Lord Alton of Liverpool
Main Page: Lord Alton of Liverpool (Crossbench - Life peer)
Lord Popat
My noble friend makes a very important observation here. I again stress that the decision not to publish this report was not taken lightly. It was decided not to publish because it was not in the public interest to do so. The Secretary of State’s reasoning has been laid before the House. He focused on three specific reasons as to why the report was an exceptional case: first, the exceptional importance of the HS2 project; secondly, the extremely strong public interest in showing that expenditure on HS2 is properly and robustly overseen and controlled; and, finally, the short timeframe between the production of the project assessment review and the request for information, and the timing of the request at this particular stage of policy development within the HS2 project.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, is it not in the public interest to have transparency and access, as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has just said, to all the details? How can we have a well informed public debate? Will the Minister at least tell the House the Government’s current estimate of what HS2 will actually cost?
Lord Popat
On the noble Lord’s first point, this Government have a strong record on transparency.