WITH regards to the letter headlined “The cost of privatisation” (Letters, February 28), it is certain that the £33 billion estimatedcost of the high-speed rail link will be much more than even doubled in reality.

The privatisation of British Rail was a shambles and was bound to be. The system should have been sold as a working organisation without splitting among those who wished to pick and choose the bits they fancied for profit. This was probably too costly for one, but a consortium of business might have been able to.

In any case, British Rail was subsidised yearly from the date it took over the bankrupt private concerns in 1948.

In every case these funds come from the same original source, since all of it is raised by the Government from the taxes, much of which is from those employed by private companies and the taxing of private companies, including the banking system.

Capitalism has always provided the private wealth, in the first place, for business which provides employment for all types of workers, most of whom pay taxes by one form or another.

Whichever party is attempting to run the country, they have access to the same funds originated by capitalism, but dispel them differently according to their leanings.

J Beisly, Osprey Close, York.