June 5, 2025 • 14 mins
With the UK government’s spending review fast approaching, all eyes are on Westminster. In a matter of days, the public will gain a clearer sense of how funding is set to be allocated across departments over the next three years. There’s growing speculation that Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves will make a significant push on infrastructure—a signal, perhaps, of shifting priorities.
In this week’s episode of In the City, hosts Allegra Stratton and Francine Lacqua sit down with Sam Richards, chief executive of the think tank Britain Remade to unpack the upcoming review and step back to look at the bigger picture: Could this mark a real turning point?
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio News.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Welcome to in the City.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Each week we unpack a story that's crucial to the
world's financial capitals. I'm alegra Stratton and I'm Fronci Laqua.
Now the government's svend your Review is just around the corner.
Next week, we're going to get a clearer picture of
how funding will be allocated across departments for the next
three years. Can you believe it? There's growing speculation that
Rachel Reaves, the Chancellor, will make a significant push on infrastructure,
(00:42):
a signal perhaps of shifting priorities.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Welcome to the City of London, The City of the City,
the City of London, the lease mind, the gap between
the and the financial heart of the country, the City,
the City.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Welcome to in the City.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Stand clear of the doors pe.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
So like were In this episode, we're stepping back to
look at the bigger picture. Could this spending review mark
a real turning point? Might it lay the groundwork for
lasting resilience rather than just offering short term relief.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Well.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
To discuss all of this, we're joined by Sam Richards,
the chief executive of the think tank Britain Remade and
former Special advisor at number ten Downing Street. Sam, great
to have you with us. Thanks for having me today Wednesday,
when we're recording this podcast, Rachel reeves Has says the
Spending Review will be focused on the priorities of working people.
What does that look like.
Speaker 5 (01:46):
I think that Britain has at its heart a fundamental
problem with growth and what sits underneath that. It's been
our failure to build the new sources of energy, the
new homes and the new transport links that we need.
So a focus on the priorities of working people have
to be unlocking those building those key bits of instructure,
(02:09):
bringing down the cost of housing. London has the most
expensive housing in the world, bringing down the cost of
energy from the highest industrial energy prices in the world,
and making it easier to see friends and family. So
hopefully we're going to see some of that with this
new focus on building new infrastructure that they see not
just in the Spending Review but also in the government's
planning Bill.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
We're talking a second about how you turn a great
big berzuoker of cash, to use a borish chance of
phrase that I always think does the job very nicely,
how you turn these many billions that her team of
briefing into as France says, that kind of experience for people.
So we talk about that later because that is tough
and it's not quick, but before we do just in
terms of the diagnosis of the problem, because you've worked
in this all the time, Sam with Britain Remade, is
(02:51):
you know, if you look at the energy transition and
so on, we've got such a grid problem, We've got
such an infrastructure problem that we have to clear away
so many of those planning hurdles. Clearly the government's talking
about doing that lots and lots in a separate piece
of legislation. What's your sense even when they turn on
the taps for this infrastructure, that it's going to work?
Speaker 5 (03:10):
So is Yeah, it's worth stepping back and remembering just
how bad the problem is. We are currently building the
world's most expensive railway line with HS two. We are
currently building the world's most expensive nuclear power plant, indeed
the most expensive nuclear power plant ever constructed in the
history of the human race. The planning application for the
(03:31):
Lower Tens crossing cost a quarter of a billion pounds.
That is more than it costs Norway to build the
world's longest tunnel. Now what is the reason for all
of this. Well, if you take the example of HS two,
is a notable part down to the fact that we're
spending one hundred and twenty one million pounds on a
back tunnel to protect three hundred vextine bats that live
(03:51):
in a nearby wood to where the line goes through,
not actually the line goes through. If you take the
example of HS two, it's the fact that EDF have
been wrangling with regulators for eight years about installing this
fish disco. This is an underwater acoustic to terrent to
stop the fish room swim me into the exhaust pipes
of the plan. So the question is then if the government,
(04:13):
as you put fires this big berzuker of cash, is
it just going to go into these world record expensive
products and we're not actually going to see any output.
