Transport: HS2

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Tuesday 26th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bradshaw]

My Lords, I agree entirely with what the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, has just said. The existing railway lines to the north—there are in fact four—are full. When a line is 85% full, it is impossible to run a reliable service because you get degradation with every incident.

Demand is bound to increase. There will be population growth in areas around London, Essex, Kent, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire. The very heavy extra freight which will come from the new port in London and from Felixstowe needs the railway. Of course, there are expanding markets. Without this, the railway is already expanding. Goodness knows what it would reach by the time we have HS2.

You cannot have incremental enhancement to existing lines. This would be very expensive and disruptive, as the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, has said. Such demand as there is for travel could be met by a new four-lane motorway, probably all the way from somewhere in Kent right through, around London and up to the north. However, that would be colossally expensive and disruptive. Or we could have a lot more flying. The only real choice is to have a new railway.

I was working for the railways when HS1 was built. I endorse entirely what my noble friend Lord Freeman has said. There was an enormous uproar in Kent, similar to that which we now have in the Chilterns. I asked a Labour MP whose constituency straddles HS1 how many complaints he got about noise and disruption. He said, “None at all. I get lots about gay marriage but I do not get anything about that”.

The other thing we must think of is that we need a link through London. I urge the Minister to address this significantly. The present link is very constricted. It will convey very little and offer nothing to people in Kent and Essex, huge areas of population growth, who want access to HS2 as well as Heathrow. A business case is difficult to make so far in advance. There are all sorts of external benefits which are almost impossible to measure.

The scheme will be much modified. Objectors will have their say. Rushing to judicial review in advance of the parliamentary process is premature and a waste of effort.