HS2

Lord Faulkner of Worcester Excerpts

Wednesday 11th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulkner of Worcester (Lab)]

My Lords, I notice that does not apply to the mover of the Motion.

I remind the House of my railway interests which I have declared on the register. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, on securing the debate. The questions she has asked about the route, the speed and the station locations of HS2 are very interesting ones and are, I suggest, comprehensively answered in the report Oakervee Review, to which she made not a single reference in her speech.

Paragraphs 6.9 and 6.10 of the Oakervee Review say:

“If starting from a blank sheet of paper, the cost impacts from reducing the speed and frequency of the design could have the potential to be quite wide-ranging: different alignments could be found, stations could need fewer platforms, junctions like the approach at Euston station could be de-scoped, and structures could be cheaper … However, to achieve these cost reductions would require revising the route alignment and designs. For Phase One, this would require changing the Phase One Act which, depending on the amount and scale of changes required, would require new environmental impact assessments, consulting with newly impacted communities and enacting new legislation. This could significantly delay the forecast opening date of Phase One, causing further uncertainty and blight to local communities on the route.”


This is my final quote from Oakervee:

“The key question is whether to build HS2 now with the maximum capability for 18tph at 360kph, or reduce requirements now and risk in the future wanting to add in this capability, which would be much more expensive to do.”


The answer is self-evident. While it may make sense to start with a more cautious level of service, with fewer trains per hour perhaps operating at slightly lower speed, we have to build in the capacity to run trains faster and more frequently in future. Can noble Lords imagine any of the great Victorian railway builders such as Brunel imagining that they would build a railway geared just for the speed of the 1840s and 1850s? No, they built for the future. That is why we have a railway network as it is. We have to show the same imagination with High Speed 2.

The noble Baroness also asked about the location of stations. I express my strong support for the Government’s decision to accept the Oakervee recommendation to make Euston the London terminus. While Old Oak Common could temporarily be the terminus for trains from the north while the line to Euston is being completed, it cannot be a long-term solution.

As far as Birmingham is concerned, I am delighted that Curzon Street remains the city’s terminus. Railway historians in the House will know that not only was Curzon Street the station serving both the London and Birmingham Railway and the Grand Junction Railway when the line opened in 1838, but happily it survives today as a grade 1 listed building. The Curzon Street area has already attracted £724 million of investment as a direct result of High Speed 2 and the overall effect on Birmingham as a whole has been immense, with both HSBC and PwC locating major parts of their business there in anticipation of the coming of the new railway. Andy Street, the Conservative Mayor of the West Midlands, has said:

“This is more than just a new railway, this is a game-changing project that is driving huge economic growth to the West Midlands, with thousands of jobs already created. A project of this significance cannot be allowed to be derailed by spiralling costs.”


Similarly, numerous other towns and cities—not just the initial 25 that will receive direct HS2 trains, but many more up and down the country—will get better rail services. Local growth plans show that almost 500,000 jobs and 90,000 new homes will be the result of the better connectivity that HS2 services will bring. It already supports 9,000 jobs across the country, including 320 apprentices, and 70% of the 2,000 businesses that have already worked on the project are small and medium-sized enterprises.

There is one other potential station considered by Oakervee, which I support and on which I would welcome the Minister’s comments in due course. Conclusion 14 of the report reads:

“The DfT should consider making passive provision for a future HS2 station near to Calvert.”


The Oxford to Cambridge line is currently being rebuilt in stages. It was not in the Beeching report for closure and should never have closed in the 1960s, but it is being rebuilt and the route will cross HS2 near the village of Calvert. There will be a phase 1 infrastructure maintenance depot for HS2 there, and there is a lot of residential and commercial development planned for the area. While it does not make sense to delay HS2’s construction to build the station now, it would be sensible to make provision for it.

It is worth remembering that other countries that have successfully built and are operating high-speed railways have added stations as demand has increased. Taiwan for example, which I know well as the Government’s trade envoy, opened its high-speed line between Taipei and Zuoying in 2007, and added four additional stations in 2014 and 2015, as well as extending the line. They worked to the principle of “build the capacity and the people will come”. Your Lordships may be impressed to learn that last year that railway carried 67.5 million passengers and 99.88% of its trains ran on time. That is the sort of service we can look forward to with HS2.

Contrary to what the noble Baroness said, HS2 will be a green and environmentally friendly railway. There is a commitment to creating a green corridor along its tracks, with 7 million new trees and shrubs already being planted along the phase 1 route, and the establishment of a woodland fund to restore existing ancient woodlands and create new ones. There will be 650 hectares of new woodland. That contrasts with the 29 hectares of woodland that will be lost over the 140 miles of HS2; that is out of 3.19 million hectares of woodland in the UK, of which around 1 million is described as ancient woodland. By contrast, the Independent reported that when contractors widened just 2.5 miles of the A21 in Kent they took out 9 hectares, almost a third of the HS2 total.

Above all, HS2 will be crucial in achieving the transition to carbon net zero by 2050 and create a long-term carbon alternative to domestic flights or driving. I hope the Minister will be able to give a commitment that her department will look again at HS2’s potential for modal shift, as that would significantly enhance its business case. As the Prime Minister said in his Statement on 11 February:

“Passengers arriving at Birmingham Airport will be able to get to central London by train in 38 minutes, which compares favourably with the time it takes to get from Heathrow by taxi”.—[Official Report, Commons, 11/2/20; col. 712]


There is an inescapable logic in that statement, because the greatest environmental gain which HS2 will make possible is the abandonment of the third runway at Heathrow. I hope the Green Party might be able to agree with me on that at least.