And that's where what they're doing with the Planning Bill
to streamline some of the environmental rules and regulations to
make it harder to sue the government the majority of
(04:33):
instructional products currently end up in the courts, and to
reduce the cost of building.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
That's why that is so critical.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Just explain for us how you would sort of square
the circle if you're the labor government, because in the
Guardian today they've got hundreds of they've got people criticizing
them for the effect that their planning bill will have
on nature.
Speaker 5 (04:51):
So it's worth bearing in mind that as we're making
it incredibly expensive to build the homes and the railway
lines and the roads and the energy that we need,
we're also failing to protect nature under the current regime.
So all of our key bio diversity indicators, from farmland
birds to insect life in decline.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Now, why is that? How have we arrived at the
worst of both world.
Speaker 5 (05:11):
It's the system that both fails to protect nature and
also stops his building. Partly, it's the way that we
protect our site. So rather than having a strategic approach
where we go look across the country this is what
we want to happen with our various species, we do
it this site by site, piecemeal approach.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
The next question is when we're looking ahead to next
week and you've got Rachel Reeves already in a speech
on Wednesday next week and saying you know it's going
to be big and meaningful, and Ran I'm reminded of
the interview in this podcast studio we did with Jim O'Neil,
where he was defending Rachel Reeves through some of her
difficult times and saying, just wait for this big infrastructure moment.
So it's really significant moment for Rachel Reeves and her allies.
(05:54):
But I suppose the question is is it it's these exorbitant,
expensive protections nature that are the significant thing, or is
it a bundle of things.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
So there's a range of facts here.
Speaker 5 (06:05):
If you look at something like building a new offshore
wind farm, right, it takes two years at most to
physically build an offshoal wind farm. At the moment, it
takes up to thirteen years to get one up and running.
That eleven year gap is in grit connections and planning.
About half of it is GRET connection and the planning chunk,
(06:26):
a big chunk of it is the compiling of environmental
impact assessments that stretch to tens of thousands of pages,
especially examples here. But a new railway line, I should
rather say reopening an existing railway line three point three
miles of track right between Bristol and Portishead. The environmental
impact assessment for that, well, the overall planning document was
(06:48):
eighty thousand pages. So the challenge that we have with
investment in this country is that it is actually incredibly
hard for private capital and indeed for government two actually
invest when there are such barriers on building. And actually
this is a problem that Joe Biden had with IRA
(07:09):
in that it was getting the money out the door
because of the permitting issues in America. It comes back
to the problem of it's all very well government signing
the checks, but if it's impossible to actually build that.
When farmed the factories for the new electric cars, if
you can't actually physically build the things because of the
(07:31):
planning rules and in particular the environmental rules, the environmental permitting,
then you're not going to get their growth.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Is Rachel Reeves when she announces this money next week,
do you believe that there's the parallel supply side reforms
on planning liberalization. Obviously, it's very very high profile that
they're pushing through this legislation through Parliament and they are
being criticized for all the reasons we've just discussed around
being too cavalier with nature. But do you think she's
got the balance right?
Speaker 5 (07:57):
So the government's planning bill, there have lots of steps
in the right direction. Consultation adds years to the process,
and they are scrapping in a genuinely significant move, they
are removing pre application consultation for big infrastructure projects. So
that's a couple of years that we've gone from that
long timeline that I set out earlier.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
That's important.
Speaker 5 (08:19):
They are also, as I've said, making it harder to
sue the government. It is the case at the moment
that the majority of our infrastructure projects end up bogged
down in the courts, and they are reducing the number
of opportunities that people will have to sue the government.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
It will to be the case though, that your costs.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
Will be capped if you sue the government under environmental grounds.
A guy who the primesis himself has highlighted, who has
brought judicial reviews against pretty much every single road project
that the government has sought to build and will that
will likely still continue. And then the big question of
THEA is around this whether they're going far enough to
(08:58):
change the way that we do environmental protections. They are
looking to bring in this new system that is a
move to a strategic approach, and that is to be welcomed,
But the problem with the way that they're doing is
it's not a wholesale change to a new system. It's
rather instead on top of all of the existing planning
rules and the town and country Planning Acts and habitats regulations,
they're adding another layer on top that they hope will
(09:22):
kind of bypass that current system. And while there's some
evidence that will work for housing, and less confident that
that will work for other infrastructure projects.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
So, you know, I think that there is a risk.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
And that brings us back to where we started with
your question fran around. You know, she's talking today about
you know, working people, and this money's going to change
working people's lives. Well, it might do, but in ten
years time, we.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
Also don't know how much money. How much money does
she need to make a material difference Right before we
even count on where she spends it, there's a spending review,
like how much money does she have to play with?
