Oral Answers to Questions
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(9 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
Order. I am sure that from her vantage point as the Member of Parliament for Chesham and Amersham, the right hon. Lady will nevertheless wish to reference the Wigan spur.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Speaker. This morning, I heard of the death of Mrs Shirley Judges, one of my firm campaigners against HS2—and she was probably against the HS2 Wigan spur. She had put up a robust defence of our local environment in the Chilterns and throughout the country. The cost-benefit analyses of this Government have always been questionable, but I would like the Ministers to look very seriously at the benefits for those people who are forced to move house because of HS2 or indeed those who may be forced to move house in future because of the Wigan spur. Would it be possible to give these people a stamp duty holiday on the sale of their properties because they are being so badly affected? Finally, let me say that without people such as Mrs Judges, we would not have the strong voices that will make this project either go away or become a better project in the future.
Stephen Hammond
I never cease to be supportive of my right hon. Friend’s support for her constituents, and on this occasion she has managed to alter this country’s geography so that the Wigan spur is somewhere close to Chesham. I am sorry to hear of her constituent’s death and our condolences go to her family. She will, of course, recognise that the Government are already paying the stamp duty on properties within the 60-metre boundary. If she writes to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, I am sure he will consider her proposition for a further extension as part of the consultation.
Mr Goodwill
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that question, and I am pleased he was paying attention earlier on. It is vital that local international airports play their part, and I know that Newcastle airport is doing that. Of course, the Government are improving connectivity to Newcastle airport, with upgrades on the Metro, work taking place at Newcastle International station and, as he will know, the £61 million upgrade of the A1 western bypass between Coal House and the Metro Centre. That will address not only congestion, but the anxiety that many people feel as they are travelling to the airport worried that they may miss their flights.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend encourage HS2 Ltd officials to meet petitioners to resolve their issues in advance of Select Committee hearings? I, and many of my colleagues, have constituents such as Sally and Stuart Jackson and Gordon and Harriet Raitt in south Northamptonshire who are in desperate situations and want nothing more than to settle their petitions as soon as possible, without the need to appear before the Select Committee.
Mr Goodwill
We are absolutely determined that, where we can, we come to some accommodation with petitioners. Indeed, two weeks ago, I met the Country Land and Business Association and a number of its members who are affected to try to resolve some of the outstanding issues they had. It is important that we do whatever we can to resolve these matters ahead of what some may feel is the daunting prospect of appearing before the Committee.
High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill: Select Committee
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years ago)
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Mr Goodwill
Yesterday the House voted comprehensively in favour of the principle of a high-speed railway between London and the west midlands. Today we turn to the practicalities of how the parliamentary process for the High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill will work. We have four motions before us this afternoon. The first is a motion to establish a Select Committee to hear petitions against the Bill; the second is an instruction to that Committee to clarify the principle of the Bill for its purposes; the third is a motion to allow the Bill to be carried over into the next Session, and also into the first Session of the next Parliament in 2015-16; and the fourth allows the payment of a salary to the Chair of the Select Committee, in the same way as for any other Select Committee Chair.
The second motion refers the Bill to a Select Committee of six members, as nominated in the motion. The motion also sets the period in which petitions against the Bill need to be submitted to be heard by the Committee. The period starts today and concludes on 16 May 2014 for petitions from local authorities, other than parish councils, and businesses.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
Having spoken with the Public Bill Office earlier, I understand that the petition period starts tomorrow, not today, because there was some query about the length of the debate on Second Reading of the hybrid Bill.
Mr Goodwill
If that is the case, I stand corrected. The petition period will then be extended by an additional day. I had not been made aware of that by the House authorities. Of course, the way the petitions are controlled and the way the Committee carries out its work is a matter for the House; it is not one over which Ministers can have any influence.
The period closes on 23 May 2014—or perhaps 24 May—for members of the public, parish councils and other groups or organisations. Such an approach of having different periods for different types of petitioner is standard for hybrid Bills, having been used for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link Act 1996 and the Channel Tunnel Act 1987. That allows 16 days and 23 days respectively for petitions, which is longer than most other hybrid Bills to date.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I shall deal with my amendments to the motions. As I am following the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), who speaks for the Opposition, I can tell her that although the principles of HS2 were agreed by the House last night, 50 Members voted for the reasoned amendment to deny the Bill a Second Reading and many others abstained, so this Government and their successors have not been given carte blanche to ride roughshod over the views of the people who do not think that the project is the best solution to our transport problems.
Today we are dealing with the process, and it is important to probe the process and make sure that it is fit for purpose. Through the medium of the amendments, I hope to gain some insight into Front Benchers’ and the House’s thinking about how we should handle such matters. The amendments are designed to probe and, for the comfort of the House, I can say that I do not intend to press any of them to a Division for the simple reason that I hope Ministers and the House might take them away and consider them. I think that will make things more comfortable, certainly for the Whips Office, which always seems very concerned to know what I am up to.
In amendment (a), which was not selected, to the committal motion, I sought only to restrict the number of members of the Select Committee. It is important to point out that if the Government wanted to add members, that would disturb the dynamics of what will be a very complex Committee that has to sit in judgment on the project. We need to maintain the same membership for as long as possible, notwithstanding what may happen with the electorate if the Committee continues its work after the next general election. We need the Committee to have a stable membership, and I do not think that any chopping and changing would benefit the House, the scrutiny of the Bill or confidence in the House and our processes.
I want to ask what training will be given to the six brave Members of Parliament, whom I certainly congratulate on their appointment to the Committee? The hon. Member for Eastleigh (Mike Thornton) is very new—he came in only in February last year—and I do not know what experience he has of such projects, but I am sure he would benefit from any training that is provided. The hon. Members for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi) and for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) entered the House in 2010. In my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (Mr Bellingham), we have a man of great experience, who has served as a shadow Trade and Industry Minister, which will be particularly useful. Of course, the longevity in the House of my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley)—since 1975—is not to be underestimated. He has the great advantage of having served as an Under-Secretary of State for Transport between 1986 and 1989, and that experience is relevant. My hon. Friend the Member for Poole (Mr Syms) was a distinguished member of the Transport Committee, and was a shadow Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions spokesperson. With his former managing directorship of a plant hire firm, he brings with him a great deal of relevant experience.
