 16:17
Report abuse
Add your comment
Name:
Town and country:
Friday, October 15, 2010
Khoodeelaar! Telling the big business, military industrial complex touts peddling the biz biz agenda scam CrossRail: get real. Face facts. It is crass role you 've been playing for Big Business.
Khoodeelaar! Telling the big business, military industrial complex touts peddling the biz biz agenda scam CrossRail: get real. Face facts. It is crass role you 've been playing for Big Business.
[To be continued]
KHOODEELAAR! TOLD YOU SO! Now we hear that they are beginning to admit that OFCOM has been lousy! More on that soon
KHOODEELAAR! TOLD YOU SO!
Now we hear that they are beginning to admit that OFCOM has been lousy!
More on that soon
Friday, October 8, 2010
KHOODEELAAR! TOLD YOU so! Crossrail is a CRASSrail. It is in a mess. And the admission comes from a CRASSrail backing outfit, 'leons consulting'.
0125 Hrs GMT
London
Friday
08 October 2010.
Editor © Muhammad Haque.
KHOODEELAAR! TOLD YOU so! Crossrail is a CRASSrail. It is in a mess. And the admission comes from a CRASSrail backing outfit, 'leons consulting'.
Quoting Leons Consulting:
Lack of Crossrail Station confirmation a cause for concern to Senior Crossrail Executive
October 7th, 2010
Author: admin
The Chief Executive for Crossrail, Rob Holden was featured in a story in the NCE this week as expressing some concern about the lack of a finished specification for the Crossrail scheme. He passed comment that this lack is proving to be an enormous frustration to him and the other Crossrail Senior Executives. One example cited of an area where the project scope had yet to be settled to Crossrail satisfaction was the planned station at Woolwich. The station has still not received the official seal of approval and Mr Holden describes this as “not a recipe for success”.
Mr Holden made a speech at the NCE Rail Summit last week and he was quoted as saying that Crossrail was still waiting for Transport for London and the Department of Transport to confirm the funding arrangements for the station at Woolwich. The Department of Transport and Transport for London are both sponsors of the Crossrail Project. However, the Comprehensive Spending Review is planned for the 20th October and Mr Holden is hoping that official conformation of the Woolwich station will follow on from this.
Although a budget of £15.9 billion has been allocated for the Crossrail project, Crossrail senior executives were hoping that more detailed funding decisions would have taken place during the Parliamentary process prior to when the Monarch signed the Crossrail Act back in July 2008.
It has now been two years since the Crossrail project received Royal Assent, but there have still been no firm decisions as to how many stations there are going to be, plus where exactly these stations will be located. Mr Holden is worried that the politicians involved in the Crossrail project are not taking the issues of specific funding seriously enough and because of this the Crossrail scheme may suffer on the long run.
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KHOODEELAAR! Stands up for the dignity and honour of ordinary people of the East End of London: Seb Coe is about to concede his serious error and make amends....
0050 [0035] Hrs GMT
London
Friday
08 October 2010
Editor © Muhammad Haque
KHOODEELAAR! is about to defend the East End of London again. In another step taken in defiance of the corrupt local council and their assortment of colluders both in the current UK CONDEM regime and among their many shady shadows in the still Bliared bureaucracy fettering the former Labour Party, the KHOODEELAAR! Campaign is due to initiate the Acton that will put paid to Seb Coe’s contemptuous conceit and complacency and bring honour and dignity to the streets of Tower Hamlets where the oirdinary people have been so deprived of those qualities for so long.
KHOODEELAAR! Will publish the details of the programme in the very near future.
A contextual updater note:
KHOODEELAAR! Told Tower Hamlets Council so! You are on a marathon to nowhere as you are still banking on lies, fakery and falsehood...
In 2007, Khoodeelaar! “The campaign in defence of the community in the inner city East London Borough of Tower Hamlets and against the agenda of Big Business as typified in the Crossrail scam”, made two formal representations to the local ‘Tower Hamlets Council’.
On both those occasions, the KHOODEELAAR! Campaign Organiser Muhammad Haque said that the collusion with the Crossrail scam by the Council was being maintained at the expense of the ordinary economic, social and other relevant interests of the community in the borough.
The representations took place in September 2007 and in December 2007.
During the second of the representations, in December 2007, Khoodeelaar! Organiser Muhammad Haque told Tower Hamlets Council that the proof of the serious wrong in the Council’s collusion with Big Business scams could be seen in the behaviour of the 2012 Hosting operations.