I know there's this tussle within government about saying, what's
the accountant that are setting policy she wants to spend.
But we're kind of beholden to investors, global investors.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
As I say, when it comes to Britain's infrastructure, it
really is a question of making sure we get much
more bang for our buck. The nuclear power stations that
we built in the eighties and nineties were half the
price of Hinckley. The ones that we built in the
fifties and sixties were a quarter of the price. There
is nothing inherent in the technology that means that it
(10:27):
has to be as eyewateringly expensive.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
You started the podcast Sam with these sort of really
inglorious titles like We're the slowest, to be the worst
with the most expensive? How did Britain get here?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Like?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
How did we get so slow?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (10:41):
I mean, it's been the steady accretion of regulation in
a range of sectors, particularly in environmental rules, some of
which are come from domestic law, some of which come
from the EU. But it's also the case that there
are more rules on health and safety here, for example,
than there are if you're trying to build nuclear power
(11:02):
plants in Korea. There's a whole steady accretion of rules
and regulations across different areas that have gone as to
this point, and that is going to be the only
way through is going to be cutting away some of
that red tape.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
There's quite a large number that are very pro these
reforms but there's a significant number that are worried that
it's going too far, and that is the tensions. But
it's sort of thematically played out on a number of issues,
isn't it. Between the leadership we still saw it probably
when we were in number ten two, but between the
leadership and the backbench that feel they're not sure what
the soul of this party is.
Speaker 5 (11:34):
It is although I was at an event with Labor
Growth Group MPs on Monday, huge room, packed room, and
I think they recognize, not least given where the polls
are now that this government has to deliver. They have
to be the proof of the They've had all this
positive rhetoric about building and we've said we're going to
(11:57):
make it easy to get my housing gladder and they
have to have come twenty twenty nine actually delivered that stuff.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Will this help the bills pledge that Milibaan made there
three hundred pounds cheaper.
Speaker 5 (12:08):
The source of our high energy bills is our reliance
on expensive gas and we need to build more of
our own clean energy sources to get off gas. So
yes in the long run. In the short run, he
is ultimately at the mercy of international gas markets.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
If you look at holistically the spending review. There's loads
of ours heavily debated taxes right, it's rules around gifting
inheritance tax that could be in the crosshairs. The option
of freezing income tax threshold is also something that could
possibly change. So I know that through the lensam of infrastructure,
is this going to be the focal point or if
at the end of the day, this is a holistic
(12:46):
choice of whether you are fairer for the Brits at large,
does infrastructure come as a second or third priority.
Speaker 5 (12:55):
Well, that's always been the challenge joint and that happened
in the twenty tens was one of the DISASTERUS decisions
then that we saw capsule budgets, long term capital budgets
slashed in order to patch up. If you keep delaying that,
if you keep putting that off, then fundamentally, yeah, you
get to a point where as we are now, you
(13:16):
have these incredibly ianie coss and you are relying in
some areas still on creaking Victorian infrastructure.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
I mean, this is not.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
The reservoir point is so interesting, So we've a net.
Last week they announced they'll be nine new reservoirs by
twenty fifty, but two of them by twenty thirty. And
to your point about how they're reforming planning that they're
going to take these the building of these two outside
of the local authority planning process, is that going to work?
Speaker 5 (13:41):
Yeah, it's necessary because I mean you have seen the
opposition to reservoir in Oxfordshire, and this is to point
the fact that local MPs there, particular pee Leila Moran,
who has campaigned to bring in many more refugees to
Oxfordshire and yet opposes.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
The building when new homes or resid was which our
need is, which increased population.
Speaker 5 (14:03):
Yeah, because that's of it, right, I mean the need
of reservoirs. Without the levels of migration that we had,
we wouldn't need more reservoirs. And yet you will have
politicians who both at the same time so that we
need to have massively increase levels of migration and yet
are unwilling to build the infrastructure needed to meet that demand.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Tam, thank you, thanks for listening to this episode of
In the City from Bloomberg. This episode was hosted by
me Alekra Stratton and Francine Lackworth. It was produced by
Sersadi Moses and dam And Tala Armadi, Brendan Francis Nenham
(14:42):
is our executive producer. Special thanks to Sam Richards. Please subscribe, rate,
and review wherever you listen to podcasts.