Sir John Randall
I am interested in what my right hon. Friend is saying, but does she not think that one merit of such Committees is having a broad spectrum of people—not necessarily all experts—who can give a common-sense view and, in that way, listen to petitions almost like members of the public?
Mrs Gillan
The five men and one woman—I apologise to the hon. Member for Bolton South East—have been chosen well and will bring an objective view to the project. However, they will have to get to grips with some pretty complex technical information on local geology, hydrology, construction details, logistics and operations. Even the Clerks of the House, who are very helpful and very good on procedure, will have to get to grips with that information. I want to know what training will be provided, when it will start and who can attend it.
Mrs Gillan
As a former Whip, my right hon. Friend will know that he and I may not discuss in public matters that were discussed in the Whips Office. I am rather surprised at him for laying such a puerile trap at this stage, when I am trying to be helpful and to elicit information.
I am concerned about who will provide advice to the Committee. As all of us who have sat on Select Committees and Public Bill Committees and who have been Ministers know, the technical and professional advice that is given to the Committee will be important. I want an assurance that people will be available to provide technical advice to the Committee who are not on the payroll of the Government in one way or another. We have a finite number of engineering companies, most of which seem to be employed by the Department for Transport or other Departments. It is a valid point that we need to know that the Committee will be able to draw on independent technical advice. I want to know how many advisers to the Committee there will be, what their qualifications will be, how they will be chosen, how much they will be paid and who will vet them.
Sir John Randall
Perhaps it is inappropriate for me to offer my services free, but if there are any questions on the environment or on wildlife, I will be happy to assist the Committee on a no-fee basis.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful for my colleague’s offer. I am sure that the Minister will have taken it on board. What worries me is that so many members of environmental groups have been insulted so often in the course of this project that he might have to provide his services, because people might be unwilling to come forward if they are going to be treated so roughly.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
I apologise for missing the first part of the right hon. Lady’s speech. I agree with her strongly about the advice of technical experts. However, even technical experts have views. Is it not important to ensure that we hear a range of views about the project and that we get honest technical advice on all the detailed points?
Mrs Gillan
The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point, which extends the point that I am making without labouring it. The members of the Select Committee will bring common sense and the view of the Member of Parliament to the Committee, but they will still have to rely on the people who have the expertise to take them through the detail.
Mr Goodwill
I thank my right hon. Friend for giving way today. The advice that the Committee takes and the expertise that it chooses to draw on will be a matter for the Committee itself. Of course, the expertise of HS2 will be available to the Committee, should it wish to avail itself of that. Many of the petitioners may well be experts, in particular the environmental non-governmental organisations that wish to petition. I do not think that there will be a shortage of offers of advice to members of the Committee. However, that is a matter for them as they conduct their work and not for Ministers.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful for that intervention. I am using this debate as a vehicle to raise these questions. They might not all be directed at the Front Bench, but I am raising them in this forum because I see no other opportunity for Members to raise them. I take on board what the Minister has said.
Frank Dobson
Does the right hon. Lady recognise that some of the organisations that are said to have advised the Department or HS2 are not necessarily on quite the same lines as the Department or HS2? For instance, we were told that the Institution of Civil Engineers had provided advice on the HS1-HS2 link. It had indeed, but it turns out that it advised against the link. That bit was not mentioned.
Mrs Gillan
One has to be very careful in this game and read the fine print. Even when one reads the fine print, one can be surprised about what one discovers.
Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)
Before the right hon. Lady moves on from this point, will she comment on the intervention by the Minister on the powers of the Select Committee? He said that it will be possible for the Select Committee to take the action it needs to take. Is it not important for there to be an instruction from Parliament on what its remit should be?
Mrs Gillan
That is another valid point. The hon. Lady and I would agree that we want to ensure that the Committee is not irrationally constrained or affected in any way if it looks as though it is moving towards decisions that HS2 Ltd and the Department do not like. We need to ensure that the Committee is independent and that it is not constrained. While I am responding to her intervention, may I say that I was very grateful for the detailed and thoughtful work that was carried out by the Environmental Audit Committee? It was very helpful and was much appreciated by my constituents and a large number of people beyond my constituency.
It strikes me with horror to hear that the advice of HS2 will be available to the Committee. I have this thought about the fox getting into the chicken house. However, I know that it is essential that HS2 advises the Committee. It will need to reveal more about its plans. That leads me to my next point.
Will the reports of the Major Projects Authority be available to the Committee? Ministers have seen the MPA reports into risk, which have categorised the project as amber-red. Those documents have been withheld from general release, despite the decision of the Information Commissioner that it was in the public interest for them to be released. My understanding is that the Information Commissioner will look for a review of the Government’s decision to block the publication of the reports.
It would be unacceptable to me if the Committee that scrutinised the project did not have access to the reports, which must contain facts that the Government do not want to be in the public domain, when deciding on the project. I ask the Minister once again: if he could not make the reports available to this House before the vote yesterday and if he cannot make them available to the wider public, can he make them available to the Committee on a confidential basis so that we know that the representatives of this House who are scrutinising the Bill will not be hoodwinked and will not have information withheld from them?
Sir John Randall
I am following what my right hon. Friend is saying and I share her disappointment at the blocking of the reports. However, am I not correct in saying that if they were going to be delivered to us, it would have happened before yesterday’s Second Reading debate? This matter will not impinge on the Committee’s work. We must not impugn the members of the Committee who, as she said, are excellent people, by saying that they will be hoodwinked in any way.