Muhammad Haque pointed out that the propaganda was that ‘local people’ would benefit from the siting of the 2012 Games Hosting activities in the neighbouring area to Tower Hamlets. But the fact, as could be ascertained from the contents of EVEN the ‘East London Advertiser’, was the opposite. That title, said Muhammad Haque was carrying items showing that local East London people were not getting the jobs that the Hosting companies were filling at the time.
Three years on, what do the latest data show?
Surprise! ” Surprise! And even more surprise!
East London people are NOT at the top of the recruitment queue at the 2012 Games hosting operations. Ooops! Enterprises!
Ooops! Ooops!
Not the ‘regeneration’ that they had promised!
More like DEGENERATION that Muhammad Haque had been warning the corrupt controlling clique on Tower Hamlets Council about.
[To be continued]
KHOODEELAAR! Told Tower Hamlets Council so! You are on a marathon to nowhere as you are still banking on lies, fakery and falsehood..
0035 Hrs GMT
London
Friday
08 October 2010
Editor © Muhammad Haque
KHOODEELAAR! Told Tower Hamlets Council so! You are on a marathon to nowhere as you are still banking on lies, fakery and falsehood..
In 2007, Khoodeelaar! “The campaign in defence of the community in the inner city East London Borough of Tower Hamlets and against the agenda of Big Business as typified in the Crossrail scam”, made two formal representations to the local ‘Tower Hamlets Council’.
On both those occasions, the KHOODEELAAR! Campaign Organiser Muhammad Haque said that the collusion with the Crossrail scam by the Council was being maintained at the expense of the ordinary economic, social and other relevant interests of the community in the borough.
The representations took place in September 2007 and in December 2007.
During the second of the representations, in December 2007, Khoodeelaar! Organiser Muhammad Haque told Tower Hamlets Council that the proof of the serious wrong in the Council’s collusion with Big Business scams could be seen in the behaviour of the 2012 Hosting operations.
Muhammad Haque pointed out that the propaganda was that ‘local people’ would benefit from the siting of the 2012 Games Hosting activities in the neighbouring area to Tower Hamlets. But the fact, as could be ascertained from the contents of EVEN the ‘East London Advertiser’, was the opposite. That title, said Muhammad Haque was carrying items showing that local East London people were not getting the jobs that the Hosting companies were filling at the time.
Three years on, what do the latest data show?
Surprise! ” Surprise! And even more surprise!
East London people are NOT at the top of the recruitment queue at the 2012 Games hosting operations. Ooops! Enterprises!
Ooops! Ooops!
Not the ‘regeneration’ that they had promised!
More like DEGENERATION that Muhammad Haque had been warning the corrupt controlling clique on Tower Hamlets Council about.
[To be continued]
London
Friday
08 October 2010
Editor © Muhammad Haque
KHOODEELAAR! Told Tower Hamlets Council so! You are on a marathon to nowhere as you are still banking on lies, fakery and falsehood..
In 2007, Khoodeelaar! “The campaign in defence of the community in the inner city East London Borough of Tower Hamlets and against the agenda of Big Business as typified in the Crossrail scam”, made two formal representations to the local ‘Tower Hamlets Council’.
On both those occasions, the KHOODEELAAR! Campaign Organiser Muhammad Haque said that the collusion with the Crossrail scam by the Council was being maintained at the expense of the ordinary economic, social and other relevant interests of the community in the borough.
The representations took place in September 2007 and in December 2007.
During the second of the representations, in December 2007, Khoodeelaar! Organiser Muhammad Haque told Tower Hamlets Council that the proof of the serious wrong in the Council’s collusion with Big Business scams could be seen in the behaviour of the 2012 Hosting operations.
Muhammad Haque pointed out that the propaganda was that ‘local people’ would benefit from the siting of the 2012 Games Hosting activities in the neighbouring area to Tower Hamlets. But the fact, as could be ascertained from the contents of EVEN the ‘East London Advertiser’, was the opposite. That title, said Muhammad Haque was carrying items showing that local East London people were not getting the jobs that the Hosting companies were filling at the time.
Three years on, what do the latest data show?
Surprise! ” Surprise! And even more surprise!
East London people are NOT at the top of the recruitment queue at the 2012 Games hosting operations. Ooops! Enterprises!
Ooops! Ooops!
Not the ‘regeneration’ that they had promised!
More like DEGENERATION that Muhammad Haque had been warning the corrupt controlling clique on Tower Hamlets Council about.
