It was reported that Mark Thurston former #HS2 ltd CEO earned £617,300 in salary in 2021/22, with added benefits worth £5,400, making him at one point the highest-paid public servant in the UK. He left HS2 in a mess and then went to work for a water company.

#HS2 was sold to the public & pushed through Parliament as levelling up the North. The project that emerged from the cuts is a London regeneration scheme with a gold plated railway attached. That was always the plan in my opinion.

Cross party support for the #HS2 dream helped to make the project immune to real scrutiny. It's not incompetence that has put the costs up and the benefits down. Political incentives reward getting projects approved, not getting them right. MPs just move on as do HS2 Ltd execs

The political class chose the 'story' of #HS2 and ignored the truth. Bent Flyvbjerg has documented this pattern in megaprojects worldwide: optimism bias gets projects approved, then reality lands on the taxpayer. HS2 Ltd had interest in the project getting the green light.

#HS2 was a cross party political project. MPs were whipped to vote it through with many not even looking at the shocking lack of detail in the original plan or understanding that the case had not been properly made. @Labour @Heidi_Labour

For anyone that has been affected by the construction of #HS2 this video ought to have some sort of trigger warning. How can we be 15 years in and still asking such basic questions. It highlights how HS2's initial design/plan was a joke. youtu.be/LbhynaoFjEo?si=LTnl… via @YouTube

HS2 was a white elephant from day one. A colossal waste of taxpayers’ money. I said from the start the costs were absurd. Back in 2019, I launched a report from the @the_tpa proposing much better ways to spend the money. Instead, we've got spiralling budgets, gold‑plated design, slack oversight, and no accountability. Billions sunk for a line that keeps shrinking. The very definition of inefficient, ineffective, and unaccountable infrastructure spending. This new review does not surprise me. It simply confirms what we already knew – HS2 was a disaster baked in from the start. thetimes.com/uk/politics/art…

#HS2 was flawed before it even begun but politicians failed to scrutinise it. @Labour party can not politicise the failure of HS2. The project had cross party support every step of the way. If anything it was Labour MPs that lobbied hardest, naively championing it for the North.

The environment bears the scar of this scandal. #HS2 thetimes.com/uk/politics/art…

Politicians, including @AndyBurnhamGM , were blinkered to the obvious truth of #HS2 from the start and were only concerned with lobbying for their own constituency. This national infrastructure project was birthed out of greed and ignorance. thetimes.com/uk/politics/art…

#HS2 is a scandal. To date nobody has been held responsible either politicians or execs for any of the failures that have become this £100billion pound money mountain. There ought to be an inquiry. thetimes.com/uk/politics/art…

HS2 is a cross party political scandal. The worst fears that #STOPHS2 had brought attention to have not only been confirmed, but surpassed. #HS2 thetimes.com/uk/politics/art…

Justine Greening 2012 #HS2: 'A high speed line will deliver £6.2 billion more in benefits to the country than a line running at conventional speeds, at an extra cost of only £1.4 billion' - 2026 HS2 to look at reducing speed to cut costs... gov.uk/government/speeches/h…

The Times 'The HS2 money train revealed — who’s made billions?' : It looks like @RachelReevesMP was barking up the wrong tree when pointing the finger at newts and bats... #HS2 thetimes.com/uk/transport/ar…

#HS2 Odd ministers don’t mention waste like the £30m on a failed rail college (closed in 2023), the cross-party support that never faltered, or the reviews that were delayed, ignored, or quietly shelved. - No, it’s the bats what done it. Shocking @RachelReevesMP @Heidi_Labour

The Independent: #HS2 In July 2023 Mark Thurston resigned after six years as chief executive, during which he earned a total of £4,495,408 msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/ho…

#HS2 It's important to remember that campaigners pointed out BEFORE the green light was given to the original scheme that £32billion was not a realistic budget. Now it's more than £100bn for a fraction of the line promised. £100bn to Birmingham is a total scandal. @StopHS2

#HS2 - Every warning ignored! Every concern ridiculed! Every reckless decision defended by Government! HS2 was supported by the two main parties - they ought to hang their heads in shame! #Labour #Conservatives @Heidi_Labour