Mrs Gillan
I am sorry if I gave that impression. I do not entirely agree with my right hon. Friend, but perhaps he did not understand fully what I said. I know that Members of this House and people beyond it cannot see the reports by virtue of the veto that has been brought to bear by the Secretary of State for Transport. I am not challenging that and it is not for me to do so any more. I have challenged it on many occasions. I think that we should have seen the reports before yesterday’s debate. However, I want to ensure that the Committee has access to them because I believe that the only reason for their being stopped is that they contain information that would reflect adversely on the project. I think that the Committee that scrutinises the project on behalf of the House should have access to the reports. I am asking whether it can have privileged and private access to the reports so that it is fully apprised of what the MPA has said about the project.
Will the costings on the tunnelling, which HS2 has so far refused to disclose, be published for the Committee? I cannot see how the Committee can look at tunnelling processes and options without knowing the costs that HS2 Ltd has calculated. It has not made those available to any of the engineering or environmental teams that have looked at better and preferred options for protecting the area of outstanding natural beauty in my constituency. I appreciate that that will be difficult, because there may be a conflict with government procurement rules. However, I need to know whether the Minister is thinking about that problem and whether there is any way around it. I do not believe that the Committee will be able to make a judgment on the tunnelling options unless it can see the full facts and information on the tunnelling proposals that have been put forward by HS2 Ltd.
Sir John Randall
If somebody presents a petition for extra tunnelling, presumably HS2 will have to present how much it would cost if it opposes it. Therefore, those facts will presumably be available to the Committee.
Mrs Gillan
I have learned that making a presumption about this project is always dangerous. I, too, would have presumed that, but I also would have presumed that when engineering experts asked for the calculations and costs associated with the tunnelling that was being promoted by HS2 Ltd, they would have been made freely available. The reply has always been that they are commercial in confidence, and I am trying to get around that, because it is important to ensure that the Committee has access to the costs. I am sure that my right hon. Friend would support me on that, but I would not make the mistake of presuming.
On amendment (i), I want to know how often the Committee will sit. I appreciate that it could sit through the recess, and I am grateful that the motion states that it may adjourn from place to place. I believe that it will need to visit the areas affected and publish the details of its sittings, and it should confirm when and how there will be public access to its meetings.
I would also like to know whether Committee members will fly the whole route of phase 1 of HS2. When I was looking at what National Grid was doing across Wales when it was building the gas pipeline, I found it of great advantage to go up in a helicopter and look at the work along the whole route. While I am on the subject, I must say that National Grid did a fantastic piece of work in negotiating with more than 80 landowners with very little trouble. It also did fantastic environmental reinstatement work across some sensitive land, including the Brecon Beacons national park. I was impressed with its operations, and I wish I could say that I had been as impressed with HS2’s negotiations with property owners and landowners so far.
On amendment (c), the petitioning process will be open from tomorrow at 10 o’clock. The Minister will know that we have to get our facts right, and the parliamentary website, in a section entitled “How and where do I present my petition?”, states:
“Petitions will be accepted from 10am to 5pm on 30 April—not on 29 April”,
as the Minister said earlier,
“as the House will not consider the petitioning motion setting the petitioning dates until the afternoon of 29 April.”
There is some useful information on the Parliament website under the title “FAQs on the High Speed 2 Hybrid Bill”, and I recommend that anybody who is watching these proceedings and wishes to petition has a look at that excellent document, which the Clerks of the House have produced.
Is three weeks really long enough for the petitioning process? May the House have confirmation that if I receive any petitions in my office in Amersham, I can seal them in an envelope with the £20 cheque or payment and then bring them here for the convenience of my constituents? Will handing them over to staff of the House in that way be sufficient, and will I be able to get a small receipt so that I can confirm to my constituents that that has happened?
There has been some confusion about the deadlines for petitioning. I should like the Minister to make it absolutely clear that town councils have the same deadline as parish councils, 23 May, whereas there is an earlier date for county and district councils.
Mrs Gillan
I will give way to the Minister, and I would also like to know why county and district councils have been given a week less. The reason is not obvious to me, but maybe I am just missing something.
Mr Goodwill
May I confirm to my right hon. Friend that town councils are in fact parish councils? The councils that do not have the longer deadline are borough and district councils.
Mrs Gillan
I am most grateful. Does the Minister also want to tell us why there is a week’s difference in the deadlines? Why could we not just have one deadline?
Mr Goodwill
We are just following previous practice. My right hon. Friend will be aware that many local authorities have been preparing their petitions for many weeks and months, so the focus on the timeline for delivering them is rather a spurious argument. The project has been known about for many months and years, and she will know that many petitions have already been prepared.
Mrs Gillan
That is all well and good, but the process is complex and I was just seeking to simplify it by having one closing date rather than a tortuous process of two dates. Frankly, I would have thought that we should set new precedents on such a large issue rather than rely on old ones.
Sir John Randall
We ought to stress that the dates set are deadlines, not dates on which all petitions have to be deposited. As somebody who has never been very good at doing stuff before deadlines—I think I still have a couple of university essays outstanding—I believe that we should press the case that we do not want all petitions to be submitted at the last minute.
Mrs Gillan
That is a valid point, and I appreciate what my right hon. Friend says about deadlines, because sometimes I am not too good at them myself.
Amendments (e) and (f) are about the transfer of money for petitions. I do not believe that electronic payment for petitions is currently possible, but that would be good. At the moment, if Members of Parliament are asked to deliver a petition to the House of Commons on behalf of their constituents, they handle money or cheques, which is not a particularly good system.
Sir John Randall
I think I have a common-sense answer to that, which probably means that it cannot happen. It is for the House to open a PayPal account, which would avoid a lot of the rigmarole involved in taking credit or debit card payments by other means. It is quite simple.
Mrs Gillan
I will go with the flow on that, because I think PayPal is very good, particularly for buying stuff on eBay and so on.
