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HS2 is billions and billions to shave 23 minutes off the North West-London and North East - London routes, which are already fast and frequent. Transport links to a main hub benefit the hub economically far more than they benefit the spokes, so HS2 is mainly a boost for London anyway.
A more sensible use of the money would be a fast East - West line in the North, where you could make a huge difference in travel times and reliability with additional lines.
Even more, why not invest all the money in cheaper, more frequent local/city-scale public transport?
Admittedly there's no opening ceremony on a bus route, but easy, cheap transport from less well-off areas makes job opportunities for poorer folk, which means less spending on benefits, more tax intake and more spending in their local areas. Everyone wins except people who are already well off. Oh, wait, I think I've answered my own question.
I always saw HS2 as less about speed and more a about freeing up capacity on existing railways for regional, local and freight services. I see why they tout the high-speed part of it since it's a headline-grabber, but it's the first long-distance line that's we've had in, what, 100 years?
With regards to the East-West link: 100% agree. HS between Liverpool - Manchester - Bradford - Leeds with upgraded links to Hull, Sheffield, York and Newcastle, if you please. Chop-chop.
One other thing I like about buses you mentioned is that they can provide a very local service but they can also run grade-seperated like a metro service; there's a bus from Manchester to Leigh that runs semi-autonomously along a guideway for much of it's length but the buses can peel off the guideway when they want to wind through towns and villages.
Someone once told me that the Manchester tram system was one of the only ones that ran at a profit in the UK and that it was because it replaced a railway service and just upped the frequency, but that was years ago now and I see they've expanded it quite a lot since then.