(11 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
17:00 - The House divided: - Ayes: 350 / Noes: 34 - Question accordingly agreed to.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I beg to move amendment 18, page 1, line 5, leave out ‘at least’.
Mr Speaker
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 12, page 1, line 10, leave out ‘and’.
Amendment 13, page 1, line 11, after ‘Manchester’, add
‘and one or more towns or cities in Scotland’.
Amendment 28 , page 1, line 11, at end insert ‘Scottish destinations’.
Amendment 14, page 1, line 12, at end insert
‘, and any newly constructed railway lines, roads, airports and light railways’.
Government amendment 17.
Amendment 19, page 1, line 12, at end insert—
‘(c) extends substantially no further than Phases One and Two of the High Speed 2 network connecting the places set out in section 1(2)(a).’.
Amendment 23, in clause 3, page 2, line 27, leave out
‘comes into force on the day on which it is passed’
and insert
‘shall not come into force until the Secretary of State has published detailed proposals for the Government’s preferred route directly connecting the network with Heathrow airport, has consulted with those residents, local authorities and businesses which may be affected by this connecting route and has published measures to mitigate and compensate for the social, economic and environmental impact, of the line.’.
Mrs Gillan
I welcome to the Front Bench the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill). This is his first outing and it is good to see him in his place. I welcome the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) to her place on the Opposition Front Bench. It is good to have some authentic northern voices speaking on this subject, albeit from the Front Bench, so we probably know exactly what they are going to say. May I also welcome my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) and, with your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, thank him for the courtesy he showed towards me during his time in office? This is a difficult subject for me and, I think, it has proved a difficult subject, from time to time, for him.
Amendments 18, 12 and 13 relate to the Government’s commitment to Scotland. I tabled them in Committee, because I felt it was important to have something in the Bill that registered the verbal intentions, expressed by Ministers and others, eventually to take High Speed 2, if it is ever built, through to Scotland. It is ironic, and slightly odd, that clause 3(1) extends the scope of the Bill to England, Wales and Scotland, given that there is no mention of HS2 going to Scotland.
If we have time, we will get on to the Barnett formula. Undoubtedly, there is precedent for the Government ensuring that Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland get their fair share of the infrastructure spend that is being spent exclusively in England, and I believe there is already such a precedent regarding the money for HS2, but will the Minister confirm that?
Mr Charles Walker (Broxbourne) (Con)
In drafting her amendments, did my right hon. Friend consider how to deliver extra passenger capacity to the east and west coast lines, but without the vast costs?
Mrs Gillan
My hon. Friend makes a good point. I am afraid that I do not have the resources to table an extensive list of amendments, and although I considered that, I dismissed it fairly rapidly. I just do not have the back-up and resource, on a project this large and complex, to keep up with the machinations of the Government, as they bring out 400 or 500 pages of information a couple of days before any crucial stage of the Bill—I am expecting the £50,000 environmental statement to arrive on our desks shortly.
Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith) (Lab/Co-op)
Obviously, I am as concerned as the right hon. Lady apparently is about high-speed links to Scotland, but is she seriously telling the House that if the Government were to announce that HS2 was going to Scotland, she would drop her opposition to it completely?
Mrs Gillan
No, not at all. I am not arguing that, but I have always been of the principle that if it is to be done, it is to be done properly. I am quite clear about my position—I do not want HS2 at all, but I also do not want a Bill to go through the House that does not reflect what I think the project should encompass, and indeed what the Bill itself states it encompasses.
Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)
Would the right hon. Lady not accept that, on the current plans for phase 1 and 2, there will be a 45-minute reduction in journey times to Edinburgh?
Mrs Gillan
The right hon. Gentleman makes a good point, but the Government recently produced the new business case, and I believe that there is doubt over the timing used for Edinburgh to London. I have been informed by a commentator that they failed to take into account the new rolling stock and the existing time savings from improvements being made to the line. I stand to be corrected—perhaps the Minister can tell us—but I believe that there has been an error in the calculation.
I would like the Bill to refer to Scotland, because it is important that a definite intent be put in the Bill. It would send a good message to Scotland, at a time when we are trying to keep this United Kingdom together, in the teeth of opposition from the nationalist parties, and I think it should be in the Bill simply for that reason.
Eric Ollerenshaw (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Con)
I sympathise with the spirit of my right hon. Friend’s amendments, and obviously many of us who support HS2 hope it will go through to Glasgow and Edinburgh and cannot understand why we do not start building from there now. But be that as it may, I am a bit worried because her amendment 18 would remove the “at least”. I read “at least” to mean that HS2 could stop at more stations. Were we to accept her amendment 18 and then her amendment 13, which would add the words
“and one or more towns or cities in Scotland”,
it would leave out everything between Manchester and Glasgow as a potential stop on a high-speed line to Glasgow. That is my understanding of her amendments.
Mrs Gillan
My amendments are intended to probe the Government’s intention. I believe that they should have made provision to include more stops on the line. For example, I would have thought that between Manchester and elsewhere, there could have been other stops giving greater benefit to some of the areas that will be destroyed by the line.
I tabled an amendment in Committee, and it must have struck a chord, because the official Opposition have tabled something very similar, and I am delighted to say that the Government, in an attempt to hug the Opposition closer, have now signed up to it and it has become a Government amendment. I congratulate the shadow Secretary of State on her victory. One of the major problems is with the connectivity of HS2. If it is not fully connected and integrated into our transport system, it will be the white elephant that so many of us believe it will be.
Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on tabling the amendment. It is not only the Opposition and the Government who need congratulating; she needs congratulating herself.
Mrs Gillan
That is most gratifying. I am glad that my hon. Friend has observed the first rule of politicians: one can never over-flatter another politician.
Connectivity is at the heart of some of the failures of this project. For example, it does not go to Heathrow; it does not connect properly with the channel tunnel rail link; indeed, it does not even go into the centres of the cities it is supposed to serve, whether Sheffield, Derby or Nottingham. All the time savings claimed by the Government come to nought if travellers have to make their way from outside the city centre, as I know will be the case for Sheffield. We need to ensure that if this is ever built, the connectivity is as good as it can be.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that HS1 has excellent connectivity with domestic services and that towns such as Folkestone and cities such as Canterbury have high-speed services even though they are not on the high-speed line?
Mrs Gillan
My hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale) is not in the Chamber, but I understand he feels that it is a work still in progress when it comes to bringing benefits to his constituency. I also gather, from studying the local economies around HS1, that there have been no additional benefits; indeed, there has possibly been some detraction from local economies.
Damian Collins
If my right hon. Friend looks at the unemployment statistics for east Kent, she will see that the rate is falling faster not only than the national average, but the average for the south-east of England, the most prosperous part of the country. The county council says it is impossible to talk of economic regeneration in east Kent without considering the benefits of HS1.
Mrs Gillan
I am very glad to hear that. I do not know how many years after the project this has become apparent. [Hon. Members: “Ten.”] Ten years; thank you.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
I want to reinforce something the right hon. Lady said about connectivity. A lot of people think that those of us who oppose HS2 are against connectivity and high-speed transportation. We are not. We want the right connectivity that will help all the towns and cities in this country to grow, but we do not want more of our country’s lifeblood being sucked down into London and the south.
Mrs Gillan
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. Of course, it echoed the words of Lord Mandelson, who really does know an awful lot about the genesis of this project. It certainly has that vampiric touch about it, as I think Members on both sides of the House can appreciate.
The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Patrick McLoughlin)
If HS2 is going to suck the lifeblood of the northern cities, as the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) suggests, why are the leaders of those northern cities, such as Sir Richard Leese and Albert Bore, the loudest demanders of this service?
Mrs Gillan
Oh simple, simple question, Secretary of State! What leader of any council of any political colour or persuasion would turn down the millions and millions of pounds being thrown at their areas? It would be completely stupid of them to do anything other than support it.
Mr Sheerman
The Secretary of State has commented following my intervention. I have talked to people in the big cities, and many of them have not read the six critical evaluations of the impact of HS2, and they certainly have not looked at the impact of high-speed rail on the provincial cities in France. It is sucking the lifeblood out of them and into the metropolitan area around Paris. We have also not been told on what grounds the local people here, who have not been given a referendum—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. The hon. Gentleman should know better. This is his second or third intervention. Let us try to keep the debate calm and orderly, with short interventions.
David Mowat
If it were true that better infrastructure for the north would suck the lifeblood out of the region, would it not be right to close the M6? Perhaps that strategy would make the north really prosperous.
Dan Byles (North Warwickshire) (Con)
I would like to draw the House’s attention to the Transport Committee’s detailed report on high-speed rail. It stated that
“only time will tell whether or not HS2 will, for example, help to rebalance the economy and reduce the north-south divide.”
It is a £50 billion project, yet we are told that “only time will tell” whether it will achieve its main aim.
Mrs Gillan
I am not going to take any more interventions. I want to make sure that other colleagues are able to speak on this group of amendments, and as there are no knives, the longer we take on this group, the less time we will have for other important groups that deal with the economics of the railway line and with compensation.
Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)
Will the right hon. Lady give way?
Mrs Ellman
I thank the right hon. Lady for giving way. Will she point out to the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Dan Byles) that the Select Committee was very clear that High Speed 2 was the only way in which the necessary increased capacity could be obtained, and that in discussing the economic benefits, we also stated that economic development strategies were required to go with the provision of that extra capacity?
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention.
A lot of people are saying that there is no alternative to HS2 if we are to solve the capacity problems, when in fact a large number of alternatives are emerging from numerous sources. Suggestions have been made by economic think-tanks and transport economists, including a recent proposal to revive the old grand central line. I fought against an ill-conceived plan to run freight on that line in the early 1990s when I was first elected to the House. That plan did not stack up economically, and we saw it off.
Amendment 19 would narrow the scope of the Bill, which, as currently drafted, could extend to all railway operations. I do not know whether it was the intention to cover not only HS2 but all other railway operations, but the drafting seems to be a bit sloppy. If the provisions are not confined to HS2, it will make a mockery of any limits placed on the costs that the taxpayer will have to face. The amendment attempts to limit this money Bill, and to limit the expenditure to HS2, in line with what I believe the Government intended. If the provision were to include Scotland, that would round up the whole package.
Mrs Ellman
I rise to support amendment 17. I am a firm supporter of High Speed 2. The case for it is essentially one of capacity. It is entirely wrong to state, as some commentators have done recently, that the argument for capacity is something new that has been brought in only at this stage. That is simply not so. The report that the Transport Select Committee produced two years ago made it clear that the need for increased capacity formed the basis of the case for HS2.
Amendment 17 deals with linking HS2 to the rest of the transport network. It specifically mentions the need for it to link to roads and airports. It is important that it should not be seen as a development that is separate from the rest of the rail network or indeed from the rest of the transport network. I therefore welcome the amendment. It is unfortunate that, because no decision has been taken on the need for increased airport capacity in the south-east, no firm proposals on Heathrow have been finalised. That matter needs urgent attention. There is also an issue about freight. In Liverpool, for example, the expansion of the port is creating a need for more freight paths and better access for freight. That, too, needs attention. I welcome the amendment in that it draws attention to networks and connectivity.
Stephen Barclay (North East Cambridgeshire) (Con)
In speaking to amendment 17, the hon. Lady is, in essence, setting out an early case for design changes. Can she confirm that the existing contingency in the spending envelope does not include provision for any such changes?
Mrs Ellman
The hon. Gentleman needs to direct such questions to HS2 itself. It is extremely important that all the financial aspects are fully considered. This specific amendment is to do with networks. The question of access to the high-speed network is critical, and that involves roads as well as other rail tracks.
The case for HS2 is also based on increased economic benefit to the areas in which the railway stations are located, as well as the surrounding areas and the regions that they serve. The issue of freed capacity on the west coast main line as a result of phase 1, and on the east coast and midland main lines following phase 2, is critical. The strategic review states that there will be a £3 billion benefit from the use of freed capacity, and Network Rail has stated that more than 100 cities and towns could benefit.
James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)
Those benefits will be crucial to areas such as Birmingham and the west midlands. One of the advantages of HS2 to the west midlands will be that it will free up capacity on the west coast main line and improve connectivity to regions such as the black country, part of which I represent.
Mrs Ellman
Indeed; the hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct. We must not look simply at the HS2 line itself; we must also consider how its connectivity to other lines and other parts of the transport network can be developed.
Dan Byles
If the principal benefit is now capacity rather than speed—this seems very much how the argument has moved—why not slow it down? If it is slowed down, we will no longer have the engineers I sit down with every week telling me, “We can’t go around Water Orton primary school because speed means it must be a straight line; we can’t go around ancient bluebell woods because speed means it must be a straight line.” If we slow it down, we will be able to avoid going over many of the sensitive areas on the route and perhaps even put in more stations.
Mrs Ellman
The strategic review and other studies indicate that alternatives have been looked at and rejected. Network Rail states that more than 100 cities and towns could benefit from this development. Named in the various reports are places including Watford, Milton Keynes, Rugby and Northampton, but many more are possible. There is also a need to increase capacity for freight, which is as important as passengers. About 20 new freight paths can be developed, but I would view that as the absolute minimum.
Mrs Gillan
I hear what the hon. Lady says about freight. How does she react to what Lord Berkeley said? He heads up the Rail Freight group and said that HS2 will in fact constrain freight because it does not link up properly with the existing network on the west coast main line and its northern end in phases 1 and 2? He should know, should he not?
Mrs Ellman
Lord Berkeley was pointing out issues of practical difficulty, but they can be worked on. Indeed, the purpose of this debate and subsequent debates is to identify where the problems are and to do something about them. No plans are finalised. We are talking about principles and strategies. It is essential to look at critical detail and to make changes where they are necessary. Debates such as this one are an integral part of that important process.
Mr Sheerman
I have great admiration for my hon. Friend as Chair of the Select Committee, but she knows the Department for Transport better than most people, and we have had from it a catalogue of confusion and chaos over the west coast franchise and now over the planning for HS2, as it has changed the priorities, rules and bases of all the assumptions. Is she confident that this HS2 project has been thoroughly prepared and that the grounds for it are absolutely perfect?
Mrs Ellman
It is essential to apply the necessary commercial expertise to this scheme—whether it be directly in the Department for Transport or in HS2 itself. I am encouraged by the new appointment of Sir David Higgins to lead this process. I think that will give people increased confidence, which is indeed necessary.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
If the hon. Lady is so convinced of the business case, will she explain why the Government are now on the fifth revision of the business case for HS2? Does she think this will be the last revision, or will there be another 25 over the next 25 years to justify the case? I simply cannot believe it: it is amazing that the project has gone up by £10 billion and the Government have now managed to find £10 billion-worth of supposed benefits. I put it to the hon. Lady that this is the biggest work of fiction since Enid Blyton.
Mrs Ellman
It is for Ministers to say why the business case has been reviewed so many times, but when the Transport Select Committee looked at the issue two years ago, it approved a high-speed line, but pointed to a number of critical areas where it was felt more work should be done, which included looking again at the business case. One reason for that was the valuation put on the time people spent travelling, when it was alleged they could not work. We thought that that was not a correct valuation and that it should be looked at again. We raised issues of environmental concern and said they should be looked at again, as we did with issues relating to economic impact, particularly the need to have economic development strategies as well as the essential rail travel links.
The Select Committee called for a review of the case, looking at those specific factors and stressing the importance of relevant and up-to-date information. We thought it would be absolutely wrong to use information that was not up to date and that ignored the concerns we had raised. The report supported the project in principle, but raised real concerns, which we said must be addressed before any final decision could be taken. Not all of those concerns have yet been addressed, but some of them have been, as we have discussed today.
Mr Sheerman
On that very point, my hon. Friend’s very good report was two years ago and since then many people have used it to do the very thing she asked to be done. The subsequent reports built on her report, however, show a very different picture. Is that not the problem?
Mrs Ellman
I do not know to which reports my hon. Friend refers, but there have been no comprehensive reports looking at the whole scheme. Some have looked at some aspects of it, but not at the up-to-date information, which was published only this week. I am not aware of any reports that have looked at that. I am sure that the Transport Committee will look again at the information, as we have it.
Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the business case is not just about the financial case? Public transport is a public service, so we need to look at the need to run trains throughout the country. We should not be looking only at pound signs, but at the overall need for this service.
Mrs Ellman
I agree with my hon. Friend’s general point. It is important to assess individual aspects of the project, but we also need to look at the concept and what it is trying to achieve. It is about expanding essential infrastructure in this country. If we do not have vision and if we are not prepared to look ahead at the nation’s needs, we will lack the essential infrastructure needed for economic prosperity. It is essential, too, to look at the detail, which is why we called for a review of the cost-benefit ratio, for a review of the environmental and economic factors and for up-to-date information on the projections of capacity, for freight as well as passengers. The concept must not be lost in the vital necessity to look at the individual components and make an assessment of them.
Mr Roger Godsiff (Birmingham, Hall Green) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is surely aware of the National Audit Office report on this subject, which referred to
“fragile numbers, out-of-date data and assumptions that do not reflect real life.”
What does she say to that?
Mrs Ellman
The strategic review produced this week provides the up-to-date information. When the previous reports, including the NAO report, were produced, that information was not available. It is necessary to examine the new information that has come forward and look at it very carefully indeed—and that is the up-to-date information. As I say, previous reports did not look at it.
Andrew Bridgen
The hon. Lady talks about looking at the detail, so let us look at the facts. This project started out at £20 billion; it has hit £50 billion; the Treasury is working on £73 billion—and it was all priced in 2011 money, with indexation of 3% on top of it. Is it going to go the same way as HS1, which started at £1.5 billion and finished up at £11 billion?
Mrs Ellman
Again, I think it is for the Minister to answer those questions. This specific amendment deals with networks. The hon. Gentleman raises an important issue about the costs and the contingencies and how they will be put together, but that is a matter for the Minister and for broader debate than for discussion on this specific amendment.
Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)
When the Transport Select Committee went to France to look at the economic impact of high-speed rail, we found that there was a huge economic benefit in Lille and most other cities. The fact is that the Department for Transport assessments do not capture that economic benefit. Talking about people working on trains really misses the point about the economic impact and the economic benefit that will come from high-speed rail. Does my hon. Friend agree?
Mrs Ellman
I do agree. When the members of the Select Committee went to France and elsewhere in Europe to look at high-speed rail there, we were struck by the success of the system and by the enthusiasm with which it was greeted by people living in the areas that it served. Indeed, what struck us was they wanted more: more stops, more stations, more access to high-speed rail. That made a considerable impact on us.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady think that the Spanish economy has benefited from Spain’s investment in high-speed rail?
Mrs Ellman
I am here to talk about the United Kingdom and an amendment concerning networks.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady agree with the comments of the hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer), which appeared in the Evening Standard yesterday? He said:
“The leadership have completely misjudged the mood both of the Parliamentary Labour Party and the party in the whole of the country.”
Mrs Ellman
I am a firm supporter of High Speed 2. I believe that it will increase capacity and create the infrastructure that is essential for the future of the nation.
Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)
Rail infrastructure in Spain has been mentioned. Studies show that the economies of both Seville and Madrid have benefited from a high-speed line, although only Seville was expected to benefit.
Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)
I am sure that the Select Committee is aware of a contrasting example, namely the line between Le Mans and Tours. Le Mans invested in a local connection to the TGV route, and saw a tenfold increase in economic benefit compared with Tours, which had failed to do so. That underlines the importance of local connectivity.
Mrs Ellman
The right hon. Lady has drawn attention to the importance of connectivity and the importance of using the opportunities offered by high-speed rail to bring benefit to areas that are not on the line. That is an essential component. In the regions, a great deal of work has been done to assess what the benefit might be. Centro estimates that there will be an additional 22,000 jobs in the west midlands, while the Core Cities Group expects an additional 400,000.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
My hon. Friend speaks of the economic benefits for the midlands. Cities such as Coventry will certainly not benefit from this investment; indeed, the opposite will be the case.
Mrs Ellman
I think it essential for HS2 to think about how it can assist areas that do not look as though they will benefit, such as Coventry. The current process—not just today’s debate, but the consultations that are taking place and the progress of the hybrid Bill—enables important points to be raised, such as the one raised just now by my hon. Friend. I am fully sympathetic to that.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
I am sure that my hon. Friend is aware of the tram-train pilot scheme which will begin in Sheffield in 2015, and which may lead to an excellent opportunity for trams to use under-utilised heavy rail track to connect wider city regions through high-speed rail stations. Will my hon. Friend encourage the Government to carry out a review? Indeed, the Select Committee itself might wish to look into the matter.
