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

Debate between Lyn Brown and Kelvin Hopkins

Tuesday 29th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

I will not speak for long and I apologise for not being here at the very beginning of the debate. I was a member of the Crossrail Committee for two years and, contrary to what some have speculated, the Whips put me and some of my colleagues on it as a punishment. We had voted against some civil liberties legislation and one of my colleagues, who is no longer in the House, remonstrated with our Whips and was told, “You’re staying on—get on with it.” It was definitely seen as a punishment. However, the Whips did not appreciate that I am a railway enthusiast. I know a lot about railways. I do not want to seem immodest, but I also know a lot about the engineering of railways, and I receive advice from a series of friends, colleagues and acquaintances who are skilled in engineering and running railways. I therefore had something to offer that Select Committee and I enjoyed my two years on it. It was quite onerous—two solid days a week and so on—but it was a nice experience, and I like to think that I made some positive contributions.

That brings me to the important point about skills. It is important for Committee members to have engineering advice at their disposal so that they know what they are talking about and what other people are talking about. Barristers will appear before the Committee, and other people will give evidence, but it is important to develop the expertise of Committee members. They are fine Members, but as there are six of them, they will have a hard job for quite a long time. If they are not interested in railways and do not receive skilled advice, they will find it even harder. I hope that that point will be taken care of.

I think that the House has become more democratic in the way in which it appoints people to Select Committees. My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) talked about the modernisation of the House and the Wright Committee. I served on the Select Committee on Public Administration under the chairmanship of Tony Wright for several years. I still serve on that Committee—it is an interesting Committee, now chaired by the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), and I really enjoy that work. We are constantly looking at the way in which government operates and the way in which the House interrelates with government, and we try to raise the status and effect of the House in holding the Government to account. That is what we are about.

Previous Governments, both Tory and Labour, have not paid sufficient heed to the House of Commons, and have adopted a rather high-handed manner. I was kept off Select Committees for a long time, perhaps because I was regarded as a radical person of the left. For five years, I tried to serve on every Select Committee, but the Whips would not hear of it. Now, the process is much more open, and anyone with any particular view in the House can become a member of a Select Committee, provided that there is a vacancy. That is a great advance. Two Members made that advance: Tony Wright and, before him, Robin Cook, who should be praised for his work in trying to improve Parliament’s control over the Executive. I want that process to continue and become more significant.

A number of points have been made about the project by hon. Members, particularly my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson). My view is that the Euston terminus is complete nonsense. It would be horrendously expensive, and it is in the wrong place. If the railway stopped at Paddington or even Old Oak Common, and linked directly to Crossrail, people would use Crossrail to go straight through to the City and Canary Wharf. There is a lot of talk about business links between the centre of Birmingham, our second city, and the City of London, and being able to make an easy trip from Birmingham to the City, particularly Canary Wharf, is a sensible way forward. Going to Euston would be expensive, and it would require at least two tube journeys to get to Canary Wharf. All the time that might be saved by a slightly faster train to Euston would be lost, given the time taken for those journeys from Euston to Canary Wharf.

The Euston terminus is nonsense, and it is my belief—and people have said this to me—that it is really about property development and making money out of such a development at Euston. It is not really about transport needs. I have criticisms and reservations about the whole project, as my vote indicated last night. Unfortunately, I was unable to speak in the debate yesterday; otherwise I would have made some serious points. If Old Oak Common or Paddington were the terminus, that would save billions and would immediately—

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

What about Stratford?