High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill

Cheryl Gillan Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2013 Commons Chamber

[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]

rose—

[Mrs Gillan]

I give way to the hon. Gentleman one last time.

[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.

[Mrs Gillan]

Thank you Mr Deputy Speaker.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

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[Mrs Gillan]

Yes, of course.

[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.

[Mrs Gillan]

I am not going to dignify that intervention with an answer.

[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.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

[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 Gillan]

How can I resist the Chairman of the Transport Committee?

[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.

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[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.

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[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.

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[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.

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[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]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Burns]

I will give way to my right hon. Friend, then I will make progress.

[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.

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[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.

[Mrs Gillan]

indicated dissent.

[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.

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[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.

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[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.

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[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.

[Mr Simon Burns]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mrs Gillan]

I hope that my right hon. Friend will forgive me if I do not.

[Mr Burns]

On this very point?

[Mrs Gillan]

I would like—

[Mr Burns]

Please? Go on!

[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—

[Mr Burns]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[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.

[Mr Burns]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mrs Spelman]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[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]

Will my right hon. Friend give way on this point?

[Mrs Gillan]

Okay.

[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.

[Mr Burns]

Will my right hon. Friend give way to me, too, please?

[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?

[Mrs Gillan]

rose—

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[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.