Mrs Ellman
That is an example of the kind of development that should be supported.
What concerns me is not that the principle of high-speed rail is not recognised—indeed, it is clear from what has been said by Members today that the importance of connectivity, in general and in relation to specific areas, is very well understood—but the possibility that it is not being pursued strongly enough at the national level to guarantee its consistent application throughout the country.
I referred earlier to initiatives taken in the west midlands and to statements made by the Core Cities Group, and I know that a great deal of work is being done in Manchester, but I am not sure that that is happening everywhere in the country, and I think it important for someone to take the lead. Of course work must be done in the regions. Elected Members and local businesses know their areas and are aware of the opportunities and the potential, but someone should be ensuring that the same is happening nationally, so that we do not miss out on the vital and perhaps unique opportunity to develop our network for the benefit of localities, regions, and indeed the country as a whole.
Mr Sheerman
When my hon. Friend’s Committee was considering HS2, she will have been made aware of the likely cost, which is estimated to be at least £80 billion. Should not the people who will be affected be allowed a vote? I agree with her about the northern hub, of which I am in favour, but if my local people had a vote, would they vote for all that money to be invested in this high-speed train? I do not think so.
Mrs Ellman
I do not accept the figure that my hon. Friend has given, but the people do, in fact, have a vote. They have a vote with which they can elect a Government by voting in Members of Parliament, and they have a vote with which they can elect members of local authorities—and I note that the leaders of the major local authorities in the north are speaking very loudly indeed in favour of this project.
Karen Lumley (Redditch) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady agree that we should commend Labour-controlled and Conservative-controlled Worcestershire—my own authority —for their foresight in predicting the benefits of HS2?
Mrs Ellman
I do agree. I think that that is an excellent example of what could be done. However, I want to be sure that such examples are being followed up nationally.
Frank Dobson (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
Let us assume that the Government’s £50 billion estimate is correct. That investment is expected to bring the greatest benefits to Birmingham, Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds and Manchester: five cities. Does my hon. Friend think that if the £50 billion were broken up into nuggets of £10 billion, and if each city were offered that amount to promote its local economy, the five of them would decide to club together to pay for a high-speed rail link? [Laughter.]
Mrs Ellman
The whole point of major infrastructure is that it makes a major difference in connectivity across the country, which benefits all parts of the country. If that benefit is fragmented, it will not accrue.
I certainly support economic development in the regions, and I deplore the abolition of the regional development agencies, but I hope that the local enterprise partnerships—alone, working together, or working in transport cores—will ensure that economic benefit comes to their areas, and that the Government provide the support that will enable that effort to be private sector-led and succeed.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
Obviously we are talking about a lot of money, but if it is true that the rail capacity of the three main north-south lines will be exhausted within about 15 years, what impact does my hon. Friend expect that to have on the economies of the cities north of London?
Mrs Ellman
My hon. Friend has made a crucial point, which goes to the nub of the matter. If those lines run out of capacity—which, indeed, they are rapidly doing—a grave blow will be dealt to the economies in the northern regions, in terms of passengers and freight. One of the reasons more freight cannot travel by rail now is the fact that no freight lines are available. High Speed 2 will solve that problem.
Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)
A railway line is for many decades, not just for the immediate future. When considering the whole issue of connectivity and networks, did the Committee think about the implications of a longer time scale rather than some of the much shorter ones that people are currently discussing?
Mrs Ellman
The Committee was very clear about the fact that this is about the future, and about long-term thinking. I strongly believe that while it is always essential to scrutinise spending, it is also essential to have vision. If we do not have vision, we do not have a future. I note that the aim of Lord Deighton’s taskforce is to maximise the economic benefit that can result from High Speed 2, but I am not sure whether that includes expanding connectivity and making the maximum use of freed lines, as well as more economic development issues. I ask the Minister to give us a response at the relevant time as to who, if anybody, is in charge of expanding connectivity and the opportunities offered by HS2 so the maximum economic benefit can be realised. HS2 is needed for capacity reasons, and it produces major economic development opportunities for most parts of the country, but they must be grasped, and unless somebody is in charge of making sure that happens, they will be squandered.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Robert Goodwill)
Of the amendments in this group, I was delighted to be able to add my name to amendment 17 tabled by the Labour Front-Bench team. That demonstrates the cross-party support and co-operation we will need to deliver this project, which is so vital to the future of our country. Indeed, when I offered to add my name, I was asked, “Would you like to go on first, Minister?” I said, “No, no; I wouldn’t want people to get the wrong idea.” Our intention has always been for this landmark project to be part of a truly connected and integrated transport system, and the amendment would ensure that any preparatory work needed to integrate HS2 with the rest of our transport infrastructure can be funded using the Bill’s expenditure powers.
Phases 1 and 2 of HS2 will directly link eight of Britain’s 10 largest cities, serving one in five of the UK population. HS2 will also connect to the existing rail network, so as soon as phase 1 is built, high-speed rail trains can start directly serving 28 cities in the UK.
I welcome the reference to “footpaths” and “cycleways” in amendment 17 tabled by the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh), and I should point out that as part of the Government’s wider commitments to boosting cycling in the UK, in August 2013 the Prime Minister announced the commissioning of a feasibility study to explore how we might create a new cycleway that broadly follows the proposed HS2 corridor. Such routes would also be open to pedestrians—presumably this is a case of great minds thinking alike. The cycleway could provide cycling and walking routes for the public to enjoy, linking local communities and stations to the countryside and tourist destinations along the way, and benefiting those living along the HS2 route.
HS2 will be at the centre of an unprecedented level of investment in the nation’s transport infrastructure. From 2015-16 to 2020-21 the Government have committed £56 billion-worth of investment in road and rail, on top of the £16.5 billion investment in HS2. We are investing more than £6 billion in this Parliament and £12 billion in the next on road maintenance, enough to resurface 80% of the national road network and fill 19 million potholes each year.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful to the Minister for confirming the billions of pounds the Department for Transport is going to spend over the next five or six years, but how does he respond to the National Audit Office, which has highlighted serious doubts over the ability and capacity of both the Department for Transport and its subsidiary company, HS2 Ltd, to deliver the project successfully? He is now claiming to have one of the largest infrastructure budgets of any Government Department, but the NAO does not think the Department is fit to run it.
Mr Goodwill
The Department has gained a lot of experience in managing big projects from projects such as Crossrail. Following the appointment of Sir David Higgins to head HS2 from January onwards I feel very confident indeed that we can deliver this project on budget and on time. Indeed, the budget is about £50 billion. Therefore, if rolling stock were excluded and nothing else was done with the Department’s budget, this project would be the equivalent of about 10 months of the Department’s total budget. That puts it into context.
We are adding 400 miles of capacity to our busiest motorways thanks to work scheduled in this Parliament and the next, and between 2014 and 2019 Network Rail has put forward plans to spend £37.5 billion on improvements to the railways. We are clearly not putting all our eggs in the HS2 basket, therefore—far from it, in fact.
HS2 will be integrated with the nation’s airports, with direct services to Manchester and Birmingham airports and a short connection to East Midlands airport from the east midlands hub station.
Mr Sheerman
What the Minister has just said is rather confusing, because the Howard Davies inquiry has not yet reported. We can get very lovey-dovey about HS2 in some regards, but there has been no love lost on the London airports question. When are we going to make up our minds about London airports, let alone the rail service to feed them?
Mr Goodwill
The timetable for the Davies commission report is well known, and there will be an interim report in December. Whether or not we put the spur in from HS2 down to Heathrow, in the plans we have published there is already a connection through Old Oak common; there will be an 11-minute connection to Heathrow via the Crossrail service with up to eight services an hour. So Heathrow will have a connection whether or not we embark on the spur.
Karen Lumley
Does my hon. Friend agree, however, that a 38-minute journey time makes it easy to get from London to Birmingham international airport, which means that people in north London would not need to go to Heathrow?
Mr Goodwill
Indeed, that will increase choice for people who have the unfortunate experience in life of having to live in the south-east of England. It will give them more opportunities to visit the north and use airports up and down the country.
We need to ensure that we maximise the cumulative benefit of individual investments by ensuring they are all properly connected. I have to say that amendments 18 and 19 in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) slightly confuse me. Amendment 19 seeks to limit expenditure to projects under phases 1 and 2 of the Bill, which finishes in Leeds and Manchester, but amendment 18 says that there should be more connectivity in Scotland. There is a degree of contradiction in those two amendments.
David Mowat
My hon. Friend has just said that phase 2 finishes in Manchester, which indeed it does as far as the business case and the benefits statement KPMG produced are concerned, yet under phase 2 we are building a 40 km spur north of Manchester. I wonder about the logic of that, since there is a £1 billion cost with no benefit. Is that an under-run that the Minister could book at this point?
Mr Goodwill
The trains do not stop at Manchester and Leeds; they keep going. In terms of the connectivity of this new system, it is important that we take traffic away from the existing rail network and allow more freight and passenger services so as to address the problem of the 5,000 people every weekday morning who are standing as they arrive at New Street in Birmingham. To address that problem we need to ensure we have the connectivity.
Limiting this legislation to a particular phase, or to particular phases, would simply mean that a further Bill would be required to be placed before Parliament to prepare for any potential future phase.
On Scotland, I would simply say that officials from the Scottish Government made clear during this Bill’s Committee stage that they are content with the Bill as it is, and see no need for the naming of any locations in Scotland. The critical point is that the network is defined as “at least” including the named locations in the Bill. Therefore, not including locations in Scotland will not be a barrier to high-speed rail extending there at some point in the future. The locations named are limited to those which have been named in public consultation documents issued by the Department.
Again I must stress that while some rolling stock will run exclusively on the high-speed network, so-called classic compatible gauge trains will run through to Glasgow and Edinburgh. These new trains are part of the £7.5 billion rolling stock investment in the project and their arrival in Scottish cities will demonstrate how HS2 will benefit Scotland at an early stage.
Mr MacNeil
Can the Minister confirm that once this rolling stock reaches Edinburgh it can go further north up to Aberdeen and cities in between?
Mr Goodwill
That will be for the railway companies to decide; it will be up to them to decide how best to utilise this stock. Obviously, the rolling stock will be rolled out as it is produced, but having trains arriving in Glasgow and Edinburgh at that early stage of the project will make a major contribution to helping to keep our kingdom united.
Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)
I wish to begin by welcoming the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill) to his place. I know that he has a strong personal interest in transport issues. Although I am sure we will disagree on many issues, I am glad that we have been able to reach agreement on a number of today’s amendments, and I look forward to our future debates.
Amendment 17 has its origins in the Bill’s Committee stage. Members on both sides of the House contributed to its development, after my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) moved an amendment requiring integration with other modes of transport. The Minister at the time, the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), who is in his place, said that he was minded to accept it. We want people to have a real choice about how to travel, be it by rail, by car, on a bicycle or by walking. We especially want to make sure that active travel is an attractive option, because it has many huge benefits, including for health and tackling congestion. We want that to be encouraged, so we welcomed the move to have better integration. We warned, however, that any amendment should pay regard to walking, cycling and light railways, so I am pleased that those concerns have been addressed by this sensibly worded addition to the Bill—of course I would say that, because it stands partly in my name.
Light rail will play an important role in linking stations in Birmingham, the east midlands and Sheffield to the high-speed network. The importance of making conventional rail accessible to pedestrians and cyclists is now recognised across the country; we have seen increasingly that railways stations have been adapted in that respect. It is right to enshrine that objective in the legislation for HS2. It is a real achievement that both cycling and walking will now be acknowledged in the Bill on the same basis as other modes of travel. We need to acknowledge that when people make a journey they regard it as starting when they close their front door. Making that whole journey as seamless as possible—not just the train bit, but how they get to the railway station and how they progress at the end—is vital. We therefore welcome the approach that has been taken.
Amendment 17 is a good example of a Bill being improved through parliamentary scrutiny. Integration between high-speed rail and the conventional rail network will benefit communities far beyond the areas directly served, and we want to make sure that HS2 is fully accessible to everyone, irrespective of their mode of travel. I am happy to commend the amendment to the House.
Mr Sheerman
Given some predictions of the level of fare that might be charged on HS2, many people think it will be exclusively for very well-off business people and that ordinary people will not be able to use it.
Lilian Greenwood
I thank my hon. Friend for that. He is right to say that we cannot afford the new high-speed rail line to become a “rich man’s toy”, as a former Secretary of State put it. Clearly the new network must be available to everyone, and I am sure the Minister will confirm the view that the fares will be no greater than they are on the current network.
Mr Jim Cunningham
Has my hon. Friend taken into consideration the frequency of the trains on the west coast main line and what effects this new project will have on that?
Lilian Greenwood
The whole point of the project is to provide extra capacity, including on the west coast main line. Obviously, the detail of what timetables will be in place needs to be worked out, but we would hope that they will be able to provide additional services to many cities, including my hon. Friend’s city, and we will call for that.
Mr Goodwill
There will certainly be very good news for people in Shrewsbury and Blackpool, where operators are keen to provide services but cannot currently do so because of congestion on the existing network.
Lilian Greenwood
The Minister rightly talks about the capacity constraints we already face on the west coast main line, and it is vital that everyone in the country is consulted on how the additional capacity is used when it is created by the high-speed line.
Mark Pawsey
The hon. Lady has moved on to the question of capacity on the west coast main line. Does she accept that the heavy growth that took place on that line occurred immediately after the upgrade in 2008, and that since that upgrade the rates of increase have slowed tremendously and that, therefore, there could be additional capacity on the existing line? Does she also accept that we can create more capacity by having longer carriages, and by changing the mix between first and second class?
Lilian Greenwood
It is well known that on the west coast main line the additional capacity created by the upgrade is already starting to run out and that the line will be full. Of course we can create additional capacity on a train by converting some carriages from first class to standard class, but that does not create extra space on the line for additional trains. As the Minister acknowledged, places such as Shrewsbury and Blackpool want to have an additional direct service but cannot because the capacity is just not available. I am sure that the hon. Member for Rugby (Mark Pawsey) would like to have directed his question to the Minister.
Andrew Bridgen
Under freedom of information requests, we have discovered that the average spare capacity on the west coast main line is currently 40% and that demand at peak time actually increased by only 0.9% last year?
Lilian Greenwood
I am not sure why the hon. Gentleman did not address that to the Minister who is responsible for the railway. I feel like I have been given entire responsibility for it, although I would be happy if we swapped places. The point is that the capacity is not available at the times when people want to travel—at peak times—and that there is insufficient capacity for additional services and for freight, which is also vital.
Mrs Gillan
Some people who study this subject and take issue with the Government’s claims about capacity on the west coast main line say that much of that capacity could be improved by allowing Virgin Trains passengers in peak hours to get off at Milton Keynes—that currently does not happen. What is the hon. Lady’s opinion of that? What studies has she made of how that could relieve capacity problems in the future?
Lilian Greenwood
I am sure that many people who want to go to the north would not, for a minute, wish to get off at Milton Keynes. The fact is that there simply is not enough capacity. I am sure that people who live in Milton Keynes are looking forward to the extra capacity created by HS2 and the possibility of additional services, particularly for commuters, that that will free up on the west coast main line.
Let me now deal with the amendments relating to the links to Scotland. Labour has always supported the principle of bringing high-speed rail to Scotland, which is why the previous Labour Government set up HS2 Ltd to examine possible routes to Scotland. HS2 will bring real benefits, enabling faster journey times and adding to capacity on the main line routes to Scotland. We wanted to put those benefits in the Bill in Committee, but we were told by Transport Scotland that the Scottish Government opposed altering the Bill. It was therefore somewhat curious to see the Scottish National party tabling such amendments.
One purpose of the Bill is to provide a legal basis for future extensions of the high-speed network, providing that the economic case can be made for them. With the Government failing to keep the costs under control, we need to focus today on the HS2 network as planned. I would be interested to hear what work the Government are doing on the costs and benefits of extending the line. We have seen reports in the media that the Government are going to launch a feasibility study into extending the line to Scotland. I do not know whether the Minister would like to take this opportunity to intervene to confirm that and explain the timetable for the study.
Mr Goodwill
I always think it is a good idea not to try to run before we can walk; let us get to Birmingham and Manchester first. I am sure that we will be looking at extensions, but they are not at the top of my to-do list at the moment.
Lilian Greenwood
I thank the Minister for his response; clearly the media reports are wrong. It is ironic that the SNP should be proposing to take this line to Scotland, given that the one thing we can guarantee is that the SNP plans for separation would make the possibility of a high-speed line across the UK even less likely.
Mark Lazarowicz
One can excuse the Minister for not having this at the top of his to-do list only because he is new in his job. I have asked similar questions of previous Ministers over the past few months, so may I suggest to my hon. Friend that if it is not at the top of a Minister’s to-do list now, it should be pretty soon and that the Minister should be giving details of this study in the near future?
Lilian Greenwood
My hon. Friend is right. We will continue to press the Minister on the issue in the months ahead.
Mr MacNeil
The hon. Lady has made the same catastrophic mistake as the Minister in thinking that a transport project is the same as a political governance project. If that were true, High Speed 1 could have been construed by the Eurosceptics on the Government Benches as part of some major European integration project, and the high-speed line that is going through the Baltic countries up to Helsinki would be seen as some nation-unification project. It is not; it is a transport project. I encourage the hon. Lady not to make the same daft mistake as the Minister made earlier.
Lilian Greenwood
I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we will not be making any of the same mistakes as the Minister.
Finally, I take the opportunity to comment on amendment 23 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell). He has rightly introduced this amendment to advance his constituency and the interests of the people living there, but I am concerned that we would be straying into territory that is covered by the Davies commission. The Labour Front-Bench team share the frustration of those who want to see from the commission an earlier resolution of the issue of airport capacity. It was we who called for those cross-party talks, to which the Government somewhat belatedly agreed. Nevertheless, we are bound into the process and there can be no justification for delaying preparation work on this important project until after the election, when that commission is due to report.
We want to see the new high-speed line built without further delay. The whole country can benefit from the improved capacity and connectivity that it will bring. I am happy to see it fully integrated into the wider network and to support amendment 17.
Mr Simon Burns (Chelmsford) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood). I confirm that I will support amendment 17. As she rightly said, it resulted from an idea put forward by the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mrs Spelman). If we are to have an integrated transport system, it is crucial that we do not link just high speed rail to the conventional lines, but take into account all the other forms of transportation to help people get from A to B.
It is particular pleasure to see the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), in his place and leading on the issue. It is an important issue and I know that he will do well on it, ably supported by officials at both the Department for Transport and High Speed 2.
I support amendment 17 and oppose amendment 18 and the amendments that flow from it. In many ways I have a feeling of déjà vu, because we had copious debates in Committee on the matter, and I never quite understood why so many people got certain parts of their apparel in such knots over the issue. It is clear from clause 1(2) that the Bill applies to
“railway lines connecting at least—
London,
Birmingham,
the East Midlands”
and so on. The whole point of the Bill and the purpose of getting it on to the statute book is to provide financing not of an actual project, but of the preparations for the project ad infinitum, because High Speed 2 need not necessarily stop at Leeds or Manchester. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport made that plain in October last year, when he announced that he was going to set up an inquiry into the feasibility of a third phase to Scotland.
The Bill will allow the expenditure of money for the preparation of not only phases 1 and 2, but potentially phase 3, if there is one, a spur to south Wales, if a business case were made that it was needed, to the south-west or—a possibility closer, I suspect, to the heart of the distinguished Chair of the Transport Committee, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman)—all the way into Liverpool. The Bill grants the Government permission to spend the money on those preparations.
The thought that there will not be full and proper consideration of the continuation of the project to Scotland at some point is bizarre. It is an obvious part of a viable rail network along the spine of the country for it to continue in time to Glasgow, Edinburgh and potentially—depending on the wishes of Government and the business case at the time—beyond that. That is what the Bill does.
Mrs Gillan
I am sorry that my right hon. Friend observed members of the Committee getting parts of their apparel in a twist. As I was not a member of the Committee, it obviously was not mine. He has outlined what so many critics beyond this place say of the Bill—that it is a blank cheque. Can he confirm that it is an open-ended financial commitment to spend any sum of money on any part of any preparation for any railway network anywhere in the country—the blank cheque that everybody dreads?
Mr Burns
My right hon. Friend is right—she was not on the Committee. It seemed as though she was, because she was in the Public Gallery the whole time, assiduously following our deliberations. I think I am right in saying, from memory, that we discussed a number of amendments that she tabled for that Committee which were moved by members of the Committee.
