Have You Been Misled?
Wot No Trams?
14th February, 2006
Following a Freedom of Information Act request BACIT have discovered a significant problem with the claims about cost increases on NET Phase Two made by Cllr Gordon Wheeler, the Chair of the Compton Acres Anti-Tram Group Environment Not Trams (ENT).
ENT have presented information on budget cost increases of the NET project from 2000 to 2005. They have sent these to various councillors, to a Parliamentary Committee. It has also appeared in the local press on a number of occasions. They state:-
"The cost of Phase Two has spiralled in five years from £77 million to £320 million" 1,2
This statement is not true.
It is clearly designed to make people question the costs and the scheme viability, by appearing to compare like with like, and lets not forget ENT have insulted City Councillors and the NET team at various points in a number of ways2.
However it appears ENTs cost claims are spurious and seriously misleading. The £77m figure comes from an outline scheme assessment report produced at a very early stage of the project in 2000, and is a basic route comparison cost.
The £77m cost does not include:
- the length of tram line from Beeston to Chilwell,
- any land costs and therefore any compensation/financial assistance.
- operational costs, government risk costs, PFI costs.
But more significantly
- Does not include any trams.
The later £320m figure is for the complete currently proposed scheme, therefore no true comparison can be drawn between these figures.
The report that included the £77m figure is explicit in what is left out of the estimate. So this begs the question.
What else have ENT got wrong or are misleading you on?
All we can say at this point is watch this space as there is more to come.
BACIT welcomes sensible debate about the tram, as a group BACIT was set up in 2002 to correct the many falsehoods and lies being spread about the proposed tram extensions (many of which are reported in the archive). It is a shame that such falsehoods are still being perpetuated despite 4 years of debate and the huge on-going success of line one.