HS2 Scandal
An open letter to the British Prime Minister regarding the HS2 scandal and allegations of fraud and misrepresentation
Dear Prime Minister,
You stood at the dispatch box recently lamenting the fraud and cover-up of the two scandals - the Post Office and the Contaminated Blood.
It is appalling, disingenuous and totally unacceptable that you have not acknowledged the third big scandal of our age detrimentally affecting over 20,000 potential claimants. These are ordinary British people who have effectively had their land stolen from them by HS2 through compulsory purchase at potentially fraudulent low under valuations. In some cases properties have been forcibly taken away from people with compensation paid in some cases at potentially under half the real market value.
It is a blot on the copy book of this proud nation that such state backed daylight robbery has been allowed to be perpetrated against British citizens.
Further we, at the Climate Party, have been supplied with comprehensive evidence indicating that the High Speed Rail (London-West Midlands) Act 2017 may have been passed by Parliament on the basis of fraudulent strategic misrepresentation and deliberate dumbing down of the projected costs of HS2. This 'dumbing down' of the project's costs meant that the sovereignty of parliament was effectively negated by provision of cost estimates that were at best complete fantasy and at worst may constitute fraudulent strategic misrepresentation.
The result — a national scandal of epic proportions which has deprived the people of this nation of 30 billion pounds of funding needed for vital public services, destroyed the lives or livelihoods of up to 20,000 people and organisations and caused environmental damage on a scale not seen since the second World War.
The Climate Party will be cooperating with others to promptly bring forward further evidence on the scale and extent of this scandal and to indicate those responsible for its perpetration.
Yours faithfully
Ed Gemmell, Leader, Climate Party