Hybrid Bill Procedure

Angela Eagle Excerpts

Wednesday 26th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

My hon. Friend will have heard me just say that the Standing Order relates to the processes of the consultation on the environmental statement—it does not change the other processes affecting the hybrid Bill—so the rest of the Standing Orders relating to consideration of the hybrid Bill are, to that extent, unchanged. I will double check, but I think it is transparent that the environmental statement must of necessity relate to the hybrid Bill that is the subject of consideration by the hybrid Bill Committee. To what extent it needs, of necessity, to go beyond the precise considerations of the route, I do not know. [Interruption.] I am advised that the environmental statement will include reasonable alternatives considered to HS2, as required by the Standing Orders.

[Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Lansley]

The shadow Leader of the House is going to help us in any case, but I gladly give way to her now.

[Ms Eagle]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. A non-technical summary states:

“Strategic alternatives were those that did not involve high speed rail…Route-wide alternatives involved different layouts or operational characteristics for a high speed railway between London and the West Midlands”,

and it states, too, that “local alternatives” also need to be considered.

[Mr Lansley]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady. In any case, the new Standing Orders do not change the character of the environmental statement that is required. They simply make it plain that we are creating a transparent process whereby consultation must take place between the introduction of the Bill and Second Reading, and everyone must have an opportunity to see the assessment before Second Reading. In that respect, this is a clear improvement on the hybrid Bill process in respect of the prospective HS2 Bill.

I commend both motions to the House.

[Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)]

I thank the Leader of the House for his explanation of the changes in the Standing Orders for the purposes of this hybrid Bill. He was right to observe that hybrid Bills are rare. We have not had one since we embarked on the Bill that became the Crossrail Act 2008, eight years ago. He was also right to observe that some of the rules governing this procedure are out of date, and could do with a bit of modernisation. I accept that the motions seek to do just that for the purposes of this particular hybrid Bill and no others.

The changes in the Standing Orders are being made first in respect of the electronic deposit of information, and secondly in respect of the process for consulting on the environmental statement, which will form a vital part of consideration of the Bill when it finally appears. I have no objections in principle to either of the changes that the Leader of the House is suggesting, but I should like to probe him a bit about them.

We are told that, in the coming year, a hybrid Bill will be presented to Parliament which will grant the powers that will allow the HS2 scheme to begin. Will the Leader of the House be a little more forthcoming about when we are likely to see it appear, along with the final environmental statement? Will we see it during the current calendar year, or during the current parliamentary Session? Is the Leader of the House confident that, even if the Government are able to publish the Bill in the next year, it will be completed before the next general election? After all, this is a huge and complex undertaking which has generated a great deal of opposition. If it takes as long to produce this Bill as it took to produce the much smaller and less controversial Crossrail Bill, it would not be completed until December 2016 even if we embarked on it today. Given that the Leader of the House schedules House business, it would be interesting to hear from him when we are likely to see the Bill and the environmental statement.

The publication by the Secretary of State for Transport of a draft environmental statement and a design refinement consultation document in May was a welcome development which will assist the consultation process, and we have just made a decision on the initial stages of the High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill itself, but we still have a long and complex way to go in the hybrid Bill procedure. It makes no sense to undertake a complex consultation procedure on a complex and controversial project such as HS2, only to discover that there are plenty of opportunities for legal action and for further uncertainty or delay because the consultation mechanisms used did not comply with best practice, or indeed—as the Leader of the House hinted—with the EU directive on environmental impact assessments. If the changes outlined by the Leader of the House mean that that risk has been mitigated, I agree that we should support them. Of course it is desirable in principle for those affected to be made aware of the position in a timely fashion, and to have a chance to comment before Parliament makes a decision.

The Leader of the House explained that the HS2 hybrid Bill would be accompanied by an environmental statement. He also revealed that he expected this to run to 50,000 pages. That is the equivalent of 33 copies of Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” rolled into one, although I am sure that it will be a more interesting read. The environmental statement accompanying the Crossrail Bill was only 2,700 pages long. As the Leader of the House noted, once a copy of the statement has been deposited with each of the authorities along the route, as dictated by the current Standing Order, the weight of the documents will be over a tonne, which is apparently the weight of 17 large trees. Opposition Members agree that it is sensible, in this particular case, to make provision for the electronic deposit of the environmental statement. Reassurances were needed, but the Leader of the House very properly supplied them during his speech. I was grateful to the Leader of the House for making it clear that if a deposit location wishes to have the documents in hard copy, they will be provided by HS2 Ltd, and that the key documents will also be made available in hard copy. I hope that that will provide suitable reassurance that there will be fair access to the documents.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) has rightly highlighted the fact that some key components of the environmental statement are not well-suited purely to online publication. Detailed diagrams and maps are often less accessible in online form, and I appreciate—as I hope my right hon. Friend does—the fact that the Leader of the House has been able to put it on the record that those maps and large documents will be made available in all formats, including in hard copy if that is required. That will ensure that the maps are deposited in libraries and other public buildings along the route and are accessible, so people can check whether they will be affected.

It is also vital that the online publication of the environmental statement be accessible to those who wish to access it. Concerns have been raised in the past about information on both the HS2.org.uk and the data.gov.uk websites being hard to find, and difficult to navigate when located. When the statement is published, it should not be hidden on some obscure corner of the internet. I hope the Leader of the House agrees on that.

We welcome the announcement of a 56-day consultation on the environmental statement—although some speed-reading may be required, as the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) has said. That is, however, a practical and sensible proposal, although I ask the Leader of the House to ensure that this consultation will not mean that the wider consultation on HS2 will be reduced. I would appreciate the Leader of the House’s reassurance on that point.

While we support the proposals in relation to the HS2 hybrid Bill, we need to be cautious about this setting a precedent. While documents should always be published accessibly online, it is crucial that we still aim to publish and deposit hard copies for future, perhaps less complex, Bills.