High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill: Select Committee

Debate between Cheryl Gillan and Joan Walley

Tuesday 29th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

Before the right hon. Lady moves on from this point, will she comment on the intervention by the Minister on the powers of the Select Committee? He said that it will be possible for the Select Committee to take the action it needs to take. Is it not important for there to be an instruction from Parliament on what its remit should be?

[Mrs Gillan]

That is another valid point. The hon. Lady and I would agree that we want to ensure that the Committee is not irrationally constrained or affected in any way if it looks as though it is moving towards decisions that HS2 Ltd and the Department do not like. We need to ensure that the Committee is independent and that it is not constrained. While I am responding to her intervention, may I say that I was very grateful for the detailed and thoughtful work that was carried out by the Environmental Audit Committee? It was very helpful and was much appreciated by my constituents and a large number of people beyond my constituency.

It strikes me with horror to hear that the advice of HS2 will be available to the Committee. I have this thought about the fox getting into the chicken house. However, I know that it is essential that HS2 advises the Committee. It will need to reveal more about its plans. That leads me to my next point.

Will the reports of the Major Projects Authority be available to the Committee? Ministers have seen the MPA reports into risk, which have categorised the project as amber-red. Those documents have been withheld from general release, despite the decision of the Information Commissioner that it was in the public interest for them to be released. My understanding is that the Information Commissioner will look for a review of the Government’s decision to block the publication of the reports.

It would be unacceptable to me if the Committee that scrutinised the project did not have access to the reports, which must contain facts that the Government do not want to be in the public domain, when deciding on the project. I ask the Minister once again: if he could not make the reports available to this House before the vote yesterday and if he cannot make them available to the wider public, can he make them available to the Committee on a confidential basis so that we know that the representatives of this House who are scrutinising the Bill will not be hoodwinked and will not have information withheld from them?

--- Later in debate ---

[Joan Walley]

I am most grateful for that intervention, as my right hon. Friend makes exactly the right point. The environmental aspects are not just about nature, biodiversity, natural capital or ecosystems; they are also about noise and air quality. This week we are already seeing the huge concerns that exist about air quality; in yesterday’s debate we heard the extent to which many Members are worried about the long-standing impact on it. How that is mitigated needs to be factored into the specifications of the work that is done, and the Select Committee appointed by this House will have an important role to play in that.

[Mrs Gillan]

I commend the hon. Lady’s amendment, the work she has done and the way in which she is putting her argument forward. May I just make the point that this issue is important for individuals, too? A constituent of mine has an impaired lung function and if he is close to any construction works it will threaten his life. That is not taken into consideration. Air quality, among other things, is vital in this day and age, particularly where individuals have that sort of health problem.

[Joan Walley]

The right hon. Lady is absolutely right about that. We are increasingly understanding that environmental issues are cross-cutting and that public health concerns are at the core. All of those need, somehow or another, to be costed and factored into the decision making. It is incumbent on the Government to say how such issues will be taken forward at a later stage, given that no precise instruction is being given to the Select Committee on that.

Let me say a brief word about Crossrail, because we have heard a lot about how it had the best way of going about this and so on. We cannot compare the geographical scale of HS2 and Crossrail, as HS2 dwarfs it. We have just heard about the biodiversity and environmental impacts of HS2, particularly on ancient woodlands. My Committee received a lot of evidence about that, but it has not really been included in the debate. This is being taken forward as a hybrid Bill, with HS2 phase 1 and HS2 phase 2, and there has not been the opportunity to examine the overarching aspect, and what happens in phase 2 will be very much determined by what happens in phase 1.