My right hon. Friend advances an argument, but repeating it does not mean it becomes more accurate. That argument is that the project has a blank cheque. It does not have a blank cheque. It is not a machine for printing money. There are very tight financial procedures in place to ensure that it does not exceed budget.
Before anyone asks how that can be considered a viable proposition, one should look at Crossrail, the largest engineering project in Europe at present, a multi-billion pound project. Owing to tight financial controls, it is on time and on budget, and I have every confidence that, with the mechanisms that have been put in place, that will be the case with HS2. I see figures quoted about what the project will cost which are from Alice in Wonderland. The cost is £42.6 billion, but that sum includes £14.4 billion of contingency funding, of which the vast majority, I am confident, will not be spent.
Damian Collins
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. Does he agree that there is a myth in this country that we cannot do big projects? Look at the success of Crossrail and the High Speed 1 line and compare that with the west coast main line upgrade, the kind of incremental project that some Members are keen on, which was four years late and 240% over budget.
Mr Burns
My hon. Friend makes an extremely valid point. I was particularly interested to hear his views in the debate because he is a Kent MP. When I first came into the House 26 and a half years ago, in one of the first Adjournment debates I ever sat in and listened to—I confess that I have not listened to many since, except those that I have taken part in—two of my hon. Friends made a vigorous case that, if High Speed 1 went ahead, it would turn the garden of England into the garbage can of England, destroy house prices, ruin the economy of Kent and end the world as we knew it. High Speed 1 went ahead and Kent’s economy has been regenerated and improved. House prices have not gone through the floor; in fact, house prices along the line of route have kept pace with those in other areas. In some cases, they have increased beyond them because of the houses’ proximity to good commuter links. Capacity has increased, particularly for those commuters who are prepared to use High Speed 1 from Canterbury, for example, to London.
The supreme irony is that one town in Kent, Maidstone, successfully lobbied not to have a station—it was put at Ebbsfleet instead—and people are now begging for a station at Maidstone because they are missing out on the regeneration and improvements to the economy that are taking place in Ashford and Ebbsfleet. The other irony—my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) should listen carefully to this, because I know she is a lady with an open mind and strong views—is that Kent county council, along with hon. Members of this House, led the opposition to High Speed 1 in the late ’80s but is now a strong supporter of the high-speed railway because of the benefits it has brought to the community and the county. The leaders and officials of Kent county council have offered to go and talk to the leaders of Buckinghamshire county council, Warwickshire county council and Staffordshire county council to explain that in their experience the railway did not destroy their communities or environment but actually greatly enhanced them. Unfortunately, there is certainly one county council that does not seem to have the wish or the will to hear the facts or the benefits that high-speed rail could bring.
Mr Burns
I will not give way, for the simple reason that many of my hon. Friends and many Opposition Members want to take part in the debate—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) speaks from a sedentary position. I think it is fair to say that we have had many interventions from him today, so perhaps there might be a chance for someone else to have a turn.
The country needs this project because of all the important arguments: the greater connectivity; the fact that it is an engine for growth; the regeneration along the line of route; and, most importantly, the fact that it will deal with the capacity issue. I think that when High Speed 2 was announced in late 2008 and into 2009, little thought was given to its name. Those who took the decisions immediately called it High Speed 2, as they already had High Speed 1. Unfortunately, it is a misnomer that has, in some ways, led us up a cul-de-sac.
Of course, faster journey times are important, but they are not the most important thing. The most important thing is capacity. As I have said before, to echo what Tony Blair said in a different context, it is about capacity, capacity, capacity. The west coast main line will be full by 2024. We need capacity on the conventional railway for those who want to travel between London, Birmingham and Manchester but do not want to go along the whole route, and we need capacity to get even more freight off our congested roads and on to the railways.
Dan Byles
My right hon. Friend and I had many discussions on this issue during his time as a Transport Minister. Yet again, we have come back to the idea that it is about not speed but capacity. Would he therefore support redesigning the line to run at a slower speed so that it could go around places such as Water Orton primary school, ancient monuments and people’s houses?
Mr Burns
I heard my hon. Friend say that in an intervention on another of my colleagues. Let me tell him gently and in a spirit of friendship that, if one takes the line that he is suggesting, it will no longer be a high-speed train. In effect, it will be a parallel conventional rail line like the west coast main line. All the reports on having a conventional new rail line in parallel rather than a high-speed one show that it would cost about 90% of the cost of HS2 but without the benefits that high-speed railways bring.
Mr Burns
No, I will not.
Unfortunately, a project of this scale and size cannot meet the problems and objections of every part of the route while still keeping to the reason for and need behind the railway. It is rotten when one cannot deal with every problem, but we need to balance what is in the national interest against what can be done to minimise the impact. I believe that the Secretary of State for Transport, his Ministers, the Department for Transport and High Speed 2 Ltd have gone a considerable way—as far as they can—towards meeting and overcoming those problems without ruining the concept of high-speed rail and without it being disastrous for the taxpayer.
For those reasons, I am as confident as one can be that High Speed 2 will become High Speed 3 and go to Scotland, and that in years to come it will go to other parts of the United Kingdom as well. That can happen in an orderly way only if this Bill is passed to enable money to be spent on the preparations—not on building the railway, because the Bill does not deal with that. For those reasons, I will support the hon. Member for Nottingham South and my right hon. and hon. Friends on amendment 17; we gave a commitment to the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras that we would do so. I will certainly oppose amendment 18 and those that flow from it, however, because they are superfluous and, as my hon. Friend the Minister said, contradictory.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. A large number of Members wish to participate in the debate. May I ask people to keep their comments a little more clipped so that we can facilitate as many people as possible? I cannot impose a time limit as we are on Report, but Members can watch the clock and appreciate that five to 10 minutes would be a good proxy as regards the length of their speeches.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)
I shall try to be brief. I have tabled amendment 23 on the link between the network and Heathrow. Some hon. Members will understand that I have raised the issue on behalf of my constituents, as is my right, in each debate we have had on High Speed 2.
Let me briefly give the context. My background is in supporting rail expansion and investment. I represent a constituency with a railway estate and a large number of railway workers and, in addition, I chair the RMT trade union group in Parliament. We have been strongly behind the development of increased capacity and investment, so when the idea of high-speed rail was first proposed it was welcomed in my constituency for a number of reasons. One was that if we could get railway journeys below four hours, that would take pressure off Heathrow airport and reduce the need for short-haul flights into Heathrow. That assisted in our campaign against the expansion of Heathrow.
When the route was published, every Member south of Birmingham could assess its impact on their constituency, except me, because the link to Heathrow was not included. The route of the link to Old Oak Common was published, but then we were told that there would be a direct link at some stage, the options would be published, there would be a consultation, a preferred option would be considered, compensation arrangements for those affected would be discussed and then this House would make a considered decision.
There are real concerns about the environmental impact where the network hits the north of my borough. The right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Sir John Randall) and the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (Mr Hurd) have valiantly argued the case for their constituents and achieved some tunnelling, but a lot more needs to be done. Other facilities that serve the whole borough will be affected, such as the Hillingdon outdoor activities centre, which will need to be relocated.
I am also concerned that my constituents now have no idea what impact the route will have on them because, following the introduction of the Davies commission, the whole timetable and consultation process for the link to Heathrow has been deferred until after the next general election, which means more years of blight for my constituents. That affects all of them, because nine different options for linking to Heathrow are being discussed, which means everyone’s home or business is under threat. That is no way to run a railway or consult on such a massive project. We were promised a logical process with a tight time scale. We were told that as the main network was decided, the routes would be published, there would be consultation on a preferred route, and a decision would be made relatively speedily, which would at least have given us some certainty. That has all gone now.
My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) said that we do not want to put off any decision on high-speed rail until after the Davies commission reports. The solution, then, is simply to ensure that the commission reports earlier. The fact that it is due to report after the next general election is a political fudge to get everybody off the hook. In the coming six weeks the commission will report on a range of options, but there will be no final report until after the general election. Why is that length of time needed? All the experts, and indeed a number of Government Members, have been clear that the deadline could be brought forward so that we can have certainty about the Government’s preferred option before the next general election.
Andrew Bridgen
I have great sympathy for the hon. Gentleman and his constituents facing the blight of uncertainty over possible routes for HS2 and the link to Heathrow. It is the same for my constituents in relation to the route for phase 2, which is out for consultation, and it could be changed, so huge swathes of my constituency and those of fellow Conservative Members are similarly blighted. To paraphrase, we are all in this together.
John McDonnell
I understand that, which is why I said that Members south of Birmingham know roughly what the route will be.
I was given promises and undertakings in this House about the process that would be followed to determine the route of the link to Heathrow. At least we thought we had some certainty on the time scale for the consultations. In fact, I was holding public meetings to go into some detail about the compensation arrangements for whatever option was to be proceeded with. Now it is all up in the air again and the route that the link will take is uncertain. The Government have opened discussions about a potential third runway at Heathrow. Sometimes Members can become paranoid in this House and think that they are coming for them.
John McDonnell
I will not take it too personally.
Frankly, my constituents have had enough of political fudge after political fudge. What they want to know, and they want to know it soon, is where the line will go, how they will be affected, how we can cope with the social, environmental and economic consequences, and how they will be fully compensated.
Steve McCabe
I have great sympathy with my hon. Friend’s predicament, but is not part of the problem that the Government are missing a trick? This uncertainty is allowing opposition to the whole project to develop. Were we to focus on reducing domestic air travel as part of the project’s value by tackling some of the uncertainty, that would help everybody.
John McDonnell
My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), who chairs the Transport Committee, has made the point time and again, with regard to the overall matter of strategic planning—with regard to aviation, I think that she and her Committee are absolutely clueless—[Interruption.] She knows that she has my respect and affection. If we are planning for transport infrastructure in the long term, we must ensure that it is integrated. The way to have integration for this project is by ensuring that the timetable set out for HS2 is integrated with the Davies commission’s report, which means having the report sooner. That could be within six months of the initial report being published this month. The decision could then be taken before the next general election. It is also about being more honest with the electorate on rail and aviation, and not only in my constituency, but nationally.
Rehman Chishti
In relation to the hon. Gentleman’s comments on the Transport Committee, in an earlier debate on aviation he said that it keeps coming back with the proposed expansion of Heathrow, which he disagrees with. If it keeps coming back with that in different guises and compositions, clearly that shows that it must be right.
John McDonnell
It shows a consistent aberration of judgment, because time and again Governments eventually say no.
I appeal to the Secretary of State. There is a solution to my constituency problems and those of the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip. First, we must address the environmental damage that is still being threatened in the north of my borough. The right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner have a series of requests that could readily be met to overcome some of the environmental and social damage.
Secondly, please give us certainty. That means having the Davies commission’s final report sooner, which could be done early next year, and integrating it with the final decision on the link to Heathrow, giving a properly planned process in which people can have confidence. Otherwise, I will take every opportunity I can to vote against high-speed rail until my constituents are satisfied that their views have been taken into account.
Karen Lumley
I rise to support amendment 17 and will speak extremely briefly. My views on HS2 are fairly widely known, but I want to place on the record that the project is needed now. The west coast main line is nearly full, and as a regular traveller on that service I know that it is essential for many commuters. HS2 is about capacity as well as speed, a fact that is sometimes lost in the argument. I totally understand where those of my colleagues who oppose it are coming from, as there are also strong views in my constituency, but I firmly believe that it is of huge national importance and must go ahead. In my region, the west midlands, we cannot ignore the facts: a £1.5 billion increase in economic output, thousands of additional jobs and increased wages.
Rehman Chishti
As a Kent MP who has benefited from High Speed 1 and over £10 billion of private sector investment coming into the south-east, including Kent and Medway, I think that the economic benefits my hon. Friend is talking about for her area are absolutely vital. People in Kent have seen those benefits, and people in the north should not be deprived of them. I fully support her in that respect.
Karen Lumley
I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention.
As Members have heard already today, I am a big champion of Birmingham international airport. To be able to access it from Euston in just 38 minutes will make a huge difference to the people of north London. It will mean a choice between either Birmingham or Gatwick and Heathrow—I know which airport I would choose. Those Members who have travelled from Birmingham international airport know how excellent it is, and those who have not should try it, because they will not regret it.
HS2 is also about rebalancing our economy. We talk about that a lot, but this is proof that we are serious about getting on with it. I know that we will hear many arguments for and against HS2 today, but I am sure that they were heard when the House debated HS1. This is something that the country needs, so we should all be brave and stand up for the national interest. We owe it to our constituents and to our country. I hope that colleagues will join me in the Lobby tonight to vote for something north of Watford.
Mr MacNeil
I wish to speak to amendment 28 tabled in my name on behalf of my party.
The Scottish National party and the Scottish Government have been supportive of HS2 in principle. Of course, that is conditional on it being properly managed and, most importantly, it coming to Scotland, so that Scotland, which pays more tax per capita than the UK average, can benefit from it. We also look to help the rest of the UK. As I mentioned earlier, the line that links Seville to Madrid, which it was envisaged would help Seville alone, benefited both ends, as, on reflection, it should have done. We want this link because it would link us into the wider European high-speed rail project that will be found in many places in Europe. Scotland, as an economic powerhouse, deserves to be part of that, not just for Scotland but for the rest of Europe, which deserves to have Scotland linked with it. This will be happening in 25 or 30 years, by which time quite a few of us will not be in this Chamber, if on this earth; we are leaving a legacy for the future.
I am glad to hear that Baroness Kramer will be coming to Scotland tomorrow as part of seeing what benefits can be brought not just to Scotland but to the wider UK and wider Europe through increased links to the central belt of Scotland, which is an important market.
Robert Flello
The hon. Gentleman talks about the wider benefits to the UK. At the moment, my constituents have a service that gets them into Euston in one hour and 23 minutes. If HS2 goes ahead, the 30 trains a day we have now will be reduced to three and there will be an extra hour’s journey time to pick up the HS2 link, so my constituents will go from taking one hour and 23 minutes to get to London to taking two and a half hours. How is that an improvement for the rest of the country?
Mr MacNeil
The hon. Gentleman represents his constituents very well. He will of course forgive me if I am not au fait with the train timetable to Stoke-on-Trent. It has sadly been an oversight on my part not to visit Stoke-on-Trent.
Mr MacNeil
I am glad to hear from a Labour MP that I will be welcome. I will happily make a speech on the benefits of Scottish independence not just to Scotland but to other European countries and to the denizens of Stoke-on-Trent.
Mr MacNeil
It is great to hear that. The point for Stoke-on-Trent is probably to liaise better with the rail authorities and the authorities here to make sure that it is represented and gets a better deal. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, as an assiduous MP—probably the finest Stoke-on-Trent has had—will indeed be doing that. I am sure that will now be very welcome in Stoke-on-Trent.
It is in Scotland’s interests to have the high-speed rail link. It is also in Scotland’s interests to make sure that the north of England is well connected, because we want to make sure that when we are independent we have on our borders a prosperous region of Europe. The north of England becoming a prosperous region of Europe is therefore exactly what Scotland wants. When Scotland is independent it will do everything it can to facilitate and help that.
Mr MacNeil
I give way to the hon. Gentleman, who is, let us say, a bit blinkered when it comes to Scottish independence.
Mr Reid
Of course I agree that it is important that the high-speed rail link is extended north to Glasgow and Edinburgh. The hon. Gentleman said that he was speaking to the amendment on behalf of his party. Let me draw his attention to the Scottish Government’s evidence to the Public Bill Committee. Question 174 was answered by a representative from Transport Scotland as follows:
“The view of the Scottish Government is that we are content with the Bill as it stands.”––[Official Report, High Speed Rail (Preparation) Public Bill Committee, 11 July 2013; c. 100, Q174.]
The hon. Gentleman’s party runs the Scottish Government, so if it is content with the Bill, why is he speaking to an amendment on its behalf?
Mr MacNeil
As the hon. Gentleman knows, thinking is always evolving. When a person is content, they can become happier as a result of improvements. The Liberal Democrats started from a position of being opposed to student tuition fees and seemed to be content with that, but the position evolved so that they wanted £9,000 tuition fees for students, and they seemed happier still. He will probably understand that I think that our evolution towards happiness is perhaps a bit more understanding of the needs of citizens, whereas the evolution of the Liberal Democrats’ thinking leaves many people in debt, unfortunately.
We want Scotland to be linked to a high-speed European network. The mistake made earlier, originally by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), was to think that this is some sort of political project. It is not. There are high-speed rail links all over the place. They go to Helsinki through the Baltic states, and there is no movement for political unity between those states. They fiercely retain their independence while supporting and helping each other to get rail links, including high-speed links, through their countries to move into the main European markets. That is a natural and understandable thing to do. Many states in Europe are independent and co-operating together. In fact, Europe has not been as together as it is now, with its 50 independent states, since the empires declined.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful to the Member for the former Western Isles constituency for giving way. I declare an interest because my father was a Scot. Does he think that if Scotland becomes independent the UK Government will be in a hurry to create the link through to the Scottish cities or will they take rather longer?
Mr MacNeil
I think that money talks far more than narrow political ideals as they are expressed at the moment. Absolutely yes: the Government will understand full well that it makes sense for the central belt of Scotland, one of 40 global mega-regions, to be linked to other mega-regions, and the political machinations or whatever political understanding the right hon. Lady has in her mind will vanish. The former BBC correspondent Stephanie Flanders put it very well when she said that people will play up the difficulties pre-independence but will play them down afterwards and work well and co-operate, as in the Baltic states and in Finland.
Mr MacNeil
I am afraid that that is the truth, and I am sure that the right hon. Lady knows it in her heart of hearts.
To achieve this link going into Scotland, we have to accept that it will go through England first. I hope to see the benefits in the north of England that Kent has seen. It is only right that our fellow Europeans, wherever they are, see their economies grow and prosper.
We are concerned about the KPMG report that arose from a freedom of information request. The report showed that part of Scotland could lose economically, but on further examination that proved to be only one part of the picture. It was the worst-case scenario, and the best-case scenario showed benefits. Rather than Scotland losing out, it was shown that HS2 would bring gains of £40 million-odd a year to Aberdeenshire and Morayshire.
Andrew Bridgen
Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that if Scotland is mentioned in the Bill, that will satisfy Scotland and it will not seek Barnettisation of this project, which would put the cost up even further?
Mr MacNeil
I am glad to hear Conservative Members speak against privatisation. That is very encouraging. Perhaps they should have thought about that with regard to Royal Mail, when they transferred loads of people’s money from the taxpayer to private pockets. [Interruption.] I think I misheard the hon. Gentleman and he said “Barnettisation”. It is the accent—I am sorry. If he is indeed talking about Barnettisation, I will come to that point. If he is patient, as I am sure he will be, he will get an understanding of exactly what our viewpoint is.
It is important that HS2 happens and that we work within Scotland to make sure that we have connectivity and can benefit by linking into the network. The Scottish Government do not agree with the assumptions that have been made by KPMG and the Department for Transport. We feel that there is an error in some of the modelling and that some of the assumptions are out of date. We are more pleased with what came out of the Department yesterday, which said:
“Scotland will benefit from high speed services from Edinburgh and Glasgow as soon as Phase One of HS2 opens. Phase Two is expected to reduce journey times by up to an hour without the need to change trains, benefiting the Scottish economy. The Government’s goal is for a network that brings the country closer together, so we are taking forward a study with the Scottish Government to consider how these benefits could be extended further. This is looking at how to boost capacity and cut journey times between Glasgow/Edinburgh and London to less than three hours”.
That journey time offers further access to an inter-European market, which is vital for Scotland.
I hope there will be Barnett consequentials, which are important, so that Scotland can prepare for the benefits of the extension of European high-speed rail. We could consider a link north of Edinburgh up towards Aberdeen. I often remark that the rail journey between Glasgow and Fort William takes about three hours, but the distance is only 100 miles. The average speed is 33 mph, so perhaps medium-speed rail would improve journey times.
The benefits of HS2 will be strong, but they will be stronger still when Scotland is included, as the example of Seville and Madrid shows. We shall work for assurances from the UK Government that they will consider a sensible extension that will benefit not just Scotland, but the south-east of England and the European markets. This is in everybody’s economic interest, as shown by the Baltic line running from Helsinki to the European markets.
High-speed rail will benefit everybody. As the hon. Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) flippantly said earlier, the counter-arguments suggest that, if connectivity is such a bad idea, closing the M6 would result in a boom in the north. Of course, that is nonsense. As Adam Smith said in “The Wealth of Nations”, the more markets and economies are linked, the better for all. There will be mutual benefits and we will all win.