Mrs Gillan
PayPal is good, but I must admit to my right hon. Friend, who has a small interest in the retail sector, that the high street is also good.
I disagree with the Minister and others, because I believe that the £20 fee should be consigned to the dark ages. Opposition Members have made good points about it. It might not seem a lot of money to some people, but let us put it in perspective. It is just under 20% of the basic weekly old-age pension, which is a lot of money. People who will be affected by HS2 will want access to the petitioning process, but £20 will be a lot of money for them to find for the privilege of defending their own house and their own territory.
Sir John Randall
Again, I have a possible solution. Obviously, the reason for the fee is to prevent vexatious petitions, and I think we all agree that that is preferable for the sake of the Committee getting its job done efficiently and quickly. Perhaps people should put down a £20 deposit, and then if the petition is accepted the deposit should be returned. If it is seen to be vexatious, the House authorities should keep the deposit.
Mrs Gillan
My right hon. Friend is leading me down a path that I do not really want to go down. I appreciate what he says and I like the way he is thinking, but I do not want to put the House authorities in the position of deciding whether a petition is vexatious. Some of my constituents know the disregard that is being shown to their views about HS2. They are not vexatious people in any way, shape or form—they are people speaking up for their locality, their homes and their environment—but they are sometimes referred to in derogatory terms by both officials and Ministers.
Amendment (b) is about the ability to amend petitions if someone has made an error in them. We have a complex format for our petitioning process, even in its simplified form compared with when I came into the House some 22 or 23 years ago. It is still complex and daunting, and I need some undertaking that if a mistake is made in the formatting of a petition, that will not be held against the potential petitioners and there will be a mechanism whereby they can be informed of the irregularity and have the opportunity to correct it. In other words, we need the assistance of the House to ensure that people who wish to get their petition in order can do so easily.
If the Committee is to last for two years, some of the petitions may not be heard for a long time. A petition is, after all, a gateway document, and I want to ensure that there is a facility for people to make changes to it. Two years is a long time for a document to be set in stone. I would therefore like reassurance that perhaps over a two or three-year period, there would be the possibility and leeway for amendments to be made to those petitions, and a mechanism whereby petitioners could contact Parliament to make those changes.
Amendments (g) and (h) are about listening to people and how easy we make that process. I know this is a matter for the Committee, but I hope it will hear what I have to say. Hearing people in their own constituency and location could make it a great deal easier for those who want to come forward. The type of questioning we see on our televisions from some of our more tenacious members of Select Committees can look pretty intimidating. I am second to none in my admiration for the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, but I want to ensure that my constituents who come forward to defend their property will not be submitted to that type of aggressive interrogation. They are trying to protect their properties and elicit information, and to give information to the Committee; they are not being held to account by the Committee, which I hope will be borne in mind.
In addition to hoping that some petitioners can be heard in their constituencies and closer to their homes, I also hope we will give people a decent period of notice about when their petition is likely to be heard. I appreciate that the detailed workings of the Committee will set out how and when it will hear which petitions and at what stages, but it is important that people have at least six weeks to make their arrangements. We are not talking about Members of Parliament who are used to being summoned in; we are talking about people who are sometimes in care or who care for others, or who have children or other responsibilities. A decent period of six weeks to let petitioners know when they are due to be heard would be acceptable.
Mr Simon Burns
My right hon. Friend raises an extremely important point because clarity and giving people time to rearrange their affairs is important. Does she agree that rather than setting in stone the period of six weeks and defining a term, it might be sensible to operate a system such as that in a long-running court case, and the way that potential witnesses are informed of the time scale in which they may expect to be called to give evidence or make their contribution?
Mrs Gillan
My right hon. Friend knows that it is a long time since I was familiar with what goes in on court cases, but if that mechanism gives reasonable flexibility to anybody seeking to petition, I could support and endorse it. My point is that we are dealing with members of the public who have complicated and complex lives, and we must appreciate that. We are not dealing with people who have been called before a Select Committee to be held to account; people are petitioning us and we must treat them with the respect they deserve and give them the time they deserve.
Mr Burns
May I reassure my right hon. Friend? I have some personal experience of this procedure, having up to that time served on the second longest Select Committee, which was ironically to do with placing the railway station for the London end of High Speed 1. The attitude of hon. Members on that Committee was that it was not a court of law in which one intimidated witnesses. Members of the Committee were there to help witnesses to develop their arguments so that the Committee was better placed to reach a decision on the merits of the petition and the arguments put forward.
Mrs Gillan
That is helpful of my right hon. Friend and I am sure his experience of these matters will be taken into account. It is worth while airing such issues at this stage because if we do not discuss them now, there will be little opportunity for any Members of the House to make their feelings known. It is also important that petitioners know how long their hearing could last. If it is a long, complicated or difficult case, perhaps people will need to come back again after the Committee has taken expert advice, and knowing how much time they need to give up is important.
Amendment (j) has been referred to by others and there are subsequent amendments to it. I think that six members is a good number for the Committee—if I were able to, I would restrict it to six and keep it to those same six people for continuity. However, I am worried about the quorum of three and have suggested that it be increased to four. We in the House set a great deal of store on the balance of Committee membership. When there is a Committee of six and a quorum of three, and three of those members are from the Conservative party, it will be possible for the Committee to sit with only Conservative members. If the quorum was four, we would always ensure a cross-party membership of the quorate Committee. I would like Ministers and the House to think about that issue because a quorum of three would be inequitable. If the Bill is to be scrutinised properly, it must be scrutinised—as other Bills are—with membership from both sides of the House. The danger is in the maths. We are still in the early stages, but I hope that the Committee will let us know how it will divide up the work and update Members who have not been able to attend the sessions, and how it will co-ordinate and ensure continuity between individual Members.