[To be continued]
KHOODEELAAR! Told Tower Hamlets Council so! You are on a marathon to nowhere as you are still banking on lies, fakery and falsehood..
0035 Hrs GMT
London
Friday
08 October 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Told Tower Hamlets Council so! You are on a marathon to nowhere as you are still banking on lies, fakery and falsehood..
In 2007, Khoodeelaar! “The campaign in defence of the community in the inner city East London Borough of Tower Hamlets and against the agenda of Big Business as typified in the Crossrail scam”, made two formal representations to the local ‘Tower Hamlets Council’.
On both those occasions, the KHOODEELAAR! Campaign Organiser Muhammad Haque said that the collusion with the Crossrail scam by the Council was being maintained at the expense of the ordinary economic, social and other relevant interests of the community in the borough.
The representations took place in September 2007 and in December 2007.
On the second of the representations in December 2007, Khoodeelaar! Organiser Muhammad Haque told Tower Hamlets Council that the proof of the serious wrong in the Council’s collusion with Big Business scams could be seen in the behaviour of the 2012 Hosting operations. Muhammad Haque pointed out that the propaganda was that ‘local people’ would benefit from the sitting of the 2012 Games hosting activities in the neighbouring area to Tower Hamlets. But the fact, as could be ascertained from the contents of EVEN the ‘East London Advertiser’. That title, said Muhammad Haque was carrying items showing that local East London people were not getting the jobs that the Hosting commonly were filling at the time.
Three years on, what do the latest data show?
Surprise! ” Surprise! And even more surprise!
East London people are NOT at the top of the recruitment queue at the 2012 Games hosting operations. Ooops! Enterprises!
Ooops! Ooops!
Not the ‘regeneration’ that they had promised!
More like DEGENERATION that Muhammad Haque had been warning the corrupt controlling clique on Tower Hamlets Council.
[To be continued]
Sunday, October 3, 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Diagnosis of the CRASS role by the London Guardian Media group is vindicated on the BBC!
KHOODEELAAR! Diagnosis of the CRASS role by the London Guardian Media group is vindicated on the BBC !
[To be continued]
[To be continued]
Saturday, October 2, 2010
KHOODEELAAR! Told you, the Big Biz scam Crossrail-peddling Guardian: that Crossrail was crass. That INCURRING extra debts for CRASSrail was even crasser... Now that all the Crossrail-peddlers have been 'reassured' that the extra £Billions of debts would be incurred for Crossrail, why then is it that the 'benefits of Crossrail' are not being even hypothetically mentioned by the likes of Ken Clarke? Clarke’s omission of CRASSrail as ‘the panacea’ demonstrates that CRASSrail is not a positive concept but a negative one. It is a black hole. Scrap it and spare the already over-indebted Uk economy the £Billions o avoidable liability that Crossrail entails… [To be continued]
KHOODEELAAR! Told you, the Big Biz scam Crossrail-peddling Guardian: that Crossrail was crass. That INCURRING extra debts for CRASSrail was even crasser... Now that all the Crossrail-peddlers have been 'reassured' that the extra £Billions of debts would be incurred for Crossrail, why then is it that the 'benefits of Crossrail' are not being even hypothetically mentioned by the likes of Ken Clarke? Clarke’s omission of CRASSrail as ‘the panacea’ demonstrates that CRASSrail is not a positive concept but a negative one. It is a black hole. Scrap it and spare the already over-indebted Uk
[To be continued]
Toby Helm and Anushka Asthana guardian.co.uk, Saturday 2 October 2010 22.00 BST Article history
The chance of the UK sinking into another recession is 'below 50%' but remains substantial, according to Clarke. Photograph: Andy Hall for the Observer
Britain's economy is at risk of a "double-dip" recession and may not recover fully for another five years, Kenneth Clarke warns tomorrow.
In an exclusive interview with the Observer, the former chancellor delivers a bleak message on the eve of the Tory conference – at which David Cameron is keen to strike a more optimistic note – saying he remains distinctly downbeat about the outlook for the British and global economies: "I'm at the more pessimistic end. I'm not sunnily optimistic about where the western economy is going."
Clarke, chancellor from 1993 to 1997, believes the chance of the UK being sucked into another recession is "below 50%", but insists that the risks remain substantial. "I do not rule out the risk of a double-dip recession caused by some fresh wave of global fear and crisis," he says.
Even though he warned before the election that over-aggressive cuts could harm the recovery, Clarke insists he is fully signed up to the coalition government's programme. But he says it does guarantee a return to sustained growth because of global forces beyond its control.
