KHOODEELAAR! commenting on the UK Opposition spokesman Phillip Hammond's admission that Crossrail is on the list of scams to be cut!

1500 Hrs GMT London Thursday 7 May 2009


KHOODEELAAR! commenting on the UK Opposition finance spokesman Phillip Hammond's reported admission that Crossrail is included IN EFFECT in the list of their cuts if they get elected..

Our commentary will be continuing throughout the rest of the day today on twitter

http://twitter.com/khoodeelaar

[To be continued]

From the web site of the London EVENING STANDARD 7 May 2009:


Tories admit Crossrail is on their list for spending ‘reassessment’
Nicholas Cecil
07.05.09
Crossrail will be reviewed by the Conservatives, a senior frontbencher has confirmed.

The Evening Standard revealed this week that the £16 billion rail project could be delayed if David Cameron wins power.

Tory sources sought to play down the threat to the cross-London rail scheme and shadow transport secretary Theresa Villiers insisted that it was not “currently” being reviewed.

But shadow chief secretary to the Treasury Philip Hammond yesterday refused to guarantee that Crossrail would escape the Conservative cuts programme.

Labour is desperate to pin down exactly where the Tory axe will fall and Treasury minister Yvette Cooper cornered Mr Hammond in the Commons on Crossrail, urging him to make clear whether his party “supported” the new rail line which will run from Maidenhead and Heathrow in the west, under central London and out to Shenfield and Abbey Wood in the east.

Mr Hammond insisted that the rail scheme, due to open in 2017, was a “good project” which fitted “very well” into his party's agenda of improving rail infrastructure. But he added: “Every single programme, every single project will have to be reassessed and re-evaluated.

“It will have to demonstrate its value for money, it will have to demonstrate its effectiveness in an extraordinary tight fiscal climate created by the disaster that this Government has visited upon this country.”

London Mayor Boris Johnson has said that he has been assured that Crossrail is protected from cutbacks.

However, estimates are circulating about the scale of savings that the next Government will have to make to balance Britain's books after Chancellor Alistair Darling's astronomical borrowing to lessen the impact of the recession.

One report, in The Spectator, suggested that cuts of 10 per cent in the defence, Home Office and education budgets would be needed over the three years after 2011.

Mr Cameron has already admitted that a Tory government could scale down Britain's Trident nuclear deterrent.

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Reader Views (6) Add your view | Show all
Here's a sample of the latest views published. You can click view all to read all views that readers have sent in.
CrossRail should be reviewed now. The project seems to have taken a very long time in awarding some very expensive management contracts but has made little real progress during the past 2 years much to the distress of the engineering sector during the current recession.

- Mike, london

I would rather they scap the NHS than crossrail!

- Thejules, Paris, France

Who needs Trident (out of date already)the Olympics or indeed Crossrail? Answers please on a postage stamp to 10,Downing STreet,London

- Mike, London England


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