Mike Thornton (Eastleigh) (LD)
I will maintain my habit of being brief.
The Liberal Democrats have long supported a fully integrated transport system, and thus we welcome amendment 17. We also believe that the only way to achieve that is by building a modern, 21st-century railway system, not by merely tweaking a bit of this and a bit of that, extending a platform here and adding a coach there.
The west coast main line will run out of space in the next 10 to 12 years. One option would be to improve the line by extending it, but that would subject passengers to 14 years of weekend bus journeys and chaos, and even when completed it would be completely insufficient.
Mr John Leech (Manchester, Withington) (LD)
My hon. Friend will probably be aware that we have already gone through the tortuous process of upgrading the west coast main line. It made a significant difference, but, despite billions of pounds having been spent, it is already full.
Mike Thornton
I agree with my hon. Friend and I think that extending the line would lead to exactly the same result.
I hope that the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) is sure, like me, that northern local government leaders have the best interests of all their residents at heart. I am puzzled that opponents of the scheme seem to think that a high-speed, modern railway system that is fit for the 21st century and that would increase economic activity throughout the whole of the United Kingdom would not benefit the country as a whole, but only those cities directly served by it. Surely it is clear that a line that would improve north-south links—I include Scotland in that—would at the same time improve and grow the economy of the whole of the United Kingdom, including my constituency of Eastleigh.
Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)
Is the hon. Gentleman aware of the evidence the Public Accounts Committee reviewed when we looked at High Speed 1, particularly on the received wisdom of its effect on regional economic regeneration? It showed that, notwithstanding that some places in Kent did improve, particularly Ashford, there were substantial pockets of poverty in places such as Dover, Folkestone and Thanet, which were not specifically affected by the regeneration effects of High Speed 1.
Mike Thornton
I am sure that building a railway line will not solve every economic problem in every part of the county. I happen to know that the improved economy of Kent also improved the economy of Sussex and its effect also reached all the way to Hampshire.
Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)
It pains me to disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson), whom I deeply respect, but the economic benefits to Dover and to Deal in my constituency have been immense. It has been transformational and made a massive difference to the whole of east Kent. I urge Members of all parties to back HS2.
Damian Collins
Following on from my parliamentary neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke), I have to say that my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson) is totally wrong. I would be happy to take him to Folkestone and show him the areas of the town that are benefiting from the better connection. Yes, there were areas of deprivation in east Kent, but the way to do something about that was better infrastructure and that is what we now have.
Stephen Barclay
I thank the hon. Gentleman for the generous spirit in which he is taking interventions. To support my parliamentary neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson), I point out to colleagues who take issue with his intervention that paragraph 15 of the National Audit Office report on HS1 concluded that
“the project is not value for money.”
Key finding 6 states that although passenger numbers grew, they were below expectations and estimates were inflated.
Robert Flello
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his generosity. Is he able to answer the question I asked the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) from the SNP? How will the people of Stoke-on-Trent benefit from a worsened service? They will have to spend an hour travelling to hook up to a line that will only be as good as the current one, and they will have to go from using 30 trains to three. How is that an improvement?
Mike Thornton
I am afraid it is beyond my capacity to decide what trains the relevant train company will run, but I doubt we can predict exactly what the train times will be in 10, 15, 20 or 30 years’ time.
Members will be glad to hear that I have nearly finished. The Liberal Democrats know that a modern, high-speed, national rail network is vital to the future of this country. Consequently, I fully support the Bill and amendment 17.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
I rise to support amendment 17 and I will support the Bill later, too.
I want to pick up on one particular point that the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) made at the beginning of the debate and with which I agree, namely the connectivity problem with HS2, particularly the lack of a proper link to High Speed 1. That is a serious problem and it needs to be addressed. I recognise that there has been some improvement in the view of how the two high-speed lines should be connected, but the current proposal—this is extraordinary—is for a single track, shared connection and a capacity of only three trains per hour going rather slowly.
The argument is that that is sufficient capacity for the international services likely to be coming to High Speed 2 from the channel tunnel. That may be correct, at least in the early years: three an hour may be enough. However, with that constraint in place, it would be impossible to run regular domestic services from High Speed 2 to High Speed 1, even though we need those regular connections. Research commissioned by my local authority, the London borough of Newham, suggests that there could be demand for seven trains per hour on the interconnection between HS2 and HS1 to meet the needs of domestic services.
I have found this discussion interesting. I agree with the point made by the hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) about the regeneration benefits of HS1, and they are largely due to domestic services. I think, therefore, that the new high-speed line has to be built with sufficient capacity for the domestic services we will need. We certainly want HS2 to connect to Kent, East Anglia and other destinations, and we need proper interconnection between the two high-speed lines in order to facilitate that.
Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)
I am aware of the right hon. Gentleman’s interest in regeneration. Does he agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) that the Bill does not put a cap on the amount that will be spent? The figures that are quoted go from £14 billion upwards. I am sure he agrees that there are other infrastructure priorities in our constituencies, such as housing, and that there are areas in desperate need of regeneration. Does he not think that supporting this project will deprive those other valuable projects of finance?
Stephen Timms
I think that investment in this project will contribute to national wealth. My concern, however, is that it should be adequately designed and planned. To have a single track connecting High Speed 2 and High Speed 1, with a capacity of three trains an hour, is a mistake.
Stephen Timms
I will make one more point before I give way to my right hon. Friend because it relates to the concerns that he has raised.
If there were a proper link between High Speed 1 and High Speed 2, some of the trains coming towards London on High Speed 2 would not have to terminate at Euston. Some could run on to High Speed 1, some could terminate at Stratford International station, in which I have a particular interest, and some could run further along High Speed 1. As a result, significantly fewer platforms would be required at Euston than are proposed and there would be a reduction in the big problems in my right hon. Friend’s constituency, to which he has rightly drawn attention.
Frank Dobson
I am sure my right hon. Friend is right that the proposal to have a tunnel from Old Oak Common to Primrose Hill and to run the rest of the connection above ground across Camden Town will not provide an adequate service. It will certainly wreak destruction in Camden Town, which the people behind the project denied until recently. As an indication of their general incompetence, when the cost of that proposal went up from £170 million to £300 million, they said that it was because of unforeseen circumstances, including the need to widen the line.
Stephen Timms
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. I am aware that the proposal for that interconnection is now rather more costly that it was initially. However, as far as I can see, the problem has not been solved. There is still a limit of three trains per hour, which is clearly insufficient. I warmly welcome amendment 17.
Mrs Spelman
Just to help the right hon. Gentleman on the question of whether the expenditure on High Speed 2 will come at the cost of investment in existing infrastructure, which might provide the kind of connection that he is seeking, “The Strategic Case for HS2”, which was published yesterday, states:
“Between 2014 and 2019, Network Rail will spend over £35bn allowing it to continue a substantial programme of expansion and renewal.”
That might allow him to seek the kind of amelioration that he wants.
Stephen Timms
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady. However, I believe that an adequate connection should be part of the initial proposal.
Stephen Timms
No, I will not give way again.
I welcome amendment 17 and the Government’s support for it. I have raised this matter with Ministers before, but I ask the new Minister for the first time to pay particular attention to the connectivity problem between High Speed 1 and High Speed 2, which was highlighted by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham.
Sir John Randall (Uxbridge and South Ruislip) (Con)
I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), to the Front Bench. It is a pleasure to see him there.
Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking, at least from this side of the Chamber—I must say what a great view one gets from the back of the stands—I am happy to speak in support of amendment 17.
I know that the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) has had to go to Westminster Hall to check up on GCHQ, but, to use words that he would understand, I give him my fraternal solidarity and will support amendment 23. I know that it is rather impractical, but that does not always stop us supporting an amendment. The issues with Heathrow, which affect his constituents badly, also affect mine.
As the Heathrow loop is in the second phase of the project, we cannot have a decision on it. The Minister said that connectivity with Heathrow will be amply secured through Old Oak Common, so regardless of any decision on the expansion of Heathrow, which I hope will not happen, perhaps we can save a bit of money and scrap the Heathrow loop straight away. That would bring great benefits to the London borough of Hillingdon where we stand as one, although not to my constituency specifically because there will be tunnelling there. My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (Mr Hurd) and I face some severe problems. It would help immeasurably if there was no Heathrow loop, because the tunnelling could be extended past the houses in Ickenham. There is understandably a considerable amount of opposition to HS2 emerging just next to those properties.
I will not take long, because I want to get on to the proposals on compensation and mitigation. Perhaps I am being rather optimistic. It is a very important subject. I would like to have had the chance to mention the awful position of the Hillingdon outdoor activities centre. I want that to be looked at. My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner has written to the Minister about various matters and I back him up entirely.
Unlike the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington, who will oppose the Bill tonight, I will support it in the hope and expectation that our gentle requests will be looked on more favourably if I am not too much of a pain during this early outing on this matter. However, I say to my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Front Bench that after this rare outbreak of good-natured bonhomie, I will be going back to the default position of grumpy old man of Uxbridge.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
It behoves all of us who are sceptical about HS2 to suggest practical and realistic alternatives.
Some people say that the project is about capacity, not speed, and others say that it is about speed, not capacity, but most of the emphasis has been on capacity. The capacity problem is between London and Birmingham, not elsewhere in the country, where we could have more trains without any difficulty. It is that section of our railway network that I will address.
There is an alternative route from Birmingham Snow Hill to Paddington. The trains currently run to Marylebone, but they could easily run to Paddington, which would be quicker and would link up with Crossrail. InterCity 125s could run on that line from the centre of Birmingham to Paddington—a very convenient station—at very little expense. That would solve the capacity problem between London and Birmingham.
I will go further and say that that route should be electrified, which could be done at a modest cost. If it was electrified, electric trains could run directly from Birmingham Snow Hill—and, indeed, from Birmingham airport and elsewhere—into the City of London, Canary Wharf and beyond via a link to Crossrail at Old Oak Common.
Nadine Dorries
My constituency neighbour is a renowned expert on the railways. Would his proposal cost less than HS2? Does he have a figure for it?
Kelvin Hopkins
My railway expert friends tell me that the electrification of that line would cost about £500 million and that the track work that would be required at Old Oak Common to link it to Crossrail would cost about £10 million. We are talking about tiny amounts of money in comparison with HS2.
There could also be a direct link to Heathrow for the electric trains, which would go off at Greenford and on to the Great Western main line. That would link to Heathrow at one end and to Crossrail at the other. Trains would be able to go from Heathrow to Birmingham airport or the centre of Birmingham, as well as from Canary Wharf to the centre of Birmingham. That would double the capacity between London and Birmingham very easily. The line could even go on to Stratford and there could be a transfer—although perhaps not an easy one—to the channel tunnel rail link and to Eurostar. That would solve the only real capacity problem, because the others involve train frequencies. My railway engineer and signalling friends say it is easy to run more trains, but the problem is that franchisees of privatised railways like crowded trains. It is more profitable to run crowded trains than half-empty trains, so if as many people as possible are crammed on to fewer trains, more profit is made.
James Morris
The hon. Gentleman talks about capacity between London and Birmingham, but HS2 addresses capacity around Birmingham. Commuter traffic has increased by about 20% in and around Birmingham—a capacity issue that HS2 will address. It is not just about capacity between London and Birmingham.
Kelvin Hopkins
I would like to explore the hon. Gentleman’s argument further. I would have thought that was a local transport matter and that we need more investment in local transport, not HS2.
James Morris
The development of HS2 will free up capacity on the west coast main line and on the radial routes serving Birmingham. That is an important benefit of increasing capacity with HS2.
Kelvin Hopkins
I am convinced that elsewhere on the network train frequencies and train paths are the problem. We have far too few trains on the existing network, and we could run many more trains much more quickly. The only real tight capacity is between London and Birmingham. Beyond that it is not difficult.
I do not want to speak for too long, but I want to mention other routes. In 1990, British Rail ran a test train from London to Edinburgh on the east coast main line. They cleared the line of everything else, ran the train straight through with a two-minute stop at Newcastle, and did the journey in three and a half hours—two minutes faster than the original time proposed for HS2.
Mark Lazarowicz
Is not the answer to my hon. Friend’s objection the fact that, as he said, they cleared the line of everything else? The point is that we cannot just clear the line of everything else.
Kelvin Hopkins
Perhaps my hon. Friend will allow me to continue. Clearing the lines is obviously not possible all the time, but upgrading the line so that we can have through trains is not difficult. [Hon. Members: “It is!”] I have specifics. We need to double the viaduct north of Welwyn, and four-track the line between Huntingdon and Peterborough. We need flyovers at Peterborough and Newark, and we could then have non-stop trains straight through to Edinburgh if we wished. The train would have to slow down at Newcastle and York, but by and large the journey could be done in three and a half hours maximum. That is the east coast main line.
As we know, the midlands main line is going to be electrified, and we also want it to improve. With some track remodelling at Leicester and Derby we could make the trains run faster there. We need to straighten out the line at Market Harborough and restore the straighter line that used to exist, and we must take freight traffic off those three lines. That is the key to more train paths, because if we can take all the freight off those lines, we will not have a problem. To do that, however, we need an alternative. We have such an alternative: a GB freight route, which I have been promoting for some years with colleagues from the railway industry. We have a detailed scheme, carefully worked out and costed, to build a dedicated freight line from the channel tunnel to Glasgow, linking all the main conurbations of Britain, and capable of taking lorries on trains. We need to take freight off the road—and off the main lines, of course, but 80% of freight travels by lorry, not by container or other means. To get lorries on trains is crucial to modal shift, and to do that we need a gauge capacity that is capable of taking lorries on trains.
Nadine Dorries
The hon. Gentleman is incredibly generous in giving way a second time. Will he say why he feels that his proposal—which, knowing his interest in this subject over many years, I have no doubt is well thought out and accurate—has not been considered? Why is HS2 on the drawing board if the hon. Gentleman’s proposal is less invasive and more cost effective?
Kelvin Hopkins
I thank the hon. Lady—my close neighbour—for her question. We took a team of 15 people, including rail constructers, and representatives from Eurotunnel and the supermarkets, to meet Geoff Hoon when he was Secretary of State for Transport. It was clear they were worried that our scheme might conflict with HS2, not because it would take up the same track, but because it might remove freight from the railway lines and make the case for HS2 weaker. We argued that HS2 could go ahead if it was thought essential, but that a GB freight route is much more vital to Britain’s economy than HS2 has ever been. What is the total cost of the scheme? A generous figure, based on outturn costs for HS1, would, we think, be less than £6 billion—a tiny fraction of HS2.
Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)
The hon. Gentleman has mentioned various lines, links between the west coast and east coast main lines and so on, but he has not mentioned the Trent Valley spur on the west coast main line, on which Nuneaton station in my constituency sits. That is an extremely important junction, and the hon. Gentleman’s proposals will not do anything to help capacity there or improve fast services from Nuneaton, which HS2 would do.
Kelvin Hopkins
I think I mentioned that on other lines there is no problem with capacity, provided we are prepared to increase train frequencies. We do not do that, however, because it is not profitable to do so while private franchisees can make more profit by running fewer trains with more people on them—very simple. The rest of the railway network clearly needs heavy investment, and Network Rail is undertaking a lot of that. This specific scheme would solve many problems and be a fraction of the cost of HS2. Indeed, upgrading the other lines I have suggested would solve almost all the capacity problems that we are now facing.
I am a passionate believer in railways, but if we are serious about them we must invest in dedicated rail-freight capacity, as I have suggested. At the moment the continent of Europe is building large rail-freight capacity right across the continent; indeed, trains can go from China to Europe even now. We will miss out on that if we cannot transport lorries on trains. We must be able to put lorry trailers on trains, or we will not see a shift from road to rail and the rest of Europe will leave us behind. For the sake of our economy, we must invest heavily in dedicated rail freight that is capable of taking lorries on trains.
Eric Ollerenshaw
It is a pleasure to be called in this debate and to follow the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) who has obviously thought the issue through. Some of his proposals are quite interesting, but the fact of the matter is that the success of privatisation and competition means that we will need the capacity—we might need the hon. Gentleman’s suggestions on top of HS2.
I will support amendment 17, and I thank Ministers for finally including the Y route in the Bill. Two years ago when this scheme was first suggested, there was a great debate between Ministers and civil servants about whether we should build a line just to Birmingham, and a separate one to Manchester and Leeds. I am really grateful to Ministers that the Bill includes London to Birmingham, East Midlands, Sheffield, Leeds and Manchester. I would of course suggest that the left side of the Y could be built faster and quicker, and would be far better, and I agree with the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) that we need to look seriously at the connection. International business men and foreign tourists will want to get on trains in Europe, bypass London and go straight beyond Manchester on to the spur to get to central, rural Lancashire and see the delights available. The sooner we can get that done, the better.
Mrs Gillan
If HS2 is going to be built, will my hon. Friend support my suggestion that it is started in the north? That would enable the Howard Davies commission to report, we could look at airport capacity in the south, and my hon. Friend would get his wish much quicker because connectivity among northern cities could be established.
Eric Ollerenshaw
I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. I always thought that was my suggestion, but never mind. I do not know how the engineering will be done—I assume it will start in many different points and I agree with my right hon. Friend. One of my earliest interventions in a debate on this issue—two years ago, I think—was to suggest that we start construction now in Glasgow and Edinburgh, while the southern counties make up their minds which back garden HS2 is going to go through.
Mr Brian Binley (Northampton South) (Con)
Is not the fact of the matter that the real bottleneck is Birmingham? If we follow the suggestion that we start the project from the north, Birmingham will become an absolute nonsense in terms of railway transport.
Eric Ollerenshaw
I thank my right hon. Friend for bringing us back to reality—[Interruption.] Sorry, he is my hon. Friend, soon to be right hon. Friend.
We must be serious on capacity. I and fellow Lancashire Members have been fighting for some time for a direct train service from London Euston to Blackpool. We had the agreement of Virgin, and a cross-party group was involved, including me, my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard) and the hon. Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden). We thought we were there, but only a month ago, Network Rail said, “We cannot put on two direct trains per day from Euston to Blackpool because the line cannot cope.”
Mr Straw
I confirm what the hon. Gentleman says, although I would much prefer all trains to turn right at Preston to go to Blackburn. The truth is we all have an interest in the prosperity of Lancashire as a whole. I would like the line to start from the north, but all the economic arguments say that it should start from the south. Does he accept that the benefit of the reduction in journey time to Preston is one of the best in the plans for the area? The journey time is improved by 44 minutes—it is cut to an hour and a half—which will have a dramatic impact not only on Preston and central Lancashire, but on the whole county.
Eric Ollerenshaw
Lancaster is not on the line yet—it might be eventually, and I might stand here in future asking for a stop there—but we will reap the benefit, as the right hon. Gentleman says. The spur line that will be built means that high-speed trains will enter the normal west coast main line just above Wigan. We will enjoy the benefits of that service, which will be fantastic for the economy of our area.
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), the previous Minister. I congratulate him on his incredible speech and I am grateful for the support he has provided all the way through the process to get the Bill right.
Another issue is the north-south balance. People in some areas of the north ask why we are spending that money. I am grateful for what appears to be an outbreak of political consensus. Some Government Members and some northern Members were worried that the consensus would break down, but from what right hon. and hon. Opposition Members have said today, it looks like the consensus is restored, for which I am grateful.
Charlie Elphicke
I, too, am pleased to hear of consensus. Does my hon. Friend share my concern at the comments of the shadow Chancellor, who says that the money would be better spent on roads, cross-country rail, affordable houses, hospitals and schools rather on important and essential infrastructure for our children and grandchildren?
Eric Ollerenshaw
I am tempted to go down that line, but, given the outbreak of consensus, I will stick with that. To be fair, northern MPs of every party have sat on the all-party parliamentary group on rail in the north, and fought together to get the northern hub from the Government—an £800 million completed deal. They have fought together for electrification of the connection between Liverpool, Manchester and Sheffield. Southern and London MPs should realise that, on the current system, I can get to London quicker than I can get to Birmingham, Sheffield or Leeds. That must be ridiculous in the 21st century. The Bill is part and parcel of such connectivity.
Mr Betts
I reassure the hon. Gentleman that, in parts of the north such as Sheffield, the consensus has never broken. We have always been firmly in favour in principle. The city’s MPs, the city council—unanimously —and the chamber of commerce, and the local enterprise partnership support high-speed rail as a matter of principle.
