Brexit the economy and house prices part 6

Herzlos

Tromking wrote: »

The EU only redistributes our own money. But I guess you already knew that.
As a resident of Scotland you’d be better to acknowledge the hefty bung you receive from rUK. Now that’s serious money.

Would our own government invested any of that money where the EU did?

cogito

Herzlos wrote: »

Would our own government invested any of that money where the EU did?

The EU only invests money in response to applications from the country concerned. So in answer to your question - probably, yes.

kabayiri

Open Q.

If we massively invested in quality mass transit systems outside London, wouldn't the pull factor encourage more housing to be built outside of London?

The tram system around Manchester is heavily used, it's just not extensive enough, and not integrated with the other transport systems. Extending such systems will draw in business and then housing to these access points.

These regional systems don't cost nearly as much as something like Cross Rail either.

Herzlos

Absolutely, modernised public transport outside of London would open up outside of London for almost everything.


It'd potentially reduce the need for everything to be in city centres in general, too. Why pay a lot for a small office space with terrible access and parking, if it's just as easy to move somewhere better and cheaper?

Enterprise_1701C

kabayiri wrote: »

Open Q.

If we massively invested in quality mass transit systems outside London, wouldn't the pull factor encourage more housing to be built outside of London?

The tram system around Manchester is heavily used, it's just not extensive enough, and not integrated with the other transport systems. Extending such systems will draw in business and then housing to these access points.

These regional systems don't cost nearly as much as something like Cross Rail either.

That was what all the railways and the roads were meant to do.

The pull factor is more than transport, London has grown up as the centre of everything, if you were going to do that you would need airport improvements too.

Even if you only have better railways built, they are bound to need to go somewhere someone doesn't want them, there would be 20+ years of arguments etc over where they were going.

Once the unions have stopped standing in the way of progress then the railways will improve and provide the service we all need, but in the meantime we have to put up with unions wanting to go back to the 50s, where we had coalmen etc on the trains. Progress needs to be allowed, if we can get fully automated trains then we can get to the standard we need, and it wouldn't take much to have the drive carriage with one door where a ramp extends automatically for those that need one.

Of course, this won't happen, the strike is politically motivated (just google it, there's plenty of videos of Sean Hoyle saying he wants to bring down the government. Unions have become so divorced from their grass roots intention that it is ridiculous. I have been told that my grandfather was the Chairman of the National Union of Railway Signalmen before it merged, he would have been disgusted at the way unions these days were acting, and he would certainly never have defended a driver caught drunk at the wheel (different I know but still unions https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-transport/11403238/Tube-drivers-go-on-strike-in-defence-of-colleague-caught-drunk-at-the-wheel-twice.html) although he would have looked after him after he was sacked.

So no, it wouldn't work at the moment. The unions have shot themselves in the foot, I am surprised strikes on the essential services such as the railways, schools etc have not yet been outlawed, if they continue to use them as a cosh then they probably will be. They have caused people to lose their jobs, they have caused people to have to change their jobs, they have caused a lot of problems for people trying to use the surface. Personally I would enable people to sue unions for the losses they suffer.

kabayiri

Enterprise_1701C wrote: »

...
The pull factor is more than transport, London has grown up as the centre of everything, if you were going to do that you would need airport improvements too.
...

I've just seen a complete contrast between Hong Kong airport and the major UK airports. It might be a limited perspective but we are falling way behind.

You are right though. It's more than just transport, but something has to trigger the change.

Of course, OTT here, back to Brexit squabbles

mayonnaise

Tromking wrote: »

Voters in Sweden are the next group of EU citizens looking to give social democratic politics a good kicking at the weekend.
Mainland Europe is changing, I still don’t detect a burgeoning realisation of that fact in Brussels however.

The anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats fail to achieve an electoral breakthrough
https://www.economist.com/node/21750539

The Europhobes must be fuming.

But despair not, there's always a next election to look forward to.

wunferall wrote: »

I see that Bavaria look likely to follow soon

Herzlos

antrobus wrote: »

In other news Chuka Umunna says that the Labour Party is 'institutionally racist'. Trevor Phillips says that the Labour Party is 'led by anti-Semites and racists'.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6147949/Labour-MP-Chuka-Umunna-says-party-institutionally-racist.html

It's a sad state of affairs.

Probably irrelevant as far as Brexit and house prices are concerned. But it's still bl00dy sad.

Which is interesting because Chuka is on record last year saying exactly the opposite.

Herzlos

Enterprise_1701C wrote: »

That was what all the railways and the roads were meant to do.

The pull factor is more than transport, London has grown up as the centre of everything, if you were going to do that you would need airport improvements too.

Even if you only have better railways built, they are bound to need to go somewhere someone doesn't want them, there would be 20+ years of arguments etc over where they were going.

Once the unions have stopped standing in the way of progress then the railways will improve and provide the service we all need, but in the meantime we have to put up with unions wanting to go back to the 50s, where we had coalmen etc on the trains. Progress needs to be allowed, if we can get fully automated trains then we can get to the standard we need, and it wouldn't take much to have the drive carriage with one door where a ramp extends automatically for those that need one.

Of course, this won't happen, the strike is politically motivated (just google it, there's plenty of videos of Sean Hoyle saying he wants to bring down the government. Unions have become so divorced from their grass roots intention that it is ridiculous. I have been told that my grandfather was the Chairman of the National Union of Railway Signalmen before it merged, he would have been disgusted at the way unions these days were acting, and he would certainly never have defended a driver caught drunk at the wheel (different I know but still unions https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-transport/11403238/Tube-drivers-go-on-strike-in-defence-of-colleague-caught-drunk-at-the-wheel-twice.html) although he would have looked after him after he was sacked.

So no, it wouldn't work at the moment. The unions have shot themselves in the foot, I am surprised strikes on the essential services such as the railways, schools etc have not yet been outlawed, if they continue to use them as a cosh then they probably will be. They have caused people to lose their jobs, they have caused people to have to change their jobs, they have caused a lot of problems for people trying to use the surface. Personally I would enable people to sue unions for the losses they suffer.

I think the NIMBYs will be a much bigger headache for public service expansion than unions. More public transport means more union jobs, but whilst everyone wants to benefit from having better links nearby (for commuting or house prices), almost none of them want the traffic/noise/distruption of it running too close for them. Thus any ambitious building project will likely lead with 20 years of arguing about routes and landowner access, dealing with resident objections and so on. Just look at the new runway at Heathrow or HS2.

Tromking

mayonnaise wrote: »

The anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats fail to achieve an electoral breakthrough
https://www.economist.com/node/21750539

The Europhobes must be fuming.

But despair not, there's always a next election to look forward to.

Yet if you go to other media sources the narrative is about Swedish populists possibly unseating the sitting PM and causing weeks and possibly months of uncertainty as the other groups struggle to form a Government. You pays your money to suit your own bias I suppose.
You wouldn't deny however the burgeoning influence of far right/populist politics on mainland Europe would you?