I have tabled amendments (a) and (c) to motion 4 on instruction to the Committee. If the Government are willing to accept amendment (a), that will go a long way to repairing the damage I referred to earlier, which has been done by insulting campaigners, environmentalists, and even MPs alike. That has seemed to be the hallmark of some of the engagement up and down the line, and it is certainly not confined to Chesham and Amersham. We need an understanding of how passionately people feel about these subjects. Indeed, some have engaged experts to provide advice and offer alternatives to the Government on how to do the project better. Those include the new tunnelling proposals that were launched by Chiltern district council, Buckinghamshire county council, Aylesbury Vale district council and the Chiltern Countryside Group last Friday. I know those proposals will be considered very seriously at the highest level, and I hope within HS2 Ltd and by the Committee.
Kelvin Hopkins
On that important point, if someone whose views are different from one’s own is abused, that is not the right way to approach politics. We should address the arguments and not commit sins by making ad hominem attacks, to use the Latin phrase. When people have serious concerns about their lives or the environment, they should not be abused. They should be listened to and perhaps if their arguments are wrong they can be countered, but they should not be abused.
Mr Speaker
It must be said that there is no better practitioner of that principle in this House than the hon. Gentleman. Whatever is said about anything else, I feel sure that his proposition will command universal assent.
Mrs Gillan
I agree with the hon. Gentleman and I am grateful for that support and endorsement. I probably fail on many occasions, but I will try to live up to his high standards. It is important because the smallest, least significant person in some people’s eyes is probably the most important in a process such as this. We must remember that and certainly not insult people.
Sir John Randall
May I put on the record our gratitude for the way in which the current Secretary of State is doing exactly that? In his comments yesterday on Second Reading he went out of his way to say that the views of those who object or have a problem with this proposal are valid, even if he disagreed with them. There has perhaps been a change, but it is very positive.
Mrs Gillan
I would agree with that. I have known the Secretary of State for a very long time. Indeed, my mother was on his selection committee—[Interruption.] It is not my fault at all; I assure the House that I was not on his selection committee. He has always treated me with respect, and certainly he would do that. I think he understands quite clearly the difficulty and problems that I, my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Sir John Randall), and many other colleagues have with this project, but there has unfortunately been some history to it, and remarks have been attributed to people in high places—such as saying, for example, that the Chilterns is “not exactly Constable country”. This is not a good basis on which to form a relationship when we are looking to protect the countryside. It is important to listen to everybody and to treat them with respect. Let us face it, we have just heard the Government admit that, after four years, their HS1-HS2 link was rubbish. It has taken them four years to get there. We have been telling them it is rubbish, but they have not until this stage admitted that and cancelled the project.
I am coming on to my closing remarks. I apologise to the House for going on for so long, but I did have rather a large number of amendments selected. It is an embarrassment of riches. Amendment (c) raises the question: what more can be added to the instructions to the Committee? Can the Government restrict and issue more and more instructions at any time? What safeguards do we have, if the Committee heads in a direction that officials, HS2 Ltd, the Department or the Treasury get nervous about? Can the Department just add an instruction, or edict, and rule out all the options that can be considered by the Committee? We need to know. If there is to be a war of attrition and an eye cast over the Committee on a constant basis by HS2 Ltd and the Department, and then instructions change through the medium of this House, that would worry me. I am sure that that is not the case, but I look to the Minister for that important reassurance.
I have a couple of questions about the carry-over motion. I do not understand why the Government ruled out a Joint Committee with another place. If time was of the essence and there was a possibility of getting this through before the general election, I would have thought that a Joint Committee with the other place might have been considered. I am not sure why the Government—they have always carried a huge majority—did not consider that. The former Minister may be about to inform me—it is a genuine question.
Mr Simon Burns
My right hon. Friend raises a very important point. Certainly, when I had anything to do with this issue, nothing would have given me greater pleasure than if we had been able to do what she suggests. Unfortunately, because of the way in which both Houses operate, it just was not possible within the rules, however we looked at it, to be able to come to that conclusion, even though we would have loved to have done so.
Mrs Gillan
That is an interesting response because we have changed Standing Orders for this process and for HS2. I am sure the other place would have looked at it. If not, I would be very interested to see the paper trail and what was pursued. Perhaps we could ask the Minister to place that in the Libraries of both Houses, so that we can see what the problems were. Phase 2 and the route to Crewe is about to come up and we need to see whether there are ways we can facilitate the process. Otherwise, it could be very arduous for our people, and others, who are petitioning.
Ms Gisela Stuart
When the Convention on the Future of Europe was set up, we did have a Joint Committee between the Commons and the Lords. New rules were found to make that possible.
Mrs Gillan
The hon. Lady has taken the very words out of my mouth. I was going to say that it has happened before and it would be interesting to consider that, because we need to learn for the future processes associated with this major infrastructure project.
Why do we have the carry-over motion here and now? To bind the next Parliament, assuming that all the Committee members are re-elected, and, in effect, to rule out the Committee stage having any chance of finishing before the general election, seems a bit short sighted. I think it is premature: we do not know what could happen between now and then. It would have been advisable to keep the carry-over motion for another day, when it became obvious what was going to happen. There must be an explanation, because the Minister is leaping to his feet.
Mr Goodwill
No one would be more delighted than I would be if the Committee concluded its work by the next general election. However, in the likelihood that it will not, the motion will facilitate its work to carry on past the election.
Mrs Gillan
I understand that. I cannot say that I would want the Committee to conclude it work before the general election, but to rule it out at this early stage and give the impression that the Government have given up on it, is not a particularly good tactic.
Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)
This gave rise to an animated conversation in the Tea Room yesterday from some of the proposed Committee members, who thought that the carry-over might be some form of endorsement for the outcome of the general election—that it was tantamount to a commitment not to stand candidates against them.
