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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Business
William Keegan

Work has stopped on HS2, but the Tories are still digging Britain into a hole

Two sleek streamlined express trains with yellow noses wait under a station canopy
High-speed Eurostar trains at London St Pancras waiting to travel to France via the Channel tunnel. No one now seriously questions the wisdom of having built HS1. Photograph: Amer Ghazzal/Rex/Shutterstock

One of the many whoppers to emerge from the recent Conservative party conference was Rishi Sunak’s claim that “our Brexit freedoms make us ever more competitive”.

When I was at school, “freedom” was used in the singular; but these days, as Cole Porter wrote, anything goes. There are promises of “freedoms” all over the place.

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