Card Factory IPO deserves better greetings

Transport wishlist is stuck in first gear

Tuesday's visit by David Cameron and George Osborne to the delightful Catthorpe Junction on the M1 in Leicestershire was clearly big news, breathlessly pre-briefed as a “visit to a transport infrastructure project” to “see how the Government is helping hardworking people and backing businesses”.

In the event, it involved re-announcing a lorry-load of infrastructure projects as familiar as they are unbuilt. They include the £191m Catthorpe scheme itself, just one of 200 projects primed to start construction this year and next, which are vaguely “part of some £36bn of planned investment”, three-quarters from the private sector, that “could support over 150,000 jobs”.

Well, maybe. No matter that the state-controlled Network Rail is already building the rail schemes as part of its five-year regulatory settlement – or that the Government might be best advised to keep quiet about the flood defences it’s only now getting around to building.

Not only that, exactly 200 more projects are due to complete this year, including Nottingham’s tram extension, Heathrow Terminal 2 and the Gwynt y Môr offshore wind farm – all started long before Cameron and Osborne came to power.

Convenient, because when you analyse the Government’s National Infrastructure Plan, otherwise known as a £375bn wish list of transport, energy, telecoms and social infrastructure projects, it doesn’t look pretty. The schools and road projects it’s now behind are many of those it canned when it first came to power. And while Labour can legitimately be blamed for leaving the public finances in a mess, that doesn’t excuse kicking a new runway into the long grass or waiting for the lights to go out to make crucial decisions on energy.

Neither is the Government far beyond the first £1bn towards its target of £20bn from the pension funds for infrastructure projects – not least because ministerial meddling and U-turns have created so much political risk. The only real achievement is the £40bn infrastructure guarantee scheme – but even that turned up far to late to help finance the job-creating projects badly needed during the downturn.

The Government has talked a good game on infrastructure, but it will take more than a motorway away-day to deliver results.

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