Mrs Gillan
I think that such a commitment should be reserved for Mr Speaker. Unfortunately, I did not manage to get to the Tea Room yesterday, but that is a good thought. I would, of course, hope all six members are returned safe and sound to the House after the next general election to serve under a good Conservative Government.
I am drawing my remarks to a close, Mr Speaker. I heard the Minister say that the process should enable the appropriate people who are affected by this project to have their say. That is very important. We may not have been able to stop the project being approved by this House, but we must ensure that the best possible mitigation to our environment, and the best possible compensation for our people, is obtained. I have always endorsed this twin-track approach. I meant what I said at the end of my speech yesterday: Members must follow the process inch by inch to ensure that fairness pertains, that people receive a good hearing and that this House does not put unnecessary barriers in the way of the people who will be pleading for their properties, their life and their environment.
I hope that not moving the amendments to a vote will provide the opportunity for those on the Front Bench, the whole House and the proposed members of the Committee to take on board my remarks. I hope some of the measures put forward in the amendments, which are supported by other people, will be incorporated. They may make the process just a little easier.
Joan Walley
I am most grateful for that intervention, as my right hon. Friend makes exactly the right point. The environmental aspects are not just about nature, biodiversity, natural capital or ecosystems; they are also about noise and air quality. This week we are already seeing the huge concerns that exist about air quality; in yesterday’s debate we heard the extent to which many Members are worried about the long-standing impact on it. How that is mitigated needs to be factored into the specifications of the work that is done, and the Select Committee appointed by this House will have an important role to play in that.
Mrs Gillan
I commend the hon. Lady’s amendment, the work she has done and the way in which she is putting her argument forward. May I just make the point that this issue is important for individuals, too? A constituent of mine has an impaired lung function and if he is close to any construction works it will threaten his life. That is not taken into consideration. Air quality, among other things, is vital in this day and age, particularly where individuals have that sort of health problem.
Joan Walley
The right hon. Lady is absolutely right about that. We are increasingly understanding that environmental issues are cross-cutting and that public health concerns are at the core. All of those need, somehow or another, to be costed and factored into the decision making. It is incumbent on the Government to say how such issues will be taken forward at a later stage, given that no precise instruction is being given to the Select Committee on that.
Let me say a brief word about Crossrail, because we have heard a lot about how it had the best way of going about this and so on. We cannot compare the geographical scale of HS2 and Crossrail, as HS2 dwarfs it. We have just heard about the biodiversity and environmental impacts of HS2, particularly on ancient woodlands. My Committee received a lot of evidence about that, but it has not really been included in the debate. This is being taken forward as a hybrid Bill, with HS2 phase 1 and HS2 phase 2, and there has not been the opportunity to examine the overarching aspect, and what happens in phase 2 will be very much determined by what happens in phase 1.
Mr Burns
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that comment, and flattery has got him a long way during his illustrious career, but I do not think that was the reason. I think I was a sucker.
Some serious points arise from my experience and I hope that they will reassure my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) about a number of interesting points that she raised. Although the Committee was not legally defined as such, we were told that we were a quasi-judicial body and we conducted our business as such. Obviously, we had been selected because we had no interest, either through our constituencies or whatever else, in the King’s Cross area. As we saw it, we were members not as, for example, the Conservative Member for Chelmsford with no interest in King’s Cross, but to give an independent judgment on the facts. The whole proceeding was conducted with barristers present arguing the case for and against.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham rightly said that she hoped that the Committee that would deal with the hybrid Bill on High Speed 2 would not be like a Select Committee, interrogating the witnesses and the people who brought their evidence and views before it. That was certainly not my experience and I am sure that it has not been the experience since. Members of such Committees are there to analyse and listen to the arguments and to reach a decision based on the facts and the evidence they have been given, taking into account the best interests of the project and so on.
My right hon. Friend also raised the relevant and important issue of the mechanics of how the Committee will work. As she rightly said, people live busy lives—they work and do other things—and they need plenty of notice about when their turn is anticipated to come. That is why I said in my intervention that, although it will be up to the Committee and its members to organise how they will conduct their business, I hope that they will have a system like that for a long trial in court in which witnesses are waiting to be called to give evidence so that people can have the maximum amount of time to put their affairs in order before they are expected to appear before the Committee with their petition and their points.
I am not in favour of my right hon. Friend’s amendment to raise the quorum from three to four, because, as she rightly said, my hon. Friends and the hon. Members who will be members of the Committee will face an onerous task as they will potentially be sitting three days a week, mornings and afternoons, and during parliamentary recesses. I know from experience that it can be a very long day. I do not share her concern about the fact that there might be a day on which there might be only three members present who were all Conservative Members, given that we are the largest party in the House. I do not think that the members of the Committee will have that mindset or thought process. They will not be Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat members of the Committee. They will be virtually independent members reaching decisions on the merits or otherwise of a case based on the evidence. Personally, I am not attracted to the idea of changing the quorum.
Mrs Gillan
My right hon. Friend makes a valid point and I follow his argument. For me, it was slightly anathema that the quorum should be only 50% of the Committee. I felt that with such an enormous project, with effectively £50 billion in question at the end of the road, the quorum should be more than 50%. The members will have to sit for very long hours and the subject will take over their lives much as it has taken over my life over the past few years, so it is important that a larger number of them share that burden. I thought that pushing the quorum up to four out of six would be a better way of doing it, but that is just a point of view.
Mr Burns
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Minister for the tactful way in which he makes his point. I am almost certain that the Committee on the King’s Cross Bill, which had only four members, had a quorum of three. That put a strain on the Committee, particularly when situations arose such as the one that he describes.
I also do not share the concern of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham, expressed in her amendment, about the ability to carry over the Committee into a new Parliament. I think that this is the appropriate time in which to make that point and enshrine it in the rules governing how the special Committee will work. In many ways, it would look rather ridiculous not to have that provision, given that we all know—because of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011—that we will have an election at the beginning of next May.