Tonight, as Cameron arrived in Birmingham for the Tories' first conference as a governing party since 1996, the prime minister was determined that his ministers would produce a "good news" theme to run alongside the austerity message. "We have to tell people there is light at the end of the tunnel," said a senior Tory source. "We need to get things back in perspective."
Vince Cable, the business secretary, and current chancellor George Osborne – aware that the coalition could become defined as a government of cuts and austerity – are looking at ways to promote economic growth and boost private sector investment. A growth white paper will be produced later in the autumn.
While supporting the need for a regional investment strategy, Clarke says there is "no point in being unrealistic" about the economic outlook. He adds that Labour's approach of cutting less severely would mean the markets losing faith in the UK economy.
"This would lump us back with the Spanish, the Portuguese and the Greeks as people possibly at risk if people thought we weren't going to deliver what George delivered."
Under the slogan "Together in the National Interest", Tory ministers will attempt to promote the benefits of their coalition with the Liberal Democrats, making the point that only by working together can tough decisions be taken. Announcements are expected on privatisation of Royal Mail and schools reform.
Work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith will tomorrow unveil the biggest shake-up of the benefits system in decades, with plans to introduce a Universal Credit in place of the current multitude of benefits. The aim is to save billions in the medium term by increasing the incentive of people on benefits to take up work.
Duncan Smith, who appears to have won a major battle with Osborne, said tonight it was the "dawn of a 21st-century welfare system. To those that have been marginalised and abandoned to a life on benefits by Labour I say: we will get you back into work and in control of your life.
"For the most vulnerable I say: we will protect you. And to the taxpayer I say: here is true value for money, a system that invests in you and supports you in your time of need, but expects everyone in society to contribute and will no longer allow anyone to choose a life on benefits.
Clarke said he was "mildly" relieved that David Miliband had not won the Labour leadership election, but added. "I don't underestimate Ed."
He would favour the Tories reaching out to David Miliband in the same way they had to other Blairites: "If he should want to give me some advice, he's the sort of chap I would listen to because I have a high respect for him."
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KHOODEELAAR! Noting the role of the CONDEM CUTS-peddling London Daily Telegraph! It fails to tell the truth in its coverage. The Daily Telegraph is covering up for CONDEM. Condemn this CONDEM COVERUP!
1300 Hrs GMTLondon
London
Saturday
02 October 2010
Editor © Muhammad Haque
KHOODEELAAR! Noting the role of the CONDEM CUTS-peddling
KHOODEELAAR! Updater comment on Simon Jenkins telling Boris Johnson and others touting for Big Biz agenda scam Crossrail.....
0755 Hrs GMT
Editor © Muhammad Haque
KHOODEELAAR! Updater comment on Simon Jenkins telling Boris Johnson [and others touting for Big Biz agenda scam Crossrail]
This updater diagnostic is overdue.
For a start, it is more than a year since Jenkins published the piece in April 2009.
Two significant factors have changed or come into being since April 2009:
One, the Gordon Brown frontage has been replaced by the CLEGGERON one.
And secondly the overly belligerent assertions that were so closely associated with Brown where it came to ‘spending our way out of a recession’ [if not ‘the’ recession] have been replaced by [equally ideologically] belligerent assertions in the opposite direction. At least on the surface.
But there has been one exemption. It is about Crossrail.
And the fact that there has been an exception about Crossrail can be seen in the words, the phrases and the capitulatory ‘reasoning’ applied by all the decision-making parties involved.
We shall examine those in the next part of this diagnostic.
[To be continued]
Crossrail will eat money. Kill it, Boris, and save the bankrupt Tube instead
Simon Jenkins28.04.09
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Kill Crossrail. Kill it now. Offer it up as London's gift to public sector sanity, while there is still time to avoid millions of pounds climbing into billions on a project that London does not need. What London needs is a fully working, modernised Tube. So kill Crossrail to save the Tube.
Crossrail, with a completely new rail tunnel from Paddington to Liverpool Street, has few friends. It has been stopped and restarted too many times to count over the past quarter-century. When Gordon Brown said in 2007 that "it will definitely proceed", sceptics sensed the cold hand of death grip its throat.
When Whitehall set out a tripartite funding package for the line in 2008, the caveats and qualifications grew in number. In an interview in February the transport minister, Lord Adonis, warned the world that, if Londoners do not raise their two-thirds share, "the Mayor understands that Crossrail will collapse ... ".