Eric Ollerenshaw
I would assume nothing less, having worked with the hon. Gentleman and fellow northern MPs to get that extra investment. To be fair, the Government have delivered in the non-high speed section across the piece. In my small patch, they have agreed to electrification from Blackpool to Preston. Only a few months ago, nearly £1 million was spent on Lancaster station to enable trains to turn round. All those improvements are happening as I speak. They are all part of the connectivity in the Bill, which provides preparatory expenditure for the
“network referred to in subsection (1)”
and expenditure on the network that
“connects with the existing railway transport network.”
For me, and for parts of the north where the high-speed rail will not reach, that is the key to our support for the Bill.
I am grateful for the cross-party support, but some hon. Members rightly have concerns in their constituencies. I ask them to look at the proposals in the context of the north-south situation. Currently, it seems to my constituents that, when London demands something, things suddenly happen. Perhaps that is an exaggeration, but Crossrail cost £16 billion, and nearly £6 billion has been spent on Thameslink—we will take its second-class trains, which will apparently be marvellous for us.
Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con)
If only it were so easy for London! It has taken 14 years to get investment on the Liverpool street east coast line. I am very grateful to Ministers for it, but it was not provided instantly.
Eric Ollerenshaw
That could be a benefit of having a Conservative London Mayor. From my perspective in Lancashire, I see that the Olympics cost £9 billion; there are continual tube upgrades; I do not know how much is spent on subsidising bus fares in London; HS1 into London cost £6 billion; we are immediately talking about Crossrail 2. I am not complaining—they are all marvellous things.
Mr MacNeil
I am enjoying the hon. Gentleman’s broadcast on behalf of the Lancashire national party. Perhaps there will be a letter to Scotland asking to come and join us. Do not the spend on high-speed rail and the debate it generates pale into insignificance compared with the money we spend in the blink of an eye on nuclear weapons? At the very least, the spend on high-speed rail will leave something tangible in the country. That cannot be said of some of our spending.
Eric Ollerenshaw
I assumed we were already joined to Scotland. That could be an exaggeration—[Laughter.] For some of my constituents, it is not an exaggeration.
For coalition Members, one key thing was to rebalance the economy of this country. For me, high-speed rail is a key part of that. I am grateful for Ministers’ work in getting us this far on the Y shape. I wish we were already into a third high-speed rail or whatever, but High Speed 2 is fundamental to our commitment to deliver a rebalanced economy between the regions and London. I will support the Bill tonight.
Mark Lazarowicz
A number of amendments in the group deal with the extension of HS2 to Scotland. Unsurprisingly, I shall concentrate my remarks on the case for the building of HS2 and the benefits it will bring to Scotland and my city of Edinburgh.
It is patently clear that the improvement to the railway system that HS2 will deliver will benefit Scotland. At the moment, we suffer from capacity problems further south on the rail network. Unless something is done to deal with them, as rail demand increases, journey times and railway services to Scotland will be affected. We will obviously benefit from the reduction of 45 minutes that will be brought about by HS2, and I hope that further reductions will be achieved in the fullness of time.
We will also benefit from the way in which HS2 will help to rebalance the economy towards the north of Britain. The development of HS2 will lead to a reduction in the pressure for growth in domestic air travel, which will have other advantages. Extending high-speed rail to the points proposed by HS2 and beyond will also improve the business case for high-speed. All the evidence suggests that the business case for the improvements further south will be strengthened by extending HS2 to the points currently provided for and beyond to Scotland as well.
Andrew Bridgen
The hon. Gentleman is obviously very keen on HS2, but can he explain why Lord Prescott has called the project “the great northern con”?
Mark Lazarowicz
I did not hear those comments. Front Benchers will put forward the Labour position on the matter, and I am pleased that this high-speed rail project was started under the Labour Government of which Lord Prescott was a member.
The case for HS2 is overwhelming, and that is why we have seen a wide degree of political consensus across the parties in Scotland and certainly in my city. It is a project that has the support of the business community, the local authority and practically all political parties in Edinburgh.
Mark Lazarowicz
Interestingly, in Scotland, it is not only those communities and councils that would directly benefit from the high-speed line that are in favour. Communities further north recognise that, although they might not get a direct benefit, it would still be beneficial overall to the Scottish economy. That is the kind of constructive approach that other communities not directly served by the line should note and use as the basis for their approach to the development of HS2.
One of my concerns was the possible temptation to extend the line as far as Birmingham and never any further north. I therefore welcome the commitment in the Bill to go further north in England and the possibility that the line will go even further than outlined in the HS2 documents. I will look for any commitment for high-speed rail to go beyond the current terminus points for HS2. I would also ask why we have to accept a 20-year programme for high-speed rail to go from London to York and somewhere near Wigan when other countries seem to manage to do it much faster than we do. I hope that that issue can be addressed in the preparations for the scheme over the next few months and years.
Mr Goodwill
I can confirm that our new Minister, Baroness Kramer, will be in Scotland tomorrow and we will no doubt hear more on that subject then.
Mark Lazarowicz
I am grateful for that update, which has been circulating over the last hour or so as the information has reached the public domain. I presume that Baroness Kramer will not announce that high-speed is coming to Scotland, but I am looking forward to some positive announcements tomorrow. There is an opportunity here for the Scottish Government—of whatever colour, as we are obviously talking about a long-term process—to work with the UK Government. It is recognised that it will be possible to do some work on high-speed rail in Scotland, perhaps to link Edinburgh and Glasgow but also to provide the basis for a route further south. Although we cannot immediately have a high-speed route all the way from Edinburgh and Glasgow to London, other sections of high-speed rail would certainly benefit the Scottish economy. Just as the business case for high-speed rail further south is strengthened by bringing into it business from Scotland, any high-speed rail in Scotland that would bring passengers into the GB-wide high-speed system would be beneficial for the rest of the country.
I understand why those communities that will not be served directly by the line, especially those that currently have a good rail service, will be concerned that they could lose out as a result of HS2 being constructed. The answer for those communities is to engage as actively as they can with central Government and neighbouring local authorities to try to ensure that they put the case to get the best benefits. It is also important that connectivity is examined, the point of the amendment tabled by my hon. Friends on the Opposition Front Bench.
It is important for the Government, and for Front Benchers of all colours, to use the opportunity of developing HS2 to rebuild the vision for rail in the country as a whole. HS2 is not just a question of trains running on the high-speed line and then going no further; they can serve other destinations in the way they will serve Edinburgh and Glasgow. On the continent, high-speed trains do not just run on high-speed lines; they serve other communities too. That is something we should aim for in Britain.
The case for high-speed developments beyond HS2 is powerful. I understand why a Government would not want to start putting down lines on a map to other parts of Britain, because that would set off scare stories about costs, but the points made by the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) on possible development should not be lost or forgotten—the lines to Scotland and routes to the north-east of England in particular. There are clear capacity problems between Yorkshire and the north-east of England and they will need to be on the agenda at some stage.
I started my comments by referring to the amendments on Scotland. The amendments tabled by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) and the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) are superfluous. The Scottish Government have accepted the Bill in its current form. The Scottish Parliament has passed the relevant Sewel motion endorsing the proposals in the Bill. I do not always agree with the current Scottish Government and Scottish Parliament, but on this occasion if it is good enough for them, it should be good enough for this House. I will not support the amendments, as they do not take the debate any further. We have good proposals that have achieved broad consensus across the House. I hope we can continue to proceed in that fashion.
Stephen Barclay
I shall speak to amendment 17 and, in particular, to the costs associated with connectivity.
On Sunday, it was my daughter’s third birthday. As the list of presents she was hoping to receive grew ever longer, I had to remind her that we did not have a magic money tree in the garden. Her response, quick as a flash, was to say, “Why don’t you plant one?” When we look at amendment 17 and consider the remarks at the beginning of the debate from the Chair of the Transport Committee, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), we need to reflect on the reality of a budget set at £42.6 billion—this seems to be used interchangeably with the spending envelope, albeit that it appears to have now grown to a £50 billion cap—that does not include the changes in design referred to in the powerful speech from the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms).
I want to draw hon. Members’ attention to the remarks that David Prout made to the Public Accounts Committee. One might have expected the contingency to have anticipated changes in design costs. Of the £50 billion cap, £21 billion is currently unspecified. More than £14 billion includes dealing with optimism bias and risk inflation—the initial 10% on that £15 billion figure—and then on top of that there is a further contingency of more than £4 billion for phase 1. Nowhere do the figures address changes to design, yet many of hon. Members’ remarks have been based on exactly that premise. I predict there will be public campaigns in Camden where people will say, “If we are going to have High Speed 2, let us connect it to High Speed 1 in a far better way.” Dare I say it, but there may be one or two well-connected opinion-formers in north London who will help that campaign. Yet David Prout said:
“The contingency would not include major changes in scope, for example, that the Select Committee might require. If the Select Committee requires an additional station”—
as some in Sheffield are hoping for—
“that is not included in the contingency. If it required 20 more miles of tunnelling”—
as the people of east Cheshire are hoping to secure—
“that is not included in the contingency. What we would expect to include in the contingency are the more minor adjustments in Select Committee to mitigate environmental impact.”
Those are the very environmental issues on which we still do not have a report.
Damian Collins
Does my hon. Friend agree that local government could also consider some of these issues? Kent county council is thinking of using money from the regional growth fund to upgrade the railway connection from the high-speed rail point in Ashford through Canterbury to Manston airport. Contributions could come from other pots of public money besides those found centrally by the Department for Transport.
Stephen Barclay
Indeed. That brings me to the distorting effect at the heart of the remarks made by my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Eric Ollerenshaw) and the paradox that the scheme will divert more funding to London.
Stephen Barclay
I will, but before doing so, may I thank my right hon. Friend, who, throughout his time as Minister, was most courteous and responsive? I take his intervention with pleasure.
Mr Burns
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I hope my intervention does not spoil that record. Is he taking into account the fact that some of the changes, particularly to phase 1, will actually save money? For example, the decision to tunnel around Hanger lane in west London will be cheaper than the original overground proposal, leaving us with money for swings and roundabouts.
Stephen Barclay
Of course, there will be some give and take. My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) highlighted the issues involved, but let us consider, for example, the Heathrow spur, on which we have had interventions. If Howard Davies decides to go with a hub airport at Heathrow—and one would think it logical for HS2 to connect to it—the cost of that is not in this budget, and neither is the cost of the connection in Camden, so the cost of tunnelling and the additional work that is likely to flow are not in these figures either. I wish, then, to draw the House’s attention to the pressure that is likely to follow from what Donald Rumsfeld would probably refer to as the “known unknowns”, which we know are going to be huge.
Mrs Gillan
My hon. Friend is listing all the items that are not included but which will add to the price of this project. The Government have now indicated their intention to accept the official Opposition’s amendment. I have been looking at some paperwork, and I believe that the cycling lanes in Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds will add up to another £750,000; the light rail construction, if it goes ahead, in Liverpool and Birmingham will cost about £1.6 billion; and if there is a walking programme for the seven cities, that will cost about £750,000. Those projects are all in the infrastructure pipeline, so we are looking at adding between £3 billion and £4 billion just to provide the connectivity to which the Government have agreed.
Stephen Barclay
My right hon. Friend makes a valid point. Inevitably, when large sums are being spent, there will be pressure to leverage it, and already the Government have signalled some tipping towards schemes linked to HS2. For example, they have referred to making cities “HS2 ready”, so it is in the very lexicon they are using.
Mrs Spelman
On a point of clarification about connectivity, local authorities have to take some responsibility as part of their transport plans. The Greater Birmingham and Solihull local enterprise partnership’s top priority is to make a bid to the single regeneration pot for light rail connections to Birmingham airport and the interchange station. When Lord Adonis was promoting high-speed rail, and we were not sure about it in the west midlands, the deal was basically that we would find the funds to build the station. There is a balance between local authority spend and other pots; it should not all come from a single resource.
Stephen Barclay
My right hon. Friend makes a fair point, but it is not the point that I am seeking to make. The £35 billion that has been allocated for control period 5, between 2014 and 2019, referred to in paragraph 18 of the Department’s case, does not cover many of the items on the wish-lists that Members are compiling today.
Andrew Bridgen
I totally agree with my hon. Friend’s analysis: there will be increased pressure on the HS2 mitigation budget for the route, which will put costs up. I put it to him that the only way in which any Government will be able to keep a cap on the cost of HS2 will be drastically to cut back on the compensation scheme for householders who are unduly affected by the project. That would be devastating for my constituents.
Stephen Barclay
I will come to the direct costs in a moment, but my hon. Friend makes a valid point. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors has told me that land prices have gone up threefold in the past decade. Not many households have been compensated so far, but the House of Commons Library informs me that 32 homes have been compensated to date—a very modest sample—and that the average cost per home has been £500,000. I do not know what the cost will be in north London, but I suspect that London house prices are going up quite quickly.
Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)
I would not wish to compete with my hon. Friend’s clear expertise in this matter, but has he considered reducing the budget for HS2 by using Old Oak Common as a terminus, thereby avoiding any of the activity in the Camden area that appears to be causing concern financially? That would fit with many European models, in which the terminus is situated outside the city centre and connected to the high-speed and cross-borough links. Has my hon. Friend considered that possibility as part of his investigation?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is a fellow Lancastrian, and he is a great champion for his constituents. Surely one of the difficulties with opting for out-of-town stations is that it would take people longer to get to where they needed to be. The clue is in the name: high-speed rail. If they travelled to an out-of-town station, they would still need to get into the city centre to complete their door-to-door journey.
Paul Maynard
This is a good opportunity to remind Members that the point of HS2 is to allow people to get to the areas of greatest economic activity, and those are not necessarily within five minutes of Euston station. The benefit of a terminus at Old Oak Common would be an ability to transfer quickly to the City, where the bulk of the economic activity takes place. This is the clear message from all high-speed rail networks around the world.
Stephen Barclay
Of course there is a debate around Old Oak Common, but I must point out the lack of clarity. Clearing a similar site for the Olympics cost £1 billion. Where is the figure for clearing and regenerating the site around Old Oak Common? Transport for London is putting in requests, stating that it is possible to leverage HS2 with better connectivity using Old Oak Common, and I think it is right to do so, but where is that proposal reflected in the figures?
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury made a clear statement on “The Andrew Marr Show” on Sunday. He did not say that the project would be delivered for £42 billion; he said that it would be delivered for less. That was the promise he made. Now we are talking about a cap of £50 billion, so an extra £7 billion has appeared in the space of a few days. In today’s debate, Members are adding their own wish-lists, which will add further to the costs.
Mr Simon Burns
The cost of HS2 is £42.6 billion, within which there is a contingency fund of £14.4 billion. The figure of £50 billion that my hon. Friend has referred to reflects the addition on top of that of £7.1 billion for rolling stock, of which £1.7 billion is the contingency fund. It is not for the building of the railway.
Stephen Barclay
The size and quantum of the contingency points to a lack of detail and of financial discipline in the cost estimates. That is why so much of it is vague.
I started my remarks believing that my time was unlimited, but having been made aware by one of my colleagues that my time is more finite than I originally expected, I shall dramatically shorten my speech and finish with reference to two issues.
First, on direct costs, reading the business case put forward this week, it is difficult to get a sense of the impact of energy prices on construction. We justified the high cost of our nuclear deal last week on the basis of rising energy prices, yet we seem to be quoting the same HS1 energy costs for steel construction for this project. Land prices seem vague. Network Rail still has a 23% efficiency gap. Is it to be a subcontractor? Are we going to fix the governance of Network Rail, which is still out of the scope of shareholders, of the National Audit Office and of freedom of information requests?
Secondly, there seem to be a number of contradictions with this project. If economic growth is as good as the passenger forecasts suggest, will it not put pressure on supplier costs for construction, particularly on a project that will deliver at its peak 40% of construction market work? We need far more transparency on costs.
Frank Dobson
It may interest the hon. Gentleman to know that about 220 households in my constituency will need to be re-housed at the expense of HS2. The authorities were rather shocked to discover that a one-bedroom flat in a block recently built in the locality is currently going for £482,000. Most of the people who need to be re-housed need a family-sized flat.
Stephen Barclay
The right hon. Gentleman brings great expertise to these issues. That takes me back to the reference to a blank cheque: my concern is that the House is being asked to exercise blind faith, which will have a hugely distorting effect on transport schemes elsewhere in the country—as pressure grows, for example, for Crossrail 2 to connect not at Tottenham Court Road, but at Euston. Other schemes in the system, such as the one in my area of Cambridgeshire, will be asset-stripped of what they rightly deserve.
Let me leave the House with the image that we look like someone coming down the platform with five business cases, while the train has already left the station and we are waiting for the announcement of whether we will hit our destination, which will be given next year not by the Government, but by the shadow Chancellor. I do not think that is the right way to proceed. We need to be far more careful with controlling the costs.
Andrew Bridgen
claimed to move the closure (Standing Order No. 36).
Question put forthwith, That the Question be now put.
Question agreed to.
Question put, That the amendment be made.
Question accordingly negatived.
Amendment made: 17, page 1, line 12, at end insert
‘as well as with such other parts of the transport network (including roads, footpaths, cycleways, airports and light railways) as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.’.— (Mr Goodwill.)
Mrs Gillan
I beg to move amendment 20, page 1, line 12, at end insert—
‘(2A) Expenditure permitted under this Act and in connection with the network (including rolling stock to be used on it) is limited to £50 billion.’.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment 30 , page 1, line 12 , at end insert—
‘(2A) Expenditure under this Act shall be limited to £5 billion.’.
Amendment 15, page 1, line 13, leave out ‘includes’ and insert ‘is restricted to’.
Amendment 21, page 2, line 1, at end insert—
‘(4) No payments in connection with expenditure under this Act shall be made to personal service companies, meaning any body set up for the purposes of allowing an individual or group of individuals to receive payments indirectly, including so as to reduce any part of their tax liability. The Secretary of State shall have power to make rules defining such companies, which shall be laid before and approved by resolution of both Houses of Parliament.’.
Amendment 22, page 2, line 1, at end insert—
‘(4) No bonuses shall be paid to any person working on the network or the preparatory work for it, and the expenditure authorised under this Act does not extend to the payment of any bonus. The Secretary of State shall have power to make rules defining such bonuses, which shall be laid before and approved by resolution of both Houses of Parliament.’.
Amendment 27, page 2, line 2, at end insert
‘For the purposes of Barnett formula spending, the network shall be designated an England-only project.’.
Government amendment 25.
Amendment 8, in clause 2, page 2, line 15, at end insert—
‘(d) the number and value of contracts placed with—
(i) UK companies with fewer than 500 employees,
(ii) UK companies with more than 500 employees, and
(iii) non-UK companies.’.
Amendment 16, page 2, line 15, at end insert—
‘(d) all expenditure in all departments across Government on matters related to the high speed railway transport network.’.
Government amendment 26.
Amendment 6, page 2, line 24, at end add—
‘(6) As soon as is reasonably practicable after preparatory spending ceases the Secretary of State will place before Parliament a final financial report, setting out all spending authorised by this legislation and including equivalent information to that required under subsection (2).’.
Amendment 31, page 2, line 24, at end add—
‘(6) Within six months of Royal Assent the Secretary of State shall present to Parliament an estimate of the expenditure to be incurred under section 1 during the period ending on 31 March 2015.
(7) On or before 30 September 2015 and on the anniversary thereof in each subsequent year the Secretary of State shall present to Parliament an estimate of the expenditure to be incurred under section 1 during the year ending 31 March following the date of such presentation.’.
Mrs Gillan
I am very glad that we managed to get through the preceding group of amendments without a vote. I think it is clear that the Government have not allowed enough time for proper scrutiny of the Bill, and it worries me considerably that a wider audience beyond the House will not understand that we reached that point. I shall therefore try to speak fairly briefly on this group of amendments, although it is one of the most important groups, apart from—if the Government press on with their proposals—the group relating to compensation, which is of great concern to everyone in the House.
HS2 is a huge financial risk. For some time, people—including, I believe, the Information Commissioner—have been pressing for the Government to release the Major Projects Authority report in full, but, as far as I am aware, neither that full report on the implications nor the amber-red report has yet been made available. Certainly neither has been made available to my office.
When I asked the Secretary of State
“if he will publish the report from the Audit and Risk Management Committee presented at the board meeting of HS2 Ltd on 18 July 2013”,
he replied:
“The update from the Audit and Risk Management Committee was given verbally at the meeting. HS2 Ltd does not hold a written report.”—[Official Report, 8 October 2013; Vol. 568, c. 193W.]
