Tom Gordon
Main Page: Tom Gordon (Liberal Democrat - Harrogate and Knaresborough)Department Debates - View all Tom Gordon's debates with the Department for Transport
(2 months, 1 week ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Heidi Alexander
One of the failings of HS2 has been to focus on the speed of the line and the four stations, when actually one of its major benefits is to free up capacity on the existing west coast main line between London and Birmingham to enable better regional services and to enable more freight to transfer from lorries on the road to the rail network. For too long the project has been about speed and not about seats and reliability. Through this reset, we are changing that. As I said earlier, we are determined to ensure that this will be the spine of the Great British Rail network that we will deliver as we renationalise the railways.
Tom Gordon (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD)
I thank the Secretary of State for her statement. It is outrageous to hear about the waste, with money thrown away by successive Conservative Governments. Even now, the eye-watering level of money required to reset HS2 grates on people up in Yorkshire and the north, where the northern legs were cancelled. We also get comparatively less funding per head for transport than counterparts in the south. Does she agree that the small amount of money to be saved from reducing the scope and speed would be better spent on schemes such as Northern Powerhouse Rail and reinstating the York area capacity scheme, estimated at only around £150 million, which would unlock the bottleneck at York station and deliver benefit across the north?
Heidi Alexander
I cannot spend the money twice. I have taken the decision to reduce the speed of HS2 to 320 kph, which we believe could save up to £2.5 billion and result in delivery a year earlier. Given how long people have been waiting for this new railway, I think that is the responsible thing to do so that people can get on these trains sooner than they otherwise would. I understand that the hon. Member is a fearsome advocate for those rail improvements for his constituency, and I am sure that we will talk about them more at the next Transport questions.