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio News.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Welcome to in the City.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Each week we unpack a story that's crucial to the
world's financial capitals. I'm alegra Stratton and I'm Fronci Laqua.
Now the government's svend your Review is just around the corner.
Next week, we're going to get a clearer picture of
how funding will be allocated across departments for the next
three years. Can you believe it? There's growing speculation that
Rachel Reaves, the Chancellor, will make a significant push on infrastructure,
(00:42):
a signal perhaps of shifting priorities.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Welcome to the City of London, The City of the City,
the City of London, the lease mind, the gap between
the and the financial heart of the country, the City,
the City.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Welcome to in the City.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Stand clear of the doors pe.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
So like were In this episode, we're stepping back to
look at the bigger picture. Could this spending review mark
a real turning point? Might it lay the groundwork for
lasting resilience rather than just offering short term relief.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Well.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
To discuss all of this, we're joined by Sam Richards,
the chief executive of the think tank Britain Remade and
former Special advisor at number ten Downing Street. Sam, great
to have you with us. Thanks for having me today Wednesday,
when we're recording this podcast, Rachel reeves Has says the
Spending Review will be focused on the priorities of working people.
What does that look like.
Speaker 5 (01:46):
I think that Britain has at its heart a fundamental
problem with growth and what sits underneath that. It's been
our failure to build the new sources of energy, the
new homes and the new transport links that we need.
So a focus on the priorities of working people have
to be unlocking those building those key bits of instructure,
(02:09):
bringing down the cost of housing. London has the most
expensive housing in the world, bringing down the cost of
energy from the highest industrial energy prices in the world,
and making it easier to see friends and family. So
hopefully we're going to see some of that with this
new focus on building new infrastructure that they see not
just in the Spending Review but also in the government's
planning Bill.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
We're talking a second about how you turn a great
big berzuoker of cash, to use a borish chance of
phrase that I always think does the job very nicely,
how you turn these many billions that her team of
briefing into as France says, that kind of experience for people.
So we talk about that later because that is tough
and it's not quick, but before we do just in
terms of the diagnosis of the problem, because you've worked
in this all the time, Sam with Britain Remade, is
(02:51):
you know, if you look at the energy transition and
so on, we've got such a grid problem, We've got
such an infrastructure problem that we have to clear away
so many of those planning hurdles. Clearly the government's talking
about doing that lots and lots in a separate piece
of legislation. What's your sense even when they turn on
the taps for this infrastructure, that it's going to work?
Speaker 5 (03:10):
So is Yeah, it's worth stepping back and remembering just
how bad the problem is. We are currently building the
world's most expensive railway line with HS two. We are
currently building the world's most expensive nuclear power plant, indeed
the most expensive nuclear power plant ever constructed in the
history of the human race. The planning application for the
(03:31):
Lower Tens crossing cost a quarter of a billion pounds.
That is more than it costs Norway to build the
world's longest tunnel. Now what is the reason for all
of this. Well, if you take the example of HS two,
is a notable part down to the fact that we're
spending one hundred and twenty one million pounds on a
back tunnel to protect three hundred vextine bats that live
(03:51):
in a nearby wood to where the line goes through,
not actually the line goes through. If you take the
example of HS two, it's the fact that EDF have
been wrangling with regulators for eight years about installing this
fish disco. This is an underwater acoustic to terrent to
stop the fish room swim me into the exhaust pipes
of the plan. So the question is then if the government,
(04:13):
as you put fires this big berzuker of cash, is
it just going to go into these world record expensive
products and we're not actually going to see any output.
And that's where what they're doing with the Planning Bill
to streamline some of the environmental rules and regulations to
make it harder to sue the government the majority of
(04:33):
instructional products currently end up in the courts, and to
reduce the cost of building.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
That's why that is so critical.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Just explain for us how you would sort of square
the circle if you're the labor government, because in the
Guardian today they've got hundreds of they've got people criticizing
them for the effect that their planning bill will have
on nature.
