HS2
Debate between Taiwo Owatemi and Tulip Siddiq(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered e-petition 563380, relating to HS2.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. The petition that we are debating is entitled “Stop work on HS2 immediately and hold a new vote to repeal the legislation”. For convenience, I shall read the petition into Hansard:
“We ask Parliament to repeal the High Speed Rail Bills, 2016 and 2019, as MPs voted on misleading environmental, financial and timetable information provided by the Dept of Transport and HS2 Ltd. It fails to address the conditions of the Paris Accord and costs have risen from £56bn to over £100bn.”
The petition was open for six months and has gained over 150,000 signatures, 459 of which are from my constituency. As we all know, HS2 has been a topic on the public’s mind since Parliament first voted on it in 2009, and many of us represent constituencies that are deeply divided on the issue.
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
The construction of vent shafts for HS2 on Adelaide Road and in South Kilburn in my constituency is already causing major disruption to residents in Swiss Cottage and a part of Brent with some of the highest deprivation levels in the country. With the projected cost of HS2 having quintupled since 2010, does my hon. Friend think that the disruption, pollution and environmental damage that will be caused by this project over two decades is worth the £106 billion that it is now likely to cost?
Taiwo Owatemi
I thank my hon. Friend for raising such an important point, which I will come to.
I have been wrestling with whether the cost of HS2, both economically and environmentally, outweighs its benefits. I represent the west midlands constituency of Coventry North West, where HS2 is projected to add many jobs locally, better connect our cities and bolster the regional economy, and I welcome those benefits. I also applaud any efforts to invest in clean and green public transport infrastructure, such as high-speed rail. Building high-speed rail that connects our country with cutting-edge train technology should be something that we can all rally around.