High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill

Mark Garnier Excerpts

Wednesday 26th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Godsiff]

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says, but I do not understand the point that he is trying to make.

As I said, we need to look at the economic case. The National Audit Office report and other reports have said that the project is already spiralling out of control. Already, figures that we were told about a year or so ago just do not stack up and people who have a vested interest in pushing the project ahead seem to be plucking figures out of the sky to suit whatever argument they are making. At the end of the day, the British taxpayer will have to pick up the tab if it goes wrong.

At this time of austerity and cutbacks across a range of services, the idea of reducing the time that business men take to travel from Birmingham or Manchester to London by 30 minutes and one hour respectively is absolutely farcical. It seems completely to disregard the fact that business men tend to work on trains nowadays. They use computers and mobile phones. Not one single, solitary business man in Birmingham has said to me, “Unless the project goes ahead and I can travel from Birmingham to London 30 minutes quicker, my business is going to suffer and be in danger.”

[Mark Garnier (Wyre Forest) (Con)]

I will come straight back to the hon. Gentleman on that point. I have met a lot of business people in Birmingham who are arguing strongly for HS2. A lot of the hon. Gentleman’s constituents are definitely asking for it.

[Mr Godsiff]

I say again that not one business man has come to me to make the argument.

The project is absolutely desperate. Secretaries of State always like to leave a legacy, and I understand that. However, I believe that High Speed 2 will not be a legacy. It is a vanity project, and if it goes ahead it could turn into a white elephant.

--- Later in debate ---

[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)]

I will not detain the House long. I speak as the joint chair of the all-party parliamentary group for high-speed rail. I am therefore highly supportive of High Speed 2. I will make four simple points.

First, this country has a shocking and disgraceful record on infrastructure, under Governments of all political persuasions. The costs of not keeping our infrastructure up to date are much greater than the costs of High Speed 2. We have built one new runway since the second world war, we have the lowest motorway density in what used to be called western Europe, the Dibden port proposal was turned down, we have only a few kilometres of high-speed rail between the south coast and London, and we have a much smaller rail system than we had 40 or 50 years ago. Our competitors are investing in all those areas of infrastructure, to our economic disbenefit.

Secondly, the justification for High Speed 2 is not the speed, as has been said, but the capacity. Having high-speed rail will cost only 10% more than the alternative of building a brand new route and will bring the speed benefits as well as the extra capacity. The alternatives that are put forward by the opponents of High Speed 2 would provide only half the benefit, while costing a great amount of time, money and disruption, as we learned from the west coast main line build. If people are worried about the projections that are used to justify the investment in High Speed 2, they should consider the fact that train passenger numbers are already at the level projected for 2021.

On the economic benefits, I am enormously sceptical of almost all economic models. There may be disbenefit to some towns and cities. The Transport Committee found that some towns in Europe that were joined to the TGV or other high-speed routes had benefited enormously, whereas others had disbenefited.

[Mark Garnier]

The hon. Gentleman is making a convincing argument in favour of HS2. He raises the important point that one of the perceived benefits is that economic activity will be drawn up the track. However, there is a risk that economic activity will actually be drawn down the track, away from the regions to London. Does he agree that, to mitigate that risk, it is important that we look to build a hub airport up the track as part of the infrastructure development of this country? A hub airport in Birmingham would be a good alternative to what is being suggested at the moment.

[Graham Stringer]

I will not be drawn into a discussion about hub airports.

On the benefits and disbenefits, it is up to the people who run our towns and cities to ensure that people go in their direction and invest in their area. There is no doubt that such people want the high-speed line. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) said earlier that she wants the high-speed route to go to Liverpool. I do not blame her, given the potential benefit.

I am sure that some of the arguments made against HS2 were made when railways began. The vested interests of stagecoach owners and bargees almost certainly led to their using similar arguments about how railways would not catch on. I know of no economic analysis that captures the likely benefits, but what we do know, from looking around the world, is that countries that invest in their transport infrastructure almost always do better economically. We should therefore invest.