Rail 2020

Guy Opperman Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jones]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. We also need to consider the multiplier effect of such a scheme, and the economic benefits to regions such as the north-east. There would be benefits in reduced journey times, and in the increased amount of freight on the railways. The climate change cost would also be reduced as we got freight off the roads, and the scheme could create regional expansion in areas such as County Durham.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

I am following the hon. Gentleman’s argument with interest, but would he not agree, given the funding for the northern hub, the improvements to northern rail services and the totemic importance of HS2, that there is now a strategic shift, supported by those on both Front Benches, in favour of high-speed rail coming to the north-east? That must surely be a very good thing.

[Mr Jones]

I fear that we will have exactly what we experienced in the early days of the channel tunnel, when trains travelled at high speed through northern France and then came to a slow stop at the other end, crawling into Waterloo. The idea that someone would travel to Birmingham or Manchester by high-speed rail and then continue the journey on the current CrossCountry network is ridiculous.

The hon. Gentleman, representing a north-east constituency as he does, will be well aware that travelling to Birmingham, for example, is very difficult at the best of times. Even if journeys to Birmingham and Manchester were speeded up marginally, travelling to the eventual destination could take a further two hours. If the hon. Gentleman has ever travelled from Durham to Manchester, he will know that it takes about two hours, and sometimes involves changing trains at York. As my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North has suggested, the investment that is being proposed could reduce those journey times now, at a fraction of the cost of HS2.

I hope that I do not sound too much like the little boy who pointed out that the emperor had no clothes on, but I have seen a great many projects such as this, and it is clear to me that the Government have become starry-eyed about HS2. In the last Parliament, Lord Adonis became starry-eyed in the same way, saying that this was the big idea that would solve the problems of the United Kingdom’s railway network. I am sorry, but I do not agree.

[Guy Opperman]

Both the hon. Gentleman and I contributed to Lord Adonis’s review of the north-east for the North East local enterprise partnership. Consideration of HS2, the northern hub development and an increase in connectivity between the various regions of the north-east formed a pivotal part of that review. I respectfully suggest that the lessons that we discussed and apparently learnt at that time seem to have been forgotten by the hon. Gentleman, given the speech that he is delivering now.

[Mr Jones]

The hon. Gentleman may have had the privilege of contributing to Lord Adonis’s report, but I was never even asked for my opinion. I think that many things in that report are complete nonsense, and that it has been given a status in the north-east far beyond its content. What my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North has proposed would increase connectivity in the north-east at a far lower cost than HS2, and would, I believe, be of more benefit to the north-east.

It interests me greatly that the hon. Member for Hexham is now enthralled by Lord Adonis’s report and believes that it is the answer to the problems of the north-east’s economy. I am afraid that I do not share his view, and I think that if he talks to people in business and to his parliamentary colleagues, he will find that many of them do not share it either. The debate about the investment in HS2 needs to take place, and I hope that it is not too late for some of the decisions that have been made to be reconsidered.