Speaker 5 (04:51):
So it's worth bearing in mind that as we're making
it incredibly expensive to build the homes and the railway
lines and the roads and the energy that we need,
we're also failing to protect nature under the current regime.
So all of our key bio diversity indicators, from farmland
birds to insect life in decline.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Now, why is that? How have we arrived at the
worst of both world.
Speaker 5 (05:11):
It's the system that both fails to protect nature and
also stops his building. Partly, it's the way that we
protect our site. So rather than having a strategic approach
where we go look across the country this is what
we want to happen with our various species, we do
it this site by site, piecemeal approach.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
The next question is when we're looking ahead to next
week and you've got Rachel Reeves already in a speech
on Wednesday next week and saying you know it's going
to be big and meaningful, and Ran I'm reminded of
the interview in this podcast studio we did with Jim O'Neil,
where he was defending Rachel Reeves through some of her
difficult times and saying, just wait for this big infrastructure moment.
So it's really significant moment for Rachel Reeves and her allies.
(05:54):
But I suppose the question is is it it's these exorbitant,
expensive protections nature that are the significant thing, or is
it a bundle of things.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
So there's a range of facts here.
Speaker 5 (06:05):
If you look at something like building a new offshore
wind farm, right, it takes two years at most to
physically build an offshoal wind farm. At the moment, it
takes up to thirteen years to get one up and running.
That eleven year gap is in grit connections and planning.
About half of it is GRET connection and the planning chunk,
(06:26):
a big chunk of it is the compiling of environmental
impact assessments that stretch to tens of thousands of pages,
especially examples here. But a new railway line, I should
rather say reopening an existing railway line three point three
miles of track right between Bristol and Portishead. The environmental
impact assessment for that, well, the overall planning document was
(06:48):
eighty thousand pages. So the challenge that we have with
investment in this country is that it is actually incredibly
hard for private capital and indeed for government two actually
invest when there are such barriers on building. And actually
this is a problem that Joe Biden had with IRA
(07:09):
in that it was getting the money out the door
because of the permitting issues in America. It comes back
to the problem of it's all very well government signing
the checks, but if it's impossible to actually build that.
When farmed the factories for the new electric cars, if
you can't actually physically build the things because of the
(07:31):
planning rules and in particular the environmental rules, the environmental permitting,
then you're not going to get their growth.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Is Rachel Reeves when she announces this money next week,
do you believe that there's the parallel supply side reforms
on planning liberalization. Obviously, it's very very high profile that
they're pushing through this legislation through Parliament and they are
being criticized for all the reasons we've just discussed around
being too cavalier with nature. But do you think she's
got the balance right?
Speaker 5 (07:57):
So the government's planning bill, there have lots of steps
in the right direction. Consultation adds years to the process,
and they are scrapping in a genuinely significant move, they
are removing pre application consultation for big infrastructure projects. So
that's a couple of years that we've gone from that
long timeline that I set out earlier.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
That's important.
Speaker 5 (08:19):
They are also, as I've said, making it harder to
sue the government. It is the case at the moment
that the majority of our infrastructure projects end up bogged
down in the courts, and they are reducing the number
of opportunities that people will have to sue the government.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
It will to be the case though, that your costs.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
Will be capped if you sue the government under environmental grounds.
A guy who the primesis himself has highlighted, who has
brought judicial reviews against pretty much every single road project
that the government has sought to build and will that
will likely still continue. And then the big question of
THEA is around this whether they're going far enough to
(08:58):
change the way that we do environmental protections. They are
looking to bring in this new system that is a
move to a strategic approach, and that is to be welcomed,
But the problem with the way that they're doing is
it's not a wholesale change to a new system. It's
rather instead on top of all of the existing planning
rules and the town and country Planning Acts and habitats regulations,
they're adding another layer on top that they hope will
(09:22):
kind of bypass that current system. And while there's some
evidence that will work for housing, and less confident that
that will work for other infrastructure projects.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
So, you know, I think that there is a risk.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
And that brings us back to where we started with
your question fran around. You know, she's talking today about
you know, working people, and this money's going to change
working people's lives. Well, it might do, but in ten
years time, we.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
Also don't know how much money. How much money does
she need to make a material difference Right before we
even count on where she spends it, there's a spending review,
like how much money does she have to play with?