I am also not so concerned about the fact that, after the election, for a variety of reasons, there might be some changes to the Committee’s membership. There are many examples of changes of personnel in Public Bill Committees, which do equally significant work in studying line by line some very important legislation. Sometimes, if it is the wrong time of year or of the cycle, Ministers taking a Bill through Committee can suddenly disappear and be replaced. The strength of this House is that the sum total of knowledge that Members bring to subjects and Committees means that there would not necessarily be the problem and hiatus that my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham fears. Of course, she is right that mechanisms must be there to assist the Committee, in an independent manner, to brief Members who, for whatever genuine reason, have been unable to attend a sitting.
I was also interested in my right hon. Friend’s amendment about the Committee going out to areas that will be affected by HS2. That is an interesting concept. It brings closer to the public the workings of Parliament, particularly on a matter that is so sensitive because it has such an impact on people’s lives. Raising that in an amendment is extremely valid as we all seek to make Parliament more relevant and closer to the people we represent. However, that must ultimately be a matter for the Committee to determine when it forms and decides how to conduct its business.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful for the acknowledgement that some of my amendments meet my colleague’s approval. It is difficult because this is the only forum in which we can examine the matter in detail. Even though it is not a matter for Front Benchers but for the Committee, it is important to get it on the record in Hansard because, like my right hon. Friend, I am worried that we will pull the House into disrepute with the general public if our processes are not transparent at every stage on a project as contentious as this one.
Mr Burns
My right hon. Friend is correct, though of course the day-to-day business of the Committee will be very transparent because it will be open to the public so that those who are interested can go and see the workings, particularly when any petitions are being dealt with that are directly relevant to certain communities, groups or organisations. It is not beyond the wit of this place to hold those proceedings in a room that has a television facility so that they can be televised in the same way as Public Bill Committees and Select Committees. The general principle of transparency so that people can see the workings, and follow and monitor the proceedings is crucial.
It was a little unfair of some hon. Members to question paying the Chair. Frankly, given what they will give up, I would not mind if every member of the Committee were paid rather than just the Chair. Serving on it is quite a sacrifice in many ways. We also have a precedent in that the Chair of the Crossrail Committee was paid, as are the Chairs of Select Committees. Having served on three Select Committees, I know that the work of one of them is very brief. When I served on it for a year, it met once a week late on a Wednesday afternoon, and it usually sat for about eight minutes. It always amazed me that the Chair of that Committee was paid the same as the Chair of the Defence Committee or the Chair of the Treasury Committee. It is known in the trade as a very cushy number. However, the job of this Committee’s Chair will not be cushy, and serving on it will be onerous for all the members. One therefore wonders whether it is fair to restrict payment to the Chair.
The amendments that my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham and the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) have tabled and the debate today have given us an opportunity to consider ideas about how to improve the Bill. Many of the decisions are to do with the day-to-day running of the Committee, and they must be left up to it when it starts its work. As we heard from previous contributions, other subjects are in the remit of the House of Commons authorities, and are therefore matters for them. However, I believe that, ultimately the House must examine the legislative process for such projects because it is deeply flawed.
I was told at the Department for Transport that the basis of the legislation—I assume this is correct because, unlike some people, I believe what civil servants tell me; I may not always accept it, but I believe it—is the legislation in the 16th century that established tollbooths, and that the Victorians thought that it was suitable legislation for granting the permissions to build a railway. Since the railways began, they have always had to have planning permission through legislation in Parliament. Of course, the Victorians were very different. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has said in the past, when the concept of building a railway from London was dreamt up in the early 1830s, it took from 1832 to 1837 to think about it, legislate for it, build it and get it running. Clearly, using a premise based on tollbooths is totally out of sync with building high-speed rail, Crossrail, an airport or an extra runway, wherever—if ever—there is going to be one. We should consider that carefully and modernise as a matter of urgency so that this country does not lose out on badly needed infrastructure because of the sheer length of time it takes to get it.
Kelvin Hopkins
Well, Stratford possibly. That would save money and would put people straight on to Crossrail. I supported Crossrail, which was a difficult, expensive project, but we improved it as a result of careful analysis by the Crossrail Bill Committee. We drove certain projects. For example, we proposed that there should be a station at Woolwich, and we managed to get that into the Crossrail Bill. There will be a Crossrail station at Woolwich, which is a valuable improvement.
There are environmental problems. My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North chairs the Environmental Audit Committee. It is important to know how we will overcome such problems. One problem with Crossrail was that it went under Soho, where there are a lot of significant and economically important recording studios, which are sensitive to vibration and noise. I know from friends and advisers that one can do various things to tackle such problems, including the use of floating slab track. Not every Member will know what that is, but it is a way of insulating the track from the concrete channel on which it runs, thus avoiding vibration. Builders do not want to know about that, because it costs more money, although not very much more. If that option had not been proposed, such a measure would not have been included. It is therefore important that expert advice to Committee members is provided by engineering specialists who know what they are talking about.
I have friends who criticise the route of HS2. It seems that, in the first instance, the route was created by non-engineers drawing lines on maps. As a small child, my son used to take Ordnance Survey maps, and used a felt-tip pen to draw railway lines across them. It ruined the maps, but the method used to determine the route of HS2 was not far from that. Even now, there are serious criticisms about the precise route, even from those who go along with HS2.
Mrs Gillan
The hon. Gentleman is making some valid points. I am sorry that he did not manage to speak at great length yesterday.
It is important that there is flexibility in the way in which the project is considered, because the route was just a straight line drawn on a map for speed purposes. Many reasons for sticking to the original route design have now gone. What gives me heart is the fact that the Government have made much of the £14.4 billion contingency fund. We must ensure that if that fund is available, it is used to get the best possible mitigation, whether environmental or urban, as in the case of the recording studios in Soho. There is capacity in the budget to afford those protections and include them, and it is important that we secure them.
