High Speed 2

Stephen Hammond Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andrea Leadsom]

I would like to make some progress, if I may.

There is no hard evidence that this project will reduce unemployment in the north. HS2’s own estimate of 30,000 new jobs—

[Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con)]

The estimate is 40,000.

[Andrea Leadsom]

The figure is 40,000, my hon. Friend says from a sedentary position, but some 73% of those jobs will be generated in and around London, not in the north. Moreover, every one of those jobs will be associated with £300,000 in costs, which is about five times more than the cost of job creation in other infrastructure projects.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrea Leadsom]

I will not give way again. I am sorry, but lots of people want to speak.

I am no rail expert, but there are lots of people who are, and they have put forward a broad range of different options that the Government and the Department for Transport should consider as alternatives that would offer more jobs, and faster and greater capacity while improving our existing rail infrastructure. I want to mention a few. We could lengthen existing trains from nine carriages to 12, and we could convert more from first class to standard.

[Stephen Hammond]

rose—

[Andrea Leadsom]

I will not give way again.

We could consider solving the bottlenecks and pinch points that are so frequent along routes that slow down the system and give us less capacity. We could consider reopening old branch lines, particularly those that would enable passengers to switch between the east coast and west coast main lines and the Chiltern line. That would solve part of the problem in the firewall argument. We could consider solving the artificial peaks in demand generated by our appalling fare structure. We could even consider a new line just between London Euston and Milton Keynes so that the west coast main line could be dedicated to taking passengers to the north of England far faster and on a far more frequent service.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con)]

It is a great honour and pleasure to speak in this debate, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) on securing it. She has allowed everybody who has a point of view the chance to make their case, expose the arguments of the other side and put forward their own.

In the last Parliament I was fortunate enough, along with the Minister of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs Villiers), who is in her place, to be part of the shadow transport team who were the first authors of a major high-speed rail debate, and indeed of a high-speed rail policy.

The hon. Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson) is absolutely right that there is a principled case for opposition to the scheme. My constituents are affected, as are those of the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson). What is not a principled position, however, is to say that there is no economic, environmental, financial or travel case for high-speed rail. There clearly is a case, although its merits might differ according to differing points of view.

I have read both the rail package 2 study and the “A Better Railway for Britain” study, the proposals in which are often referred to as an alternative to high-speed rail. I shall briefly examine—because I want to move on to the positives, rather than the negatives—the proposals in the latter study for overcoming the capacity issues on the west coast main line. It proposes to introduce 12 car trains, grade-separated junctions and an additional track south of Nuneaton. It claims that the costs, at best, would be £2.06 billion, but it takes that figure from another, flawed document. I do not know whether those who produced the study have ever spoken to any of the rail operators, but it will be extremely difficult to integrate 12 cars into 11-car sets.

[Paul Maynard]

Does my hon. Friend agree that rail package 2 plus and RP2 both admit that they do not tackle the peak-hour demand, which is the crucial concern of many of us travelling on the west coast main line?

[Stephen Hammond]

Absolutely. However, so much in “A Better Railway for Britain” is mere assertion. The good points, though, are like that television programme from so long ago, “Not Only… But Also”. Not only do we need to do the things mentioned in RP2, but also we need high-speed rail. The case for high-speed rail is clear. It revolves primarily around capacity. Official sources say that the west coast main line will be full by 2020, although some say 2026, while unofficial sources say 2015. The question, then, is about how we add capacity. We either build a classic new line or we build one that uses some of the new techniques and signalling. The latter is called high-speed rail.

[Andrea Leadsom]

Does my hon. Friend accept that if we are going to make the case for “not only but also”, as he described it, the case for HS2 needs be made after the “not only”? In other words, if we are trying to make an economic argument, we have to add on the incremental improvements to be made and then justify HS2 expense on top of that.

[Stephen Hammond]

There is one fallacy with my hon. Friend’s argument. Simply speeding up the current network and alleviating some minor problems is no substitution for high-speed rail. It is clear that high-speed rail would at least double capacity, and on certain parts of the route, the capacity increase would be significantly more than that.

The Y-shaped high-speed network across the UK would bring a benefit-cost ratio of about 2:6. For the London to Birmingham section, the ratio would be 2:0. That shows that the case for going further north becomes more compelling and adds to the economic benefit. The proposals in “A Better Railway for Britain” would have a benefit-cost ratio of 1:4. Those ratios prove that high-speed rail is significantly better than some of these hotch-potch alternatives in “A Better Railway for Britain”.

[Dan Byles (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend accept that between the two iterations of the business case in March 2010 and February 2011, the Government had to slash their estimate of the benefit-cost ratio by 40%? That was the first time that the business case was prodded. If another 40% comes off it when it is prodded again, it will be proven to have been economically unviable.

[Stephen Hammond]

When the business case is re-examined, the key thing will be: what happens if it improves? The more important point is that the benefit-cost ratio for HS2 is overwhelmingly ahead of any of the other proposals. That is true.

The economic case is overwhelming. My hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey) eloquently set out some of the issues in the north, but the point is that in the construction phase alone, high-speed rail will generate 40,000 jobs along the route. That does not include any calculation of the ripple supply-chain effect, which will certainly be felt. More than that, the combination of HS2 and the northern hub, which has already been referred to, will create a new economic conurbation in the north and allow much quicker access between the north and London. That connectivity is hugely important.

When the business community criticises politicians, it says that all too often one of the reasons why it does not invest and why there are barriers to growth is that we, the politicians, have not put in place the appropriate infrastructure. This scheme is the appropriate infrastructure for the 21st century.

The environmental impact cannot be understated. The Department for Transport currently estimates that the project is carbon-neutral, and I absolutely accept that. However, I am aware that the Campaign for Better Transport is doing some new research into the impact of taking extra freight by rail, which, when combined with the transference effect from railways, I am led to believe points to the conclusion that the carbon footprint will be significantly reduced.

[Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Stephen Hammond]

No, I am sorry; I have only a minute and a half left.

There is a myth that local services will suffer as a result of High Speed 2. That is not true: local services are already at capacity. We need to do other things, but high-speed rail is not part of that argument. That is a diversionary tactic. There is also a myth, which has been brought up time after time today, that there is a £30 billion cost. Yes, of course the scheme will cost £30 billion, but Crossrail is currently costing us £2 billion a year. Crossrail will have a huge impact on London and create huge benefits for the commuting area of London and the south-east. If we look at the cost of Crossrail against the annual cost of High Speed 2, we see that they are actually a substitution for one another. It is quite clear that we can invest the £2 billion a year in rail infrastructure that the Government have costed for without affecting other investment.

The case is a good one and there are overwhelming reasons for it. The network is at capacity, the economy will benefit, the scheme will be at least carbon-neutral and, given that it does not start until after 2017, High Speed 2 is affordable.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—