In the absence of the transparency that would enable us to read the risk analysis from the Major Projects Authority, and given the Secretary of State’s response to a request for a regular update on financial risk, it is difficult for us to assess whether the Government are sticking to their guns.
In amendment 20, I have sought to provide the cap that everyone is talking about. I had expected Labour Members to table such an amendment, and I am surprised that they did not, because they have made much of the fact that they will not give this project a blank cheque, and that the expenditure can go only so far and no further. Amendment 25—which I think the Government are minded to accept, as two Conservative Members have added their names to it—is limited to some financial reporting, and some crystal ball-gazing on the effect that an underspend or an overspend would have. It reminds me rather of “The Merchant of Venice” in many ways. I think that the Labour party has bottled out completely and remains sitting on the fence, and I do not think that people will forgive it for that.
Steve McCabe
I want the cost to be contained as well, but does it not worry the right hon. Lady that if she presses ahead with her amendment, she will effectively put a cap on transport links to northern cities, in which none of her side was interested when we were talking about London and south-east developments?
Mrs Gillan
I do not think that that is true at all. I think that what I am doing is giving Members—such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns)—who claim that the project will come in at bang on £42.6 billion, or indeed less, an opportunity to enshrine that in statute.
Mrs Gillan
I would like to make some progress.
What worries me particularly, even in the case of this project, is that it will run out of money. Infrastructure projects have a very unfortunate history, both in this country and abroad, and megaprojects—
Mrs Gillan
I have already said that I will not.
Mega-projects of this sort are subject to great risk, and almost never fulfil their promise. The passenger numbers never equal those that were predicted, and the costs always exceed those predicted. What will happen if this Government, or any Government of any complexion, start to run out of money and see the bills going up? The contingency reserve may not be enough, and what will suffer is what will come at the end of this project.
We make much of protecting our environment—Members in all parts of the House make much of our green credentials—but we should consider what the reinstatement of our countryside will cost. We should consider the ancient woodlands that have been destroyed, and the work that will be necessary for some time to maintain biodiversity, mitigate noise, and offset the loss of some of our amenities. I do not agree that compensation will suffer. The Government seem perfectly capable of paying compensation with or without this Bill. The sum of compensation paid to date is £52 million, so I think that that is irrelevant to whether this Bill goes through or not. I worry greatly about that, but the genesis of this project is the fact that in March 2010 the cost for the whole route was £30 billion; by February 2011 it had risen to £33 billion; by January 2012 it had risen to £33.4 billion; and we are now at £42.6 billion without the rolling stock being included.
Mrs Gillan
I want Members to make their own points, and I am just going to make the points I need to make on my amendments.
Mrs Spelman
I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend, because I am worried that, given the time, we may not get to my amendments about biodiversity offsetting. I received a letter from the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on 20 October saying DEFRA and Natural England are currently working with HS2
“on a proposed methodology for accounting for habitats.”
That is for biodiversity offsetting, showing clearly the funds and methodology needed to offset the loss of green space. I am sure she and I very much want to see that.
Mrs Gillan
I am pleased I let my right hon. Friend make that intervention, because I, too, am worried.
Mrs Gillan
How could I resist my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford?
Mr Burns
I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend. May I seek clarification from her because I am very concerned? This Bill is authorising the spending of money on the preparation work for building HS2. In one of her amendments, she is trying to limit that spending on the preparatory work to £50 billion, which seems far more, to the Nth degree, than the Government would ever want to spend on preparatory work. Surely there is something slightly wrong with this amendment.
Mrs Gillan
I do not think there is anything wrong with this amendment at all. It was a probing amendment, and just as the Government managed to slip their name under the official Opposition’s leading name on one amendment, I hoped that the Opposition might slip their name under mine as it contains the cap they wanted. Also, if we had had some adjustments to this Bill, it would have encompassed the spend. If we are going to have a money Bill, it should not just cover the open-ended preparatory work—now my right hon. Friend is wanting to have his cake and eat it—but should cover the money that is going to be spent on the project. After all, he has been arguing for—[Interruption.] Well, we know the hybrid Bill is coming. It will be a gargantuan monster of a Bill that will take up more time in this House than any other Bill has ever done.
Amendment 15 seeks to restrict the preparatory expenditure. I am sure my Front-Bench colleagues will say that these amendments are contradictory, but they are probing amendments. I did not serve on the Bill Committee so this is the opportunity for me to get these matters discussed. I think we need to restrict the expenditure to those items that are on the face of the Bill. Currently, the word “includes” in clause 1(3) means that the Bill is the blank cheque to which I referred earlier. I think that, in the Bill’s current form, there is no restriction. I am sure the Government will not accept any restriction, but they would have been in a much better place if they had done so.
I shall move on now, as I know many other Members want to speak. There are colleagues who are not in the House today but whom I have consulted in Buckinghamshire. The Attorney-General, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), knows his residents at Denham are wholly opposed to this proposal, and I know that the Minister for Europe, my right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr Lidington), is continuing to work tirelessly within Government to put to the most senior Ministers the arguments and interests of his constituency. He has asked me to point out today that there are serious mitigation issues both in Wendover and Aylesbury that are still not resolved, yet the Department’s current plans make no adequate provision either for the measures to reduce noise or for fair compensation. I am also concerned for Mr Speaker, whose constituents in Buckingham continue to express overwhelming opposition.
This money Bill writes a blank cheque for the Government, or it purports to write a blank cheque and give the Government a fig leaf to cover their embarrassment about the hundreds of millions they have already spent and the £1 billion they will spend by the time we reach the next election. I was, however, hoping that we could regularise some of the terms and conditions of the people working on this project, which is the aim of amendments 21 and 22.
Amendment 21 deals with payments made through service companies. I do not know how many people in this House pay close attention to this matter, but there has certainly been a lot of fuss about service companies, particularly in connection with the BBC and others. When I asked a fairly innocuous parliamentary question, I was surprised to find out that in the past 12 months HS2 Ltd has engaged 48 people paid through personal service companies. Apparently, eight of those people have either left the company or transferred to the payroll, and a further 12 will have left or transferred by 31 December. That means that there will still be many people who are paid through personal service companies. Apparently, the Department was carrying out an assurance process at the time to ensure that all those people were compliant with their tax and national insurance obligations, and the good news is that the response was that they were—none was not compliant. But on a Government project of this sort, being paid for from the public purse, people should be paid as civil servants and they should not be in receipt of bonuses.
Much has been made about bonuses in and around this House in connection with many other professions. MPs do not get a bonus, and neither would I be asking for one as an MP, but I was shocked to find that between 2011 and 2013 people in the Department for Transport, including people working on HS2 Ltd, have been paid bonuses of more than £3 million between them. I admit that many of those bonuses will be small, but we should still put our money where our mouth is and the practice should cease. I also understand that HS2 Ltd, which was operating bonus schemes, is no longer doing so for its employees. I am pleased about that, because I do not think we can say one thing in one area of government and practise a different set of procedures in another.
Stephen Barclay
When my right hon. Friend tabled that parliamentary question, did she get clarification of whether any of those on personal service contracts were ex-staff of the Department for Transport and whether they had received any pay-off from the Department?
Mrs Gillan
No, I did not, but that is the sort of fine detail of the finance that we will need to look at, as it should be examined. One thing I have been trying to have a look at is Mr Higgins’s new employment contract, which I understand does not start until January. I have been denied sight of that, but I wanted to see what performance bonuses, or any other inducement or performance-related measure, it contained.
Amendment 27, tabled by the—[Interruption.] Forgive me, a year is a long time, and I cannot recall the constituency.
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (PC)
Carmarthen East and Dinefwr.
Mrs Gillan
As a former Secretary of State for Wales, I am particularly concerned—[Laughter.] You can’t know everything, can you, Madam Deputy Speaker? I do apologise.
As a former Welsh Secretary, I am concerned that this railway, currently planned only to be in England, needs also to make sure that it bears the costs of “Barnettising” that expenditure, particularly for Wales, but also for Scotland, if the railway does not go there, and for Northern Ireland. That is particularly the case in the light of the PLANET Long Distance model—PLD—zone information in the KPMG report, which showed that places like Neath, Port Talbot and Newport completely miss out. I am sure the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) shares my sadness that there are no Welsh Members on the Opposition Benches to plead the case for Wales. I am rather disappointed that they are not here because it shows that they are not interested in pressing the case for Wales.
Andrew Bridgen
Does my right hon. Friend have any estimate of the cost of Barnettisation on this project and what that would add to the total cost of HS2?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. Before the right hon. Lady resumes her comments, may I gently remind her that she has been speaking for some 16 minutes? The knife comes down at 4 o’clock and there are many other Members who would like to speak on this group of amendments, so I hope she might be coming to a conclusion.
Mrs Gillan
Indeed, Madam Deputy Speaker, I am.
Finally, on my amendment 16, I say, “Mark my words”: the cost to the taxpayer, the council tax payer and other Departments will rise and rise. The costs in Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool just of promoting the project show that there is public money going into the project which is not being accounted for, particularly in the Bill.
Will the Minister include and publish the costs that have been incurred and will be incurred on a regular basis in other Departments, such as the Department for Communities and Local Government, the Department of Energy and Climate Change, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Treasury? If we do not get to see those costs, the Government will be concealing the real cost of HS2, which should be taken into consideration.
Mr Straw
I shall speak particularly to amendment 25, which has the support of my Front Bench and, I am pleased to say, of the Government as well. I was a member of the Cabinet in 2009 which first gave formal approval to HS2. That was endorsed in the run-up to the general election by all-party agreement. Although I have taken a close interest in the project ever since, I have seen nothing in the intervening period to persuade me to withdraw my support for it.
The case is clear. First, thanks to a dramatic increase in the usage of the railways in the past 15 years—I am very proud of Labour’s record—we face a situation where, for both freight and passengers, the existing lines cannot cope. As someone who for years has had to endure the west coast main line, I have to say that large sums of money were spent during that period—one of the reasons why there was so little electrification—on patch and mend to that line and on quadrupling the line in the Trent valley, with very little overall benefit. If folk in the House and outside think there is an alternative to HS2, they are right that there is, but it is a worse alternative, with more disruption and greater cost.
The second reason why I strongly support HS2 is that it will help to rebalance our economies. I have listened to some fancy arguments in the House, but among the fanciest are those that I have heard today and from colleagues in the Tea Room—that if we put in this investment, it will somehow suck more economic activity into London. It is worth turning that argument on its head or, as the Treasury likes to say, looking at the counterfactual. If that were the case, it would be overwhelmingly an argument for reducing the capacity of the railways north-south and for slowing up the lines. It is simple nonsense.
Mr Straw
I will in a moment, but I am conscious that others want to get in before the knife.
I come to the issue of the costs. No one is in favour of providing blank cheques for schemes, but I have seen no evidence that a blank cheque is being provided for this scheme. What we are talking about is £42 billion until 2033, which works out at just over £2 billion a year. That is a lot of money but, in the grand scheme of things, including infrastructure investment, it is not huge, particularly when compared with the massive amount of money that has rightly been put in by successive Governments to improve infrastructure in London and the south-east. I would be happy to support that, but it is time that the investment went elsewhere.
Frank Dobson
Does my right hon. Friend feel that some people might be a bit suspicious that a contingency sum of £14 billion closely resembles a blank cheque?
Andrew Bridgen
The right hon. Gentleman is obviously an advocate of HS2, and that can be his view, but will he explain the discrepancy between his view and that of the noble Lord Mandelson, who was also a member of the previous Labour Government?
Mr Straw
I have certainly never wished to speak for my right hon. and noble Friend Lord Mandelson. All I can report as a matter of fact is that my right hon. and noble Friend was in the same Cabinet Room in 2009 when the project was endorsed. If he has had some reverse damascene conversion, it is for him to explain that, not me.
Let me turn to the issue of costs. I was chairman of the Cabinet Committee on the Olympics for its first four years. The first bid was put in at about £2.5 billion and the ultimate cost came out at £9 billion. Let me explain why there is no direct comparison. The bid was not based on the contingency but on a prayer that we would win it. Not a huge amount of effort was put into costing it because, frankly, very few people ever thought we would win. It was only after we had won on 6 July 2005 that the serious work began and led, quite properly, by the Treasury, we considered the contingencies.
I say to my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) that a contingency of such a size is sensible, because there needs to be an optimism bias. That was what was put into the budget for the Olympics by the man who is now Sir David Higgins, who turned that project around. Contrary to what was said by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), the Olympics as an infrastructure project came in not only on time, because it had to, but on budget. Those who are worried about a blank cheque—any Chancellor or shadow Chancellor needs to be—should be reassured that Sir David Higgins is now in charge. I have every confidence in him, not only from his time running this operation and the Olympics, but from his time at Network Rail. He got costs down and took a close interest in the detail of the projects.
Frank Dobson
Can my right hon. Friend confirm that Sir David Higgins spent all the contingency sum on the Olympics?
Mr Straw
Not quite, I think. There were reasons for that, however, and for the contingencies. These are very large projects. There were also contingencies for Crossrail, for Thameslink and for the expansion of Euston in 1968 and I do not recall Members who would have benefited directly from those projects raising issues about contingencies at the time.
Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)
The right hon. Gentleman and I worked with David Higgins on the improvements to the Blackburn-Manchester rail line, which serves both our constituencies. Given the right hon. Gentleman’s experience with that project, does he regret the fact that a long-term view, which we found we needed, is not being taken by those on his own Front Bench, who seem to be holding a question mark over the future of HS2?
Mr Straw
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that he and I have had direct experience of dealing with Sir David Higgins on a micro-level as well as a macro-level, and very impressive he is too. I do not criticise anybody who either holds or might hold the purse strings for wanting to ensure that we bear down on costs, but those on my Front Bench and the whole of the parliamentary Labour party, as has been made clear, support the project and the Bill. That is why, if a Division is called at 5 o’clock, we will be in the Lobby with the Government in support of the Third Reading of the Bill. Let me make that clear. We started this project and I hope very much that the Labour party is in a position to ensure that we finish it.
Steve McCabe
Does my right hon. Friend agree that it might help those who want to support the project and perhaps make it easier for the softer opponents if the contingency figure was reduced? At a third of the projected total cost, it seems remarkably high, and it might risk inflating the project’s costs.
Mr Straw
I know about optimism bias contingency costs because I faced exactly the same situation when I chaired the Cabinet Committee for the Olympics. My initial reaction was the same as that of my hon. Friend and my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras: “Why on earth are we building in a contingency reserve on this scale?” I got the Treasury officials in and cross-examined them—I bumped into one the other day who remembers it—but in the end I was convinced that what was proposed was prudent, to use an adjective that used to be owned by the Labour party, and still is. Contingency reserves of that size are sensible and realistic. Yes, the cost is £42 billion, but that is over 20 years, so we are looking at a cost of about £2 billion a year, of which the optimism bias contingency reserve is about £700 million. In my judgment, such things are manageable.
Mr Straw
I must make some progress.
Of course I understand the concerns of Members on both sides of the House about their constituencies. Were I in their position, I would probably be voicing similar concerns. However, when the grand motorway schemes were being built across the country, including in the Chilterns—the M40 goes right through them—there was no parliamentary process of this kind at all. There were no private Bills; there were private inquiries and compulsory purchase orders, and on it went. Of course there was an argument about the exact route the M40 would take when it went through the escarpment out of the Chilterns and around Oxfordshire, but I do not recall any Member from Buckinghamshire standing up in the House recently to say that building it was a disaster, that the effect on biodiversity was terrible and that we should return the land to the way it was.
Had there been a parliamentary process for the M40, the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham can bet her life that such would have been the opposition in the Chilterns—I understand exactly why, because we are all concerned about our own back gardens, including me—that it would never have been built. However, that road, at far greater disruption to the area than any railway will ever cause, has brought benefits to her constituency and county. While she continues to pursue her constituency concerns, I hope that she also recognises that there is a national interest in rebalancing our economy and ensuring that people in the north can get to the south more quickly.
Mrs Gillan
My concern is not only about my constituency, but about how we use taxpayers’ money. I am as keen as the right hon. Gentleman to rebalance the economy between the north and the south; I just do not think that HS2 is the way to do it. The M40 has of course brought benefits, but that does not mean that the damage that will be done to the environment by yet another breach of the area of outstanding natural beauty can be brushed aside, although it is quite obvious that he thinks that the suffering of my constituents and their businesses is a price worth paying.
Mr Straw
My last point is this: far from being brushed aside, the environmental concerns are being taken into account in far greater measure than was ever the case with the motorway schemes. I hope that the Bill goes through this afternoon so that we can then see an all-party consensus behind the project and introduce the hybrid Bill, if possible before the general election.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Stephen Hammond)
It is a great pleasure to see you in your place, Madam Deputy Speaker, and a great pleasure and honour to follow the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw).
These amendments deal with expenditure, reporting and costs. The Government have set out in a strategic plan the spending plans for High Speed 2, which are £21.4 billion for phase 1 and £21.2 billion for phase 2 —a total cost of £42.6 billion, including £14.4 of contingency. I am convinced that, as the right hon. Gentleman pointed out, that is likely to decline as the date of construction nears. HS2 Ltd has set out a target cost for phase one of £17.16 billion.
The original purpose of the reporting duty on the Government was to give Parliament an opportunity to scrutinise the manner in which we were spending the preparatory expenditure and to get a sense of how we were making progress on the project. Amendment 25 is very much in the spirit of that objective. I am happy to provide the commitment that the Government will ensure that the reporting duty makes information on underspends and overspends explicit.
Managing costs is at the heart of how the Government intend to manage this project.
Stephen Hammond
If I were to do that, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) has pointed out, I would be making a commitment of £50 billion on the preparatory expenditure. I do not intend that we spend anything like £50 billion on that. As my right hon. Friend said in response to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), this Bill is about the preparatory expenditure.
Mr Simon Burns
There seems to be utter confusion about this. The cost of the project is £42.6 billion, with £7.1 billion for the rolling stock, but the Bill is about the preparatory work. It is preposterous to grant, in legislation, the Government of the day £50 billion to spend on preparatory work.
Stephen Hammond
I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. He is absolutely correct in his understanding; of course he would be, as he has so skilfully managed the Bill so far.
Stephen Hammond
I am going to make some progress because I think that my hon. Friend is going to refer to amendment 20. If he waits for a moment I will deal with that.
We have always made it clear that HS2 will provide a significant opportunity for vocational skills across the lifetime of the project, giving a real boost to British industry. This Government are committed to raising skill levels and creating an environment for small and medium-sized enterprises to succeed. Amendment 26 would place an obligation on the Government to report on their progress in delivering those opportunities and to demonstrate what we mean when we say that HS2 is an engine for growth. I have always been convinced, as have many Members across the House, that we will be able to do that. HS2 is a generational scheme, and as such we need to make sure we have the right home-grown talent that allows us to deliver it. I am delighted that there is cross-party support for amendments 25 and 26, and I hope that the whole House will be able to support them.
Mr Chope
Will my hon. Friend turn his mind to amendment 30, which seeks to limit the amount of expenditure on preparatory works to £5 billion—a pretty substantial sum, but obviously not as large as £50 billion? Will the Government undertake not to spend more than £5 billion on preparatory works?
Stephen Hammond
I might be prepared to consider that. However, my hon. Friend needs to be absolutely clear that this is about the preparatory works on phases 1 and 2 as opposed to preparatory works for the whole scheme were it to go further and create a network. His amendment does not cover that, and that is why it is unnecessary.
Mr Simon Burns
As I understand it, this Bill relates not only to phases 1 and 2 of current high-speed rail projects, but to phases 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 of such projects at any time in the next 40 to 60 years. How could the Government of today restrict the amount of money available without knowing the value of money in 40 years’ time?
Stephen Hammond
My right hon. Friend is completely correct. This Bill is about the preparatory expenditure. It is also about not only phases 1 and 2, but the whole network as it may be conceived in the future. It would, therefore, be completely erroneous to restrict ourselves to a limit on preparatory costs, because we do not know the future extent of any network. That is also why I agreed with my right hon. Friend a moment ago that amendment 20 is unnecessary.
I know that the intention of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham was to put a limit on expenditure and I understand why she wanted to do that, but the amendment does not explicitly address preparatory expenditure, which is what this Bill is about. I note that she said it was a probing amendment.
Mrs Gillan
The Minister knows exactly what my intention was with my amendments. I will not press any of them to a vote, but what is worrying about the Bill is that it is not restricted in any way, shape or form. It is totally open-ended, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) has just admitted, and this House has no control or say over what moneys will be spent on the preparation, and on the HS2 project itself. That is what I object to and that is where I think the Government have failed.
