Boring for Britain
INVESTMENT is no substitute. A misdi- rected or unmanaged business can absorb any amount to no effect, as we saw with steel (and with British Leyland.) From sta- ble direction and positive management, everything else can follow — investment included. Nothing must dispirit railwaymen more than the annual wrangle for patron- age under Treasury rules, as tempered by political favour. They can observe, or they should, that a 26-mile high-speed railway through difficult terrain is nearing comple- tion, on time, and without absorbing a penny of public money. It is called the Channel Tunnel. Maybe it should, as I argue, be extended to York (now 103 min- utes from London, unlike the Kent coast) or all new railways should be in tunnels, or when Sir Alastair Morton has finished bor- ing for Britain, he should take on British Rail. The tunnel has got built because when lie is in charge of something he believes in running it. He might like to note that a team from the Societe Nationale des Chemins de Fer has been seen in the City. The hosts asked politely why the French were so much better at building rail links to the tunnel. `Ah', a spokesman explained, `when we drain the pool we do not consult the frogs.'
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