Why is the UK Stagnation NOT a going to change? The Planning Roadblock to Growth
The UK’s stagnation is can be distilled to single root cause.
50 years of Issues with planning approvals, which are hindering the growth of industries like the creative sector, high-speed rail, and technology. Major projects that have been turned down or faced challenges due to planning, preventing job creation and economic development.
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Consider this:
Energy
Between 2004 and 2021, before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, industrial energy prices in the UK saw a steep rise, tripling in nominal terms, or doubling when adjusted relative to consumer prices. Despite similar population sizes, the UK has fewer than 30 million homes, compared to France’s 37 million.
Additionally, while 800,000 British families own second homes, 3.4 million French families have the same privilege. When it comes to electricity generation, the UK lags significantly behind other developed nations. The UK’s per capita electricity output is just two-thirds that of France (4,800 kilowatt-hours annually in Britain versus 7,300 in France) and only slightly more than a third of what is generated in the United States (12,672 kilowatt-hours per person). In fact, the UK is closer to countries like Brazil and South Africa in terms of electricity production per capita than to Germany, Sweden, or Canada. Britain’s last nuclear power plant was completed between 1987 and 1995.
The next one, Hinkley Point C, is under construction, but its cost per megawatt of capacity is between four and six times higher than equivalent projects in South Korea. It is also four times more expensive than what South Korea’s KEPCO is building in Czechia.
Infrastructure and Transport
Infrastructure projects in the UK also face exorbitant costs. Tram projects in Britain are two and a half times more expensive per mile than similar projects in France. Over the past 25 years, France has constructed 21 tram systems across various cities, including smaller ones like those with populations equivalent to Lincoln or Carlisle (about 150,000). Yet, the UK has been unable to build a tramway in Leeds, a city of nearly 800,000 residents, making it the largest city in Europe without a mass transit system.
The UK’s high-speed rail project, HS2, is a case study in cost overruns. At £396 million per mile, HS2 is more than four times costlier per mile than Italy’s Naples to Bari line, and over eight times more expensive than France’s high-speed route between Tours and Bordeaux.
Despite adding 10 million people to its population, the UK has not built a new reservoir since 1992, raising concerns about future water supply.
At Heathrow Airport, one of the world’s busiest hubs, annual flight numbers have stagnated since 2000, despite rising demand. While passenger numbers have increased by 10 million thanks to larger aircraft, this pales in comparison to the 22 million additional passengers at Amsterdam’s Schiphol and the 15 million added at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle. The scarcity of slots at Heathrow has driven their value sky-high, with the right to land once a week worth tens of millions of pounds.
Finally, the planning process for the Lower Thames Crossing, a proposed tunnel linking Kent and Essex, has generated a staggering 360,000 pages of documentation. The application process alone has cost £297 million, more than double the cost of constructing the world’s longest road tunnel in Norway.
If we can’t ALLOW our country to flourish, grow or compete on the global stage where will be going? Brain drain, wealth drain…
Would the industrial revolution have happened IF people could not work, or afford a home near the place of employment? NO.
Therefore stagnation is here to stay….