Stephen Hammond
It is rare that I disagree with my right hon. Friend, but in this case I do. What this Bill does is explicitly place reporting obligations on the Government for the preparatory work. Moreover, it is the hybrid Bill, which my right hon. Friend has mentioned, that will provide the opportunity to scrutinise all stages and costs.
We have created the reporting duty precisely to ensure that Parliament can scrutinise the expenditure and see that we are spending it responsibly. Planned expenditure on design works for the financial year 2013-14 is about £2.5 million, and for 2014-15 it is about £9.2 million.
There are a number of other amendments in this group and I know that other Members want to get in. I sympathise with the spirit of amendment 8, but it does not clarify the exact level that most people recognise as the number of people employed by small and medium-sized enterprises. Moreover, it would restrict a small or medium-sized enterprise that had fewer employees, but that hoped to secure a high-value contract that would result in many UK jobs. The amendment goes beyond the direct nature of the contract.
Stephen Hammond
On amendment 31 and the transparency of the project, I do not believe it is necessary to produce six-monthly reports of spending estimates in addition to the annual reports to which we have already committed. Given what my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham has said, I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) would not want us to waste money or create bureaucracy just to produce six-monthly reports. Such a requirement would be onerous on the Government.
Stephen Hammond
The Government accept that we need to come to the House to explain our actions and report on our preparatory expenditure. As has been discussed extensively this afternoon, the initial target cost for phase 1 is £17.16 billion.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham has tabled amendments on the monitoring of tax avoidance and the payment of bonuses to those who work on High Speed 2. We must manage the costs, but we must balance that with ensuring that the staff reward arrangements attract the right talent. We need to ensure that those who work in the public sector demonstrate the highest standards of integrity and meet their tax obligations.
Following the review of the tax arrangements of public sector appointees last year by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, all Departments and agencies have a duty to seek assurances about the tax arrangements of their long-term specialists and contractors to ensure that they are paying the right amount of tax. The Government are committed to tackling all forms of tax avoidance and have taken a wide range of measures to close tax loopholes.
It is essential that we guard against the payment of bonuses that are not in line with the Government’s goal of reducing the public sector remuneration package. However, we must ensure that we have the right reward structure in place. We must not put provisions in legislation that would tie the hands of the whole supply chain. I am happy to confirm to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham that Sir David Higgins will move to High Speed 2 on the same salary that he received at Network Rail and that he has guaranteed that he will not accept any bonuses. I hope that that satisfies her.
I hope that the House will support amendments 25 and 26.
Lilian Greenwood
I am pleased to speak in support of amendment 25, which represents a significant strengthening of the financial reporting requirements in clause 2.
Taxpayers need to know that the costs are being controlled. Under this Government, the budget for HS2 has swelled from £773 million to at least £900 million in this Parliament. The botched design for Euston pushed the cost of that station from £1.2 billion to £1.6 billion, even though some of the features of the design were downgraded. The Government announced in June that, with a sizeable increase in contingency funding, the headline budget for the project had increased by £10 billion to £50.1 billion.
Lilian Greenwood
I am afraid that I am very short of time.
That headline budget includes the costs of construction and procuring rolling stock. That is reflected in amendment 25, which I believe is superior to amendment 20, which has been proposed by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan).
In short, Ministers have failed to keep the costs under control. The rising budget for HS2 has damaged the public perception of the project. It is therefore vital that, under the incoming leadership of Sir David Higgins, financial discipline is imposed. The use of the project’s £14.4 billion contingency fund must be minimised wherever possible. Ministers must ensure that Sir David Higgins has their full backing in that task.
Amendment 25 is designed to ensure that that happens. It will introduce a powerful mechanism to ensure that there is financial responsibility. It will force the Government to announce any overspend of the yearly budget. It will also provide an incentive to identify areas in which costs can be reduced, as was successfully done on the Crossrail project.
Lilian Greenwood
I will not give way at the moment.
Given that the Government have produced annual budgets for the project up to 2020-21, it makes sense to measure progress against that yardstick.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)
We will hear the point of order after 4 o’clock.
Lilian Greenwood
The Government’s hopelessly ambitious timetable to pass the hybrid Bill for phase 1 by the middle of 2015 makes it even more important that we introduce stringent reporting standards. Even Ministers acknowledge that that plan is challenging, and that is putting it mildly. It appears to be certain that spending will continue under the authority of the preparation Bill beyond the general election. If it does, there must be proper reporting requirements in place. In fact, we submitted a similar amendment in Committee, and I am sorry it was deemed unnecessary at the time. I am glad the Government have been persuaded to think again and have accepted our amendment. It will make for a tougher Bill that makes Ministers accountable for bearing down on costs, and it will deliver better value for public investment.
Mr Cash
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. We have not reached the last group of amendments, which are vital to all the people in my constituency and throughout the country who are affected by the Bill. This point of order is about the travesty of proceedings in relation to the programme motion and all that goes with it.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)
The hon. Gentleman, as ever, makes his point, but as he and the House know, that is not a point of order. The timetabling of discussions on this Bill is a matter for the House.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)
The hon. Gentleman indicates that he wishes to move an amendment that has not been spoken to, and I cannot take his amendment.
Third Reading
Mr McLoughlin
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
Let me begin by thanking all Members who served on the Public Bill Committee. In particular I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), not only for his work on the Bill, but also for the hard work that he put into the Department for Transport during his time there. It was a great pleasure to work with him.
For a project as important as this, everyone should have their say—indeed, it sometimes feels as if they do. At the same time, however, we need to move the debate forward, which is what the Bill does. This is the point at which the debate starts moving from “if “ to “when”. The House has already voted overwhelmingly in favour of the principle of a new high-speed, high-capacity rail network. I hope it will do so again this evening because the decisions we take today will benefit our country for decades to come.
Just this week, with the storms that hit the south and east, we have seen how crucial our railways are to national life. When trains are crowded and disrupted, life for hard-working people gets more difficult. That is why the new north-south line is not some expensive luxury.
Mr McLoughlin
I will, but I do so reluctantly because of the number of hon. Members who want to take part in Third Reading.
Mr Cash
I understand why the Secretary of State is reluctant to give way. Throughout the whole of this land, people are deeply disturbed by the manner in which the Bill is being rammed through. Furthermore, as he well knows, the arrangements he has described as benefits are not accepted by my constituents and many other people, nor by the many reports emanating from the Public Accounts Committee and others that demonstrate that HS2 is not a straightforward benefit, and is in fact quite the opposite.
Mr McLoughlin
I know my hon. Friend is not in favour of the new line—he loses no time in telling me that. I dare say that similar comments were made in debates on railways in the House over the centuries. The truth is that the line will be the first line built north of London in 120 years. I understand the concerns of hon. Members whose constituencies the line goes through. I do not dismiss them and have never done so. I want to ensure that we have a fair compensation scheme in place. I believe that the scheme is, without any doubt, right for the future of the UK.
I find it rather ridiculous that I can go from London to Paris on a high-speed train, and that my hon. Friend can go from London to Brussels on a high-speed train—I know he keeps a close eye on what goes on there—but we cannot go from London to Birmingham, Manchester or Leeds on a high-speed train. The time has come for a steep uplift in our transport system.
I should tell my hon. Friend that there is still a long way to go. We must take the hybrid Bill through the Commons. There will be plenty of opportunities to debate it in detail. As the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) said, HS2 will be debated in far more detail than roads that now go through various constituencies when they probably caused greater environmental damage.
Mr McLoughlin
I do not want to take too long because I know many hon. Members want to speak. I will give way—for the last time—to my hon. Friend.
Andrew Bridgen
I thank my right hon. Friend for giving way. It is true that this is a high-speed debate. Does he agree that an hour is completely insufficient parliamentary time for a Third Reading debate on the largest infrastructure project the country has ever seen?
Mr McLoughlin
My hon. Friend has taken part in the Third Reading of many Bills—they have always been hour-long debates. In fact, it is only recently that we have had debates on Third Reading. Back in the days when the right hon. Member for Blackburn was Leader of the House, we sometimes did not have debates on Third Reading because we simply did not have the time. The Government are trying to help everybody we can—[Interruption.] I do not want to get any more partisan now that I have the right hon. Gentleman on side.
The Bill is about helping communities and businesses, and helping the cities of the north and the midlands to compete on equal terms with London. Nobody begrudges the money we are spending on Crossrail or Thameslink. They are huge investments in our capital city, but it is time we looked at what is happening in the rest of the country.
Three important words—room for growth—sum up why the project is so important. They are at the core of the strategic case we published on Tuesday. The responses to the report show the crucial message of growth. The British Chambers of Commerce states:
“This report bolsters the economic case for HS2…HS2 is the only scheme that can transform capacity on Britain’s overstretched railways.”
The CBI has thrown its considerable weight behind the project. It did so because the new line is part of the answer to the infrastructure deficit that faces our country. The leaders of our great cities back HS2. Sir Richard Leese, leader of Manchester city council, has said:
“It’s straightforward and simple. We need more capacity and the only way is through this new network.”
Since 2008, the country has learned some tough lessons, but we must make ourselves more resilient and competitive as an economy. That will not happen if we do not take the long-term decisions on investment and stick to them. Our society is changing, our population is growing, people are travelling more, and demand for inter-city rail travel has doubled in the past 15 years and will continue to increase.
As I have said all along, I welcome suggestions for creating more capacity, but the so-called alternative suggestions from the critics simply do not add up. We have looked at the case for building new motorways and dramatically expanding domestic aviation. Neither does the job. Some people believe we can carry on squeezing more room out of our current railways, patching up our problems. The work we published this week shows that, if we tried to create the capacity we needed by upgrading the three current main north-south lines, we would face 14 years of weekend closures. That is not an alternative to the new line, it is disruption on a nightmare scale.
We are already investing record sums in the existing railway. Network Rail will spend £38.3 billion in its next five-year control period, and the Government have a £73 billion budget for wider transport investment over the next Parliament. Despite all that, we will still need new rail capacity. If one accepts that—and that we need room to grow—there is no choice about how to provide it. As the strategic case makes clear, a new high-speed north-south line is not just the right way, it is the only way.
The new north-south line will be the backbone of Britain. It will have 18 trains an hour, each carrying up to 1,100 passengers, transforming the available space on inter-city lines. As long-distance services transfer to the new line, capacity will be released on the existing network. Of course, not every city across Britain will benefit in the same way, but Network Rail estimates that more than 100 cities and towns could benefit from released capacity. It would mean significantly more commuter services, better connectivity and more routes for rail freight, taking lorries off our most congested roads.
We know that HS2 is the best answer to our transport problems, but as with any large infrastructure scheme, we also know we will face opposition. I respect the fact that some people are concerned about the impact on the places they live, and I respect those with serious proposals for improvements. Already, the environmental impact of the new line has been vastly reduced thanks to such improvements. But I also respect what Sir John Armitt said in his recent report on infrastructure—that big schemes need “broad political consensus” as well as “resolution” from political leaders.
HS2 must be a national project with support across the parties, or in the end it will be nothing. Labour leaders in our great cities across the north and the midlands know that HS2 is right. To those who say that there is no blank cheque, I say that there never has been and there never will be. I know that hon. Members want costs controlled. Here are the facts. The target price for the first phase is £17.16 billion. That is the price for construction agreed with HS2 Ltd. For the whole Y-route, the agreed budget is £42.6 billion, including a contingency of £14.4 billion, which we are determined to bear down on. Sir David Higgins—the man who built the Olympics on time and on budget—will make sure that happens. As the new chairman of HS2, he will bring his penetrating eye and expertise to the task to get the best value for our country.
As the strategic case published this week shows, our updated benefit-cost ratio has fallen slightly from 2.5 to 2.3. We have been open about that, but it means that the business case for the new north-south line is still strong, with more than £2 returned for every £1 invested—about the same as Crossrail and Thameslink, and nobody seems to doubt those projects. In fact, the ratio for HS2 could increase to 4.5 if rail demand continues to rise until 2049.
It is still important to recognise that the benefit-cost ratio cannot take account of unpredictable factors. That was true of the Jubilee line extension in London, for instance, which did not include the 100,000 jobs it now supports at Canary Wharf. It was true for High Speed 1, which did not include benefits from redevelopment at King’s Cross and St Pancras. When I first became a Member of Parliament, King’s Cross and St Pancras were places where people did not want to spend any time if they could possibly get away with it. They would try to turn up just before their train was due to leave. Those stations are now destinations in their own right. People go there and look with amazement at what has happened to the UK’s railway system.
Frank Dobson
I represent not just St Pancras, but Euston and King’s Cross. Does the Secretary of State accept that virtually all the people in my constituency who are now opposed to HS2 were strongly in favour—indeed, the first advocates—of the transformation of St Pancras and the improvements at King’s Cross?
Mr McLoughlin
Of course I do. I am more than happy to meet the right hon. Gentleman to discuss the particular issue of Euston station, because the redevelopment will bring specific problems. But we must also ensure that we get the very best deal for his constituents in the redevelopment of Euston station. I am meeting the leader of Camden council next week, although I do not know if the right hon. Gentleman will be there. I do not discount the concerns of local residents about the work on major infrastructure projects, and we have to take them into account.
Jonathan Edwards
Last week it was disclosed that the Treasury had made a mistake and awarded Barnett consequentials to Wales in the 2015-16 spending round. Subsequently, the Treasury said it would claw the money back in the next spending review and that it did not set a precedent. Will the Secretary of State confirm that there will not be a clawback, that the precedent has now been set and that Wales will have the consequentials? Unless he does so, we will vote against him on Third Reading.
Mr McLoughlin
It would be a brave Secretary of State who started second-guessing the Treasury, and I will not do that now. I understand the hon. Gentleman’s representations and will bear them in mind.
I will briefly explain the next steps. We intend to submit the hybrid Bill before Christmas. In February, the growth taskforce reports. I know the challenges ahead, but also the opportunities. We are not here to patch up our railway once again, only to spend far more later when it turns out that we should have invested properly at the start. It will take determination to strengthen our country. I urge this House to support the Bill. It is our chance to get ahead and to invest in our long-term prosperity.
Mary Creagh (Wakefield) (Lab)
I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), to his new role, and I look forward to working with him. I pay tribute to my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle), for her work in holding no fewer than four Transport Secretaries to account, and for her tireless work to develop Labour’s transport policy. I pay tribute, too, to my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) for piloting the Bill through Committee in a co-operative manner. Following in her footsteps, I am proud to support High Speed 2, and I am proud to support getting good value for public money, too.
We support plans for a new north-south rail line, but we are clear that the Government must get a grip on the costs. High Speed 2 was the brainchild of Lord Adonis, the Labour Government’s last Transport Secretary. We understand that the railway is not needed just to tackle the rail capacity crunch that we face in the next ten years: managed properly, HS2 has the power to transform the economic geography of our country. It will build our great cities and bring them closer together. It will connect people to each other, to work and to leisure. It will help to rebalance the economy, creating and using our country’s manufacturing skills.
Charlie Elphicke
This is an important project requiring national consensus. It needs all parties to support HS2 if it is to go ahead—no ifs, no buts. Will the Labour party support this project properly: yes or no?
Mary Creagh
If the hon. Gentleman had listened, he would know that I just said we will support HS2. We shall be voting in favour of it this evening.
This is the first new north-south railway for more than 100 years, but Labour's brainchild has, sadly, been neglected by the Government. Instead of gestation, we have had stagnation. The project has been put at risk by delays, project mismanagement and, in July, by a huge increase to the budget.
First, on delays, Ministers looked at strategic alternatives to High Speed 2. That took until November 2011, which wasted 18 months and led to slippage in the project timetable, with Ministers now playing catch-up. Costs in this Parliament have risen from £700 million to £900 million. The National Audit Office has warned that this tighter time scale poses risks to the project:
“Faster preparation for the bill may increase the extent of petitions to Parliament which may make it less likely that royal assent is granted by the planned date of May 2015.”
Another delay is that the consultation on phase 2 of the route has only just been launched for the Y part of the network, despite the fact that it was being worked on when we were in power three years ago. Ministers have been trundling along; it is time for more urgency.
Secondly, on project mismanagement, the Government’s early cost-benefit reports were criticised in May this year by the National Audit Office for failing to make the strategic case for the new railway. I welcome that that has now been published in full. In September, the Public Accounts Committee warned that Ministers’ plans to present the hybrid Bill to Parliament before Christmas were “ambitious” and “unrealistic”. I would be interested to hear from the Secretary of State whether that is still his plan.
Andrew Bridgen
Will the hon. Lady confirm, as he has stated in the media, that the shadow Chancellor will have the final say over whether Labour supports HS2?
Mary Creagh
The shadow Chancellor has never said that in the media. In fact, he has told the media that it will be a collective decision, so I do not know where the hon. Gentleman has got that from.
Finally, this summer the contingency budget ballooned to £14.4 billion, now one third of the railway’s cost. Our concern is that putting in such a large contingency at such an early stage of the project could be a self-fulfilling prophecy, a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe). We are living in austere times. Our constituents are facing the largest cost of living crisis for a generation. Prices have risen faster than wages for 39 of the 40 months of this Government, and working people are, on average, more than £1,500 a year worse off. In these circumstances, and given the public finances, it was right for my right hon. Friend the shadow Chancellor to call the Government to account for their mismanagement of the project, which has led to this ballooning of costs. That is the right thing to do, because public consent for this great project depends on people like the shadow Chancellor having the courage to stand up against sloppy, incompetent and bureaucratic government. It is we, the Opposition, who are the true friends of HS2 and this Government who have put it at risk. We will continue our scrutiny of these costs and our discipline on the public finances.
Mr Betts
My hon. Friend rightly draws attention to the problem of delay. Certainly in Sheffield, we are particularly concerned about the delay between completing phases 1 and 2. Now that the welcome appointment of Sir David Higgins has been announced, should not one of his jobs be to consider how we can build the second phase more quickly? Perhaps we could start building in the north as we start building in the south.
Mary Creagh
Again, that is for Sir David Higgins to work out with Ministers, but undoubtedly that could keep costs down and allow further benefits to be realised.
Mr Godsiff
Is there a figure above which the Opposition Front-Bench team would not support this project, if the incompetence to which she refers is played out by the Government? Is there a figure at which the Labour party would pull out?
Mary Creagh
I do not know whether my hon. Friend was here when this was discussed, but we tabled an amendment on Report that was agreed by the Government and which makes it clear that any contingency spend must be reported to the House annually.
We will continue to hold up the weaknesses of the management of HS2 until every one of them has been addressed. We want to see swift progress with the hybrid Bill and we shall scrutinise the latest strategic case, published this week, to satisfy ourselves that it is based on sound assumptions. The Government must drive down those contingency costs and have a clear strategy for doing so. This fiscally disciplined scrutiny is what one would expect from any credible official Opposition seeing a Government desperately mismanaging a project. We will go ahead with the project, but the Government must bring down the costs, and the benefits to the nation must be clear. We say: get a grip on the project, get control of the budget and get it back on track.
The increase in rail usage during our time in government was a record to be proud of, but we now face serious challenges. We understand that current and future capacity constraints on the existing rail network place a brake on regional and city growth. We know that demand for rail travel continues to grow, despite the tough economic times, and our support for a north-south line rests on tackling that capacity problem and supporting 21st century transport infrastructure. This week’s strategic case shows the intense pressure our major mainline stations are under, and not just in the south. In four years, there will be 200 people for every 100 train seats arriving into Birmingham New Street at 5 o’clock. Rail freight is growing at 3% a year, and HS2 would free up space for more freight trains on the east coast, west coast and midland main lines, and take those lorries off our roads.
Kelvin Hopkins
As I said in my speech, if we want a serious transfer of freight on to rail, we must make it possible to transport lorries on trains, but we cannot do that on the existing network because the gauge is not big enough. We need a dedicated freight network for that to happen.
Mary Creagh
I am not sure whether my hon. Friend is proposing that we build an entirely new freight network—
Mary Creagh
Okay, well perhaps we will park that thought for another day, because many others want to come in. My hon. Friend is absolutely right, though, that we have to shift freight from the roads and on to the more environmentally friendly railways, and we want to ensure that this line can do that. We want HS2 to give people a real choice between short-haul aeroplanes and the more environmentally friendly trains. We want to see more inter-city services for cities that currently have a poor service to London. We want HS2 to free the west coast, east coast and midland main lines for new commuter services between the midlands and the north.