I know there's this tussle within government about saying, what's
the accountant that are setting policy she wants to spend.
But we're kind of beholden to investors, global investors.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
As I say, when it comes to Britain's infrastructure, it
really is a question of making sure we get much
more bang for our buck. The nuclear power stations that
we built in the eighties and nineties were half the
price of Hinckley. The ones that we built in the
fifties and sixties were a quarter of the price. There
is nothing inherent in the technology that means that it
(10:27):
has to be as eyewateringly expensive.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
You started the podcast Sam with these sort of really
inglorious titles like We're the slowest, to be the worst
with the most expensive? How did Britain get here?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
Like?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
How did we get so slow?
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (10:41):
I mean, it's been the steady accretion of regulation in
a range of sectors, particularly in environmental rules, some of
which are come from domestic law, some of which come
from the EU. But it's also the case that there
are more rules on health and safety here, for example,
than there are if you're trying to build nuclear power
(11:02):
plants in Korea. There's a whole steady accretion of rules
and regulations across different areas that have gone as to
this point, and that is going to be the only
way through is going to be cutting away some of
that red tape.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
There's quite a large number that are very pro these
reforms but there's a significant number that are worried that
it's going too far, and that is the tensions. But
it's sort of thematically played out on a number of issues,
isn't it. Between the leadership we still saw it probably
when we were in number ten two, but between the
leadership and the backbench that feel they're not sure what
the soul of this party is.
Speaker 5 (11:34):
It is although I was at an event with Labor
Growth Group MPs on Monday, huge room, packed room, and
I think they recognize, not least given where the polls
are now that this government has to deliver. They have
to be the proof of the They've had all this
positive rhetoric about building and we've said we're going to
(11:57):
make it easy to get my housing gladder and they
have to have come twenty twenty nine actually delivered that stuff.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Will this help the bills pledge that Milibaan made there
three hundred pounds cheaper.
Speaker 5 (12:08):
The source of our high energy bills is our reliance
on expensive gas and we need to build more of
our own clean energy sources to get off gas. So
yes in the long run. In the short run, he
is ultimately at the mercy of international gas markets.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
If you look at holistically the spending review. There's loads
of ours heavily debated taxes right, it's rules around gifting
inheritance tax that could be in the crosshairs. The option
of freezing income tax threshold is also something that could
possibly change. So I know that through the lensam of infrastructure,
is this going to be the focal point or if
at the end of the day, this is a holistic
(12:46):
choice of whether you are fairer for the Brits at large,
does infrastructure come as a second or third priority.
Speaker 5 (12:55):
Well, that's always been the challenge joint and that happened
in the twenty tens was one of the DISASTERUS decisions
then that we saw capsule budgets, long term capital budgets
slashed in order to patch up. If you keep delaying that,
if you keep putting that off, then fundamentally, yeah, you
get to a point where as we are now, you
(13:16):
have these incredibly ianie coss and you are relying in
some areas still on creaking Victorian infrastructure.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
I mean, this is not.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
The reservoir point is so interesting, So we've a net.
Last week they announced they'll be nine new reservoirs by
twenty fifty, but two of them by twenty thirty. And
to your point about how they're reforming planning that they're
going to take these the building of these two outside
of the local authority planning process, is that going to work?
Speaker 5 (13:41):
Yeah, it's necessary because I mean you have seen the
opposition to reservoir in Oxfordshire, and this is to point
the fact that local MPs there, particular pee Leila Moran,
who has campaigned to bring in many more refugees to
Oxfordshire and yet opposes.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
The building when new homes or resid was which our
need is, which increased population.
Speaker 5 (14:03):
Yeah, because that's of it, right, I mean the need
of reservoirs. Without the levels of migration that we had,
we wouldn't need more reservoirs. And yet you will have
politicians who both at the same time so that we
need to have massively increase levels of migration and yet
are unwilling to build the infrastructure needed to meet that demand.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Tam, thank you, thanks for listening to this episode of
In the City from Bloomberg. This episode was hosted by
me Alekra Stratton and Francine Lackworth. It was produced by
Sersadi Moses and dam And Tala Armadi, Brendan Francis Nenham
(14:42):
is our executive producer. Special thanks to Sam Richards. Please subscribe, rate,
and review wherever you listen to podcasts.
Host
Francine Lacqua
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