Mention Crossrail to Boris Johnson and his normally open, cheerful visage changes to that of a parent just told his kids are on drugs. He starts to shake. When reminded that he once said Crossrail was "one of those times you have to say, get in that hole and keep digging" the look becomes a rictus.
At a farewell dinner at City Hall earlier this month, the outgoing head of Transport for London, Tim O'Toole, hinted at his known private view that Crossrail is capital madness. He pleaded with his colleagues to fight instead for the existing Tube, now teetering on the brink of insolvency. TfL executives know that continuing with Crossrail will eat money and distract management for a decade.
It would yield nothing but bad news stories, while severely disrupting traffic in central London just when it will be recovering from the water mains chaos. Test drilling is already upheaving St Giles.
Crossrail is no longer a railway that makes sense. Back in the Eighties it was way behind the Jubilee line and the then (and now) top priority, a new northeast/southwest line from Hackney to Chelsea and beyond. Lines were needed to fill the Tube-less no-man's-lands of Greenwich and Chelsea/Fulham.
It took Margaret Thatcher to force through the Jubilee line to help the Reichman brothers build Canary Wharf. Chelsea/Hackney has no such power backers.
This project's only real friends have been in the City, eager to fend off the "threat" from Docklands and garner the bulk of the 900,000 extra office jobs predicted for London a decade ago. Nobody expects that need now. The Central line's parallel capacity can easily be increased by station improvements and better management.
Crossrail's backers have duly fallen back on that catch-all for any extravagant project, "urban regeneration". But that involves taking the line far out to the east, at further cost. For all the efforts of consultants to prove otherwise, this line is neither profitable nor a priority for economic renewal.
Boris Johnson now has a golden chance. He knows the capital must tighten its belt somehow - especially after he failed to curb the gargantuan appetite of the Olympics (costing more than half the £16billion total for Crossrail).
Johnson has already had to end his predecessor's costly fantasies, the Thames Gateway bridge, the Cross-river tram and the Dagenham light railway extension.
The Government has offered £5.6billion to the Crossrail budget. The rest must come from a raised London business rate (£3.5billion), borrowing against so-called train access charges (£2.3billion) and £2.7billion from TfL, this time borrowing against future fares.
Given the recent history of Tube finances, these figures are wholly unreal. TfL is close to technical bankruptcy. Borrowing against future revenue is mad, especially when it has already been assigned to meet Crossrail's running costs. Has London learned nothing about dodgy accounting from the past five years of such projects?
Meanwhile the City Corporation is offering a meagre £200million, on top of which is budgeted £150million from City businesses and, once upon a time, £230million from the airports authority, BAA. Lord Adonis claims this amounts to a further £750million, which is inconceivable. The truth is that Crossrail is another financial pig in a poke.
The Government has already poured £2billion in extra guilt money into the Tube to finance its public-private partnership (PPP), the sunk cost of this now largely aborted scheme. No minister or official has ever taken responsibility for it - indeed the official, Shriti Vadera, has been rewarded with both a peerage and a ministry.
In addition, the Government has pledged a huge £39billion to TfL over the next decade, a sum higher than anything conceived during nationalisation. This, it says, will have to embrace the completion of the PPP scheme and Crossrail. But the latter is not formally ring-fenced.
This is the Mayor's great opportunity. He has a £1.4billion hole in his transport budget already and must somehow fund £3billion of debt left over from the Treasury's collapsed Metronet infrastructure company.
Adonis said last November that there was no way he would plug this hole, despite it being one of the Government's own creation. He could hardly have given a more direct indication of his willingness to see Crossrail crash.
Johnson could now argue that the £5.6billion for Crossrail be switched to other Tube projects, such as resignalling the Bakerloo and Piccadilly lines and replacing Metropolitan line stock, projects that may anyway have to be postponed to meet the cost of Crossrail. Cancelling the latter would relieve the Tube budget of a tidal wave of uncertain costs now advancing down the track.
This would enable Johnson to declare himself the saviour of London's Underground railway, after a decade of mismanagement and financial chaos.
By liberating himself from Crossrail and demanding that London be allowed to keep its transport grant, he could begin to reconstruct TfL's finances and meet its voracious appetite for new signals, stations and rolling stock. He could declare a clean slate.
Johnson need not fear the Government on this: if ministers wanted Crossrail they would have paid for it. He need not fear the City.
He can use the recession as an excuse to put this white elephant to sleep while garnering the popularity of restoring London's transport system to sanity. But first he must kill Crossrail.