These are not just transport arguments. They are social and economic arguments about the sort of country we want to be: a country in which no town or city is left behind. We want to ensure that cities such as Wakefield, which currently enjoys a twice-hourly inter-city service to London, are not downgraded. I obviously have a particular interest in Wakefield’s twice-hourly service to London, which I am happy to declare.
The public consultation on compensation arrangements is important, and the Government need to ensure that they respond fully to specific local issues such as those raised by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), and that proper compensation is given to residents who are affected or blighted, such as those in the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson). We will maintain pressure on the Government to work closely with the communities affected.
We will vote today in favour of this paving Bill to allow preparatory expenditure on the scheme. We believe that how we build something is as important as what we build. This is not just a transport project; it is also a social and economic project. I am glad that the cities are already looking at how they can invest in skills so that local people can benefit from the employment opportunities that HS2 will bring. We are pleased that the Government have agreed to our amendments on vocational training audits for the scheme. That will help us to realise our Labour vision of creating 35,000 high-quality apprenticeships over the lifetime of the project, representing a step change in vocational education for this country’s young people. HS2 is not just a transport project; it is also an employment project.
We are glad that the Government have accepted our amendments on annual reports to Parliament on contingency spending to ensure that the scheme is kept on budget, and on linking the railway with active travel such as cycling and walking. Having said that, I will not make any promises about cycling the new cycle path that will run alongside the track. After cycling from London to Brighton, I think I know my limits. We will also continue to scrutinise Ministers to ensure that they work closely with UK companies to use procurement to deliver the maximum jobs, growth and skills for UK companies, small and large.
High Speed 2 is a huge project which, if managed properly, will bring great social, economic and environmental benefits to this country. The project is about how we deliver capacity for more passengers and services, and connectivity to bring cities closer together, while ensuring that the trains run on time. We will serve our great cities by having HS2 come in with a budget that is under control and with benefits that are clear for all to see. The Secretary of State should do his job and I will do mine, and my job is to ensure that he does his job properly.
High Speed 2 is a project that is in the national interest. It has suffered from the fiscal and project management incompetence of this Government, and I hope that this Secretary of State will get it back on track. Britain deserves better than this. It will fall to the next Labour Government, a one-nation Government, to build HS2—on time, on budget and in the national interest.
Mrs Spelman
I should like to congratulate the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), on his new appointment and thank him for taking up the baton on the Bill on Report. That was not an easy task. He was preceded by an excellent Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), who did a very good job in Committee. I really enjoyed the spirit of co-operation between both sides in Committee, and the latitude that the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) and I were given to table amendments that have genuinely improved the Bill.
Anyone who will have High Speed 2 going through their constituency is having a difficult time. Those who will have an interchange station will have what I have described as the pain and the gain. The quality of the local connectivity can tip the balance between pain and gain in those areas, and I am delighted that an amendment has been accepted on a cross-party basis to improve local connectivity. That will make a big difference to the constituencies that will have those stations. It will provide for local road, rail, cycle and pedestrian connections to the new interchange stations.
The Birmingham interchange station will offer a rare opportunity to improve the already integrated international airport and its main line station, through a connection with high-speed rail. Seeing the potential for that, the airport has proposed a second runway, even though it has plenty of spare capacity on its recently extended runway. It hopes, of course, to relieve some of the pressure on London and the south-east. With the interchange station being approximately 38 minutes from Euston, it is obviously competitive in terms of journey time with some of the London airports. This had led my local authority to see the potential of this transport hub, designating it as “UK Central”. HS2 is central to that vision.
To fulfil that vision, I hope that the Department will be able to look at the design stage of the new junctions required on the M42, as it serves Birmingham airport, the present station and the National Exhibition Centre. We need help with that. It would be worth giving consideration, too, to the development of the surface area and perhaps take another look at providing a tunnel—I would very much like to see that—where HS2 crosses over the existing west coast main line.
I believe that the extra time the Government have given for this Bill has allowed important improvements and mitigations. The draft environmental statement was indeed a draft—one on which we could consult our constituents and seek to secure improvements. I am sure that my constituents and those of many other Members appreciate the value of that.
Unfortunately, we did not reach my amendments today. They would have improved the terms of the compensation for all affected constituents and enshrined in statute a property bond. I am pleased that the Government are consulting on a property bond, and we have every hope that that will be brought to fruition.
Mrs Gillan
I support my right hon. Friend in her search for a property bond. As she knows, my constituent Hilary Wharf, the railway economist, has done a great deal of work on the property bond issue, and believes this will be a much fairer way of compensating all those people whose lives and properties will be damaged by this project.
Mrs Spelman
I agree with my right hon. Friend and I urge all Members whose constituencies are affected by HS2 to make sure that their constituents respond to the consultation that is under way; the Government remain open-minded about the eligibility criteria, which is important. I indicated in an intervention that there is an important need to offset the impact on biodiversity. I know that the present Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is working with HS2 to make sure that no net loss of biodiversity arises from the infrastructure.
For the west midlands, HS2 is a lifeline. We should not overlook the fact that, at a time when west midlands manufacturing is undergoing a renaissance for the first time in my generation, there is no capacity for transporting manufacturing products on our railways. Anyone driving down the M40 will see transporter load after transporter load of cars going for export. We export 82% of all the cars we produce, and 50% of them go to other EU countries. They should be able to be transported by rail. The freight aspect of HS2 is thus incredibly important.
Finally, in view of the completion date, this project is principally going to benefit our children and our children’s children. I would like us to be the generation with the foresight to provide for them.
Frank Dobson
I am going to be the original parochial MP. For many people in my constituency, this issue is not a question of “not in my back yard”, but one of “not through my front room”. A total of 220 homes will be destroyed and a further 1,000 homes will be blighted for the 10 years while the works go on at Euston. A large number of small businesses will be bankrupted because of what is going on there.
When it comes to getting compensation, both the qualifications and the quantum for compensation in Greater London, and most particularly at Euston and in Camden Town, are much worse and far inferior to what will apply in rural areas. I hope that some people in the House of Lords will see fit to help Ministers keep the promises they made about being fair to everybody in terms of compensation. There can be no justification for saying that the noise is less in Euston than in Great Missenden. Noise is noise, dirt is dirt, filth is filth. The main difference is that in Euston all that will go on for 10 years, whereas on most other parts of the line it will go on for only a short period.
HS2 Ltd, and the HS2 apologists, say “Oh, it will not be as bad as Frank Dobson says.” Well, if the trouble will not be as bad as Frank Dobson says, why cannot those at HS2 come up with full, decent compensation? The main reason is that they know that it is going to be terrible and that proper compensation would cost a lot of money, but why should people living in my area experience dreadful blight for a decade or more while a national project goes through? Why should they be sacrificed on the altar of that national project?
It has been suggested that buildings in the area will act as buffers against noise. The people who live in Mornington terrace, the people who live in Ampthill square, the people who live in Park Village East, the people who live in Eversholt street, the people who live in the Regent’s Park estate, the people who overlook the railway now and the people who will overlook the railway when the “buffer” blocks of flats have been demolished—all those people face 10 years of noise and filth and disruption, and we are proposing that they should not receive the same level of compensation as people living in Great Missenden. That cannot be fair, and it cannot be decent.
I think that nearly everyone in the House wants to support and help small businesses. Drummond street, in my constituency, is full of small businesses with very hard-working owners and staff, providing restaurants and cafés and shops. It is on the west side of Euston station. The shopkeepers and restaurateurs have conducted surveys, and have found that between 40% and 70% of their trade is passing trade—people who are going to or from Euston to catch a train, the tube or a bus.
It is currently proposed that about a third of Drummond street will be demolished—which does not include any of the shops—that a huge fence will be built around the construction site for 10 years, and that there will no longer be any access to the west side of Euston station from Drummond street. Anyone trying to get from the shops and restaurants into the station will have a quarter-of-a-mile wander around the boundaries of the site. That means bankruptcy for the small businesses there which will lose their trade. Those businesses are already being damaged and blighted. The kitchens of one of the restaurants are getting a bit past it, and the restaurant is thinking of replacing them, but there is no point in investing in that replacement. Let me say this to both Front Benches: do they seriously think it right to go ahead with this project and damage those little, ordinary citizens?
I raised this matter in the Committee, which took evidence from witnesses. When the problems in Drummond street were brought to the distinguished attention of the man who is the director general of the HS2 project at the Department for Transport, he gave his considered opinion of the Drummond street traders, saying
“Their business will develop. We hope that businesses in Drummond street will benefit from the construction workers on the HS2 site.” ––[Official Report, High Speed Rail (Preparation) Public Bill Committee, 11 July 2013; c. 154, Q292.]
Does he seriously think that some construction worker, knackered and stopping for his snack break, will walk a mile to and from Drummond street to get food? No is the answer to that, but what is worse, had this great person inquired of the traders in Drummond street, they would have confirmed to him that a major construction site nearby had supplied them with no single remembered user during their lunch breaks. This, I have to say, is someone who works for the outfit which has been promoting HS2 until now.
As I have said to the Secretary of State and his predecessors, if I was in favour of this hare-brained scheme, I would get rid of a lot of the people involved, because in my constituency alone their original estimate of the costs has proved to be £1 billion less than their revised costs. That is £800 million extra at Euston and £125 million for running the works across Camden town, where, apparently, the cost went up from £170-odd million to £300 million because they had not realised they would need to widen the track. If that reflects the quality of thought and advice, I say to those people who are in favour of this scheme, “Watch it, because it’s a mess, and even the great man who, at the Olympics, did manage to spend the contingency fund is going to have difficulty sorting it out.”
I therefore have to say that I believe it will be necessary for the House of Lords to try to look after and properly compensate the people I try to represent. At the last general election I made two promises. I promised I would try to stop HS2 happening and, failing that—this was a twin-track approach, if people will excuse the expression—I said I would try to make sure all their interests were looked after. I have great belief in the integrity of the current Secretary of State, and if he is going to discharge his promise to look after people properly and treat them fairly, he will have to deal properly with the people I have been trying to represent.
Sir John Randall
Madam Deputy Speaker, may I take this opportunity to welcome you to the Chair for the first time when I have been speaking?
I am very sorry that time on Report did not allow us to address all the various matters I hoped we were going to talk about, especially with regard to compensation and mitigation. I am equally sorry that I was otherwise occupied on Second Reading so I was not able to speak then. I would just say to my former captors, who held me hostage for the last 13 years, that I hope that when we come to the Second Reading of the hybrid Bill we will have plenty of time—several days—because this is a hugely important issue.
Many issues of huge concern to many of my constituents and to even more of my fellow residents in the London borough of Hillingdon have not been solved by what we have heard today. The right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) mentioned the property bond not being extended outside rural areas, and that is a matter of real concern to us. However, my constituents can rest assured that I will be raising those concerns inside the Chamber, outside the Chamber, and in any way I can. I and the other two Members of Parliament for Hillingdon—we like to be regarded as the three musketeers, “one for all, and all for one”—will be raising these issues.
Voting for this Bill tonight does not mean I will be giving a green light to the whole project. There is still some way to go for me to be persuaded that the pros outweigh the cons, and I shall be looking at things very seriously. But one thing I would say is that if there is one person in this Chamber who can persuade me of that, it is the Secretary of State.
Phil Wilson (Sedgefield) (Lab)
Sedgefield has a particular place in the history of railways, as it was in a place in Sedgefield, Heighington crossing, that Locomotion No.1 was assembled by George Stephenson in 1825, on its route to Darlington to open up the Darlington and Stockton railway. It was said at the time that such was the velocity that in some parts the speed was frequently 12 mph, but it still took 65 minutes to travel the eight and a half miles to Darlington from Heighington crossing. Obviously we have come on a long way since then, but there is still a long way to go, which is why I support the Bill.
I wish to talk a little about supply chains and how this project will have an impact on jobs. Hitachi is opening a factory in my constituency which is going to build the intercity express programme trains, and the Secretary of State is coming to the constituency tomorrow to celebrate the start of construction there. That is just one example of what impact this will have on factories in areas that, in the first instance, are not affected by high-speed rail, because the route will not be going through the north-east initially. We are talking about 730 jobs, with 3,000 to 5,000 jobs in the supply chain. We also have a new university technology college opening. Hitachi and other companies in Newton Aycliffe are in negotiations with Sunderland university to open the UTC. It will create a plethora of people who are interested in engineering, electronics and all the other kinds of apprenticeships that we require to continue the work and the factory going forward. In addition, the research and development facility for trains for Hitachi will be based in Newton Aycliffe.
We should not forget that Hitachi built the bullet train in Japan, so if Hitachi is lucky enough to win the contract, it will have the technology to build the trains in this country. These trains would not be imported; they could be built in this country. That would mean 3,200 permanent jobs, not necessarily at Newton Aycliffe, but around the country, and jobs to maintain the trains as well. The capacity for the supply chain is fantastic.
The system of high-speed rail in Japan—the Shinkansen —covers 1,500 miles. The first high-speed rail started there in 1964, and Japan is on its eighth generation of high-speed train. The average delay on these trains is 36 seconds. I want a bit of that for the UK.
Mrs Gillan
May I, too, welcome you to the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker, as this is the first time I have spoken with you in that position, and offer many congratulations? I will be brief, because I have spoken at length before. I still think that HS2 is an expensive toy. I remember that we once had something else that went fast—it was called Concorde, and we know what happened to that. [Interruption.] It is still not flying these days, and it lost out to the jumbo jet.
The Government have introduced this Bill, but it has not really moved this House or our knowledge of HS2 much further on. The Bill writes a blank cheque for the Government to spend as much as they want on the preparation of any of our railway works throughout the country, in perpetuity. The Government really introduced the Bill because they have lost control of the public relations on this project and they have lost control of the costs. I cannot even remember how many times we have read about the Department for Transport carrying out a “fightback” on this project.
No one is very impressed that four and a half years down the line a project that is supposed to be so worthy is still in the position it is in: the business case has worsened; the capacity claims have not been backed up in this Chamber today by any facts; the speed has now dropped away and is no longer the prime reason; and the connectivity is poor, as we have seen. Of course, all of us would agree with some of the aims and objectives, including mending the north-south divide, as has been discussed. We would all like those aims to be achieved, but I do not think that HS2 will do that.
I am sorry that we did not have more time to discuss compensation, but compensation consultation is still going on and I hope that the Government will have a property bond.
Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way on the point about compensation. Although it is important that the Bill be given a Third Reading tonight, because many of my constituents would otherwise be left in limbo, it must be placed on the record that the project cannot go ahead if a property bond is not put in place to defend people not just now, but in future. Even if the project is dropped, they still need that property bond.
Mrs Gillan
I hear that, and many people would agree with my hon. Friend.
I am sad that the Bill is coming up for Third Reading without our having had longer to debate it. I, sadly, will be going through the Lobby to vote against it. I do not think any help or support should be given to the project. Many people around the country share my view. Simon Walker, director general of the Institute of Directors, said recently:
“We agree with the need for key infrastructure spending, but . . . It is time for the Government to look at a thousand smaller projects instead of . . . one grand folly.”
Richard Wellings of the Institute of Economic Affairs said:
“This lossmaking project fails the commercial test, while standard cost-benefit analysis shows it to be extremely poor value for money.”
I could go on. Even the Adam Smith Institute says that HS2 is a disaster.
Andrew Bridgen
Does my right hon. Friend agree that if there were a genuine business case for HS2 the Government would not have to put £50 billion-plus of taxpayers’ money into it, and the chief executive of Legal and General, which has announced a £15 billion fund for UK infrastructure, would not say that he does not want one penny of that money spent on HS2?
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful for the support for the quotes that I cited.
As the Secretary of State well knows, we have an outstanding meeting on compensation. I know he has tried to fulfil that and I hope we can get together on compensation, because my constituents are so badly affected.
I hope HS2 does not go ahead. The new love-in between those on the two Front Benches does not fool me much. I am pretty sure Labour will play politics with the project right up to the wire, but if it does go ahead, we must make sure that we have the best protection for our environment and our countryside, and the best compensation for people whose lives, businesses and communities will be rent asunder by the project. Nothing less will do.
Mr Godsiff
I spoke and voted against the Bill on Second Reading, and I regret to say that nothing I have heard subsequently has convinced me that I should not vote against it again today. After Second Reading, the argument put forward by the Government began to unravel and people came out stating different positions from those that they had taken before.
First, the Department for Transport upped the figures to £42 billion. Then a previous Chancellor of the Exchequer said that the cost could go to £80 billion and he was withdrawing his support. Then Lord Mandelson said that he attended the Cabinet meeting—presumably the same one as my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) attended—where the project was dreamed up as a big idea on the back of an envelope without proper analysis or costings. You pays your money and you takes your choice as to what you want to believe, but I do not think that is the way we should undertake such a project.
There are two points that I wish to make. First, the Government say, not unreasonably, that to go ahead with such a big infrastructure project, they need the support of the main Opposition party. That is perfectly reasonable, but I have been there before, as have many Members in the House. I remember when Michael Heseltine was making preparations for the millennium. He went to the Labour party and said, “Look, I can’t build a millennium dome unless you commit yourselves to it.” We committed ourselves to it, and what happened? Well, there was a good party for the great and the good on new year’s eve, then attendances at the dome dwindled, we could not give it away, and eventually we ended up with £600 million of taxpayers’ money being totally wasted because it had to be given away to AEG for nothing. That is what happens when we go in for a vanity project without proper costings.
Secondly, if this is a such a great bargain for the taxpayer and for this country, why is it not being financed by private capital or foreign sovereign wealth funds? The Government are no great lover of public enterprise. Indeed, they are doing their best to pass the very successful franchise on the east coast line back into private ownership. That is their position, fine, but why is private capital not coming into this project? Why are foreign sovereign wealth funds not coming in? The Government are quite happy to have a new generation of nuclear reactors built by a state-owned Chinese company that is answerable to the Chinese politburo, yet this project needs to be paid for with public money. I suspect the reason is quite simple: private capital will not touch it with a bargepole, because those involved know that it cannot be done within the figures that have been talked about. It will go massively over budget and they are not going to pick up the bill.
I asked my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) whether there was a pull-out figure for this project. She declined to give me a figure, and I understand that, but if there is no figure to all intents and purposes we are signing a blank cheque. If we go along with the Government and costs escalate—she made a very good point about degrees of incompetence—what will the pull-out figure be? What will happen if we get half the line built and all of a sudden the figure shoots up to nearly £100 billion? What will we do then? Just continue?
I have a great deal of time for the Secretary of State and in many ways he is in a hole. As an ex-miner, however, he ought to know perfectly well that when someone is in a hole, they should stop digging. My strong advice to him is that he should stop digging. He does not want to end up with a white elephant.
Alec Shelbrooke
HS2 is a very important project for the city of Leeds. The benefits it will bring to the north of England are immense, but they cannot be built on the back of hard-working people who have invested their livelihoods in their houses and so on. It is therefore vital that, before we sign the Bill off next spring, proper compensation is in place in the form of property bonds, and that the suggestions on rerouting, which are not about “not in my back yard” but propose sensible alternatives to ensure that the route follows existing transport corridors or goes through open countryside, are dealt with. With the best will in the world, we cannot mitigate the effects of such a development just 30 metres from the back of someone’s house.
I was a supporter of this project before I came to this House, but I cannot support it if the compensation package is not right. I urge the Secretary of State to ensure that it is right before the subject returns to the House in the spring.
Mrs Ellman
High Speed 2 is essential national infrastructure, and we are at a critical part of the process. The concerns raised in today’s debate are very important, and many of them were raised by the Transport Committee two years ago. Some of them have been addressed, but some need to be looked at further. It is now the responsibility of the Secretary of State, working with High Speed 2, to ensure that they are dealt with. The concerns relate to the environment, value for money and ensuring maximum economic benefit, including giving opportunities during construction for employment and apprenticeships across the country. The project is essential, but it must benefit the maximum number of people, and that is the Secretary of State’s responsibility as we reach this very important juncture.
Mark Pawsey
Being given the opportunity to speak now feels like winning the lottery, Madam Deputy Speaker.
I will make one quick point on the impact on my constituents in Rugby. We currently benefit from a fast and frequent service on the west coast main line, so with Virgin Trains we can be in London in 50 minutes and with London Midland we can be there in just under an hour. That is attractive to businesses coming to Rugby, which we can present as a great location. My fear is that, if the Bill goes ahead and the money is given to build High Speed 2, the legacy line will become a stopping line, with trains stopping at every station as the operator seeks to maximise revenues, because the city-to-city business will have been lost—