Kelvin Hopkins
I agree, and I very much appreciate what the right hon. Lady said in her speech.
There are measures to deal with environmental damage. I mentioned floating slab track to deal with vibration, but there are also noise barriers disguised by foliage and tunnelling where necessary. All sorts of things can be done: they cost a bit extra, but they make the project much more acceptable. Getting the line right in the first instance is absolutely fundamental, and many of my good friends tell me that the line is not right, especially north of Birmingham, but also between London and Birmingham. All sorts of details need to be argued, which will take the Committee a long time. HS2 is a much bigger project than Crossrail, and the Crossrail Bill Committee took two years. We met every week, and there were lots and lots of petitions. There will be many more for HS2, so we are looking at a big job.
The right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) mentioned speed, and recently there was talk about reducing the maximum speed from 250 mph to 183 mph—or 300 kph—and going at the speed of HS1. It was an arbitrary decision—“Oh well, let’s just reduce the speed”—which changes a lot of suggested journey times. I have spoken in the House about journey times, and criticised the project in that regard, as it seems that someone can just make a quick decision—“Oh well, we won’t go there. We’ll decide to change the speed.” There is a problem with high-speed trains, which cannot go round tight curves as they would fall off the track. Curves have to be gradual and of a large radius, which causes all sorts of problems. That does not apply to trains on standard rail, with a speed of up to 125 mph or 135 mph.
Raising the speed from 300 kph to 250 mph demands a tremendous increase in energy. Energy costs are much greater at higher speed, and extra emissions from power stations required to drive electric trains are disproportionately increased. Optimum railway speeds are much lower—
Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)
I rise to speak to the amendments to motion 4 to which I have lent my name as I have some particular local and regional reasons to support them.
Although I did not lend my name to amendment (a), it contains a regional aspect that is important in my constituency. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) seeks
“to provide complete protection to any areas of outstanding natural beauty”
and areas of special scientific interest. The first interchange station outside London is proposed on green-belt land in my constituency at the juncture with Birmingham international airport. It is perhaps not an area of outstanding natural beauty, but the Meriden gap is the green land that holds the cities of Birmingham and Coventry apart. Throughout my 17 years as an MP, there has been constant pressure to build in that gap, which is only 5 miles wide at its narrowest point but contains a lot of transport infrastructure.
Right at the centre of the gap is something known as the golden triangle, which comes under the auspices of the Solihull planning authority. Great concern has been expressed by the Campaign to Protect Rural England that the imperative of this infrastructure may lead to the loss of green-belt land in that triangle without due consideration. My local authority, which supports high-speed rail in principle, with certain conditions attached, very much wants me to put on the record that it wants to maintain control of carefully planning what comes into that most sensitive of green spaces. In respect of amendment (a), the Select Committee needs carefully to consider what happens when green-belt land is at stake.
I put my name to amendment (b) to motion 4 specifically because I want the Committee to consider the statutory and non-statutory provision for compensation. As I said yesterday, I welcome the fact that the Government have produced a revised compensation package. To be perfectly clear, it is a significant step forward from the statutory compensation currently available, because constituents really get compensation only one year after a project is finished. Considering that this project is expected to end in 2026, folks would be waiting an awfully long time without the revised package, which successive Secretaries of State have worked towards.
However, the revised compensation package contains an important omission: compensation for people affected by construction works. The revised package represents a step forward, because the area of eligibility has been extended beyond 120 metres from the tracks to a taper of 300 metres in rural areas, but construction compounds and sites might not be adjacent to the tracks, so they slip through the net of the revised compensation package.
Significant parts of the route, at both the London and the west midlands ends, will see many years of extensive construction work. The environmental statement highlights that around the interchange station at Birmingham airport we can expect construction work to continue for over five years. People are every bit as blighted by being opposite a construction compound or next to a spoil heap as they are by being 60 metres from the tracks. That is why I have put my name to the amendment.
Mrs Gillan
It has been a great pleasure working with my right hon. Friend on this subject, and I think that, together, we have made some progress. The situation she describes also applies in Buckinghamshire. In the course of preparing for yesterday’s debate, I discussed it with colleagues in Buckinghamshire, including the right hon. Member for Buckingham (John Bercow), who told me that he had a group of houses near a construction site where no anti-HS2 campaign was active, and the residents did not realise until recently that they would be so badly affected. In fact, HS2 Ltd had not contracted them. If that can happen in the fairly immediate past, we must be very careful about who will be affected.
Mrs Spelman
I agree, and I hope that when the Minister responds to the debate he will mention the impact of construction works.
Mr Goodwill
I am not aware that an assessor has been appointed, and neither do we need to appoint one at this stage. Therefore, I am not able to tell my right hon. Friend who it would be, but under the definition of the word “independent” it would be a person not connected to any vested interest.
When we started this debate my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) touched on the Major Projects Authority report. As we have heard many times from the Dispatch Box, the MPA does not routinely publish its reports on the major projects it scrutinises, and a founding block of the effective function of the MPA is the confidential nature of the reports it produces and the way it can be used as a tool within government to ensure that projects are delivered efficiently.
Mrs Gillan
I understand what the Minister is saying and it is absolutely accurate. What I asked was whether, for the purposes of examining the project in detail, we could treat the Committee members as Ministers and give them confidential access to the MPA reports, so that they can fully see the risks that have been identified by the very body set up by the Government to scrutinise such projects.
Mr Goodwill
The work of the Committee will be done in public and I would be very nervous about giving confidential information of any sort to it. That would not be appropriate. The report that my right hon. Friend refers to is from 2011, so its relevance erodes by the day. I really do not think that it would bring anything to the Committee’s work.
My right hon. Friend mentioned electronic payments, and identified that Parliament’s website has much useful information for petitioners. This includes the information that payment can be made by cash or cheque, and by credit and debit cards except, I am told, American Express.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful to the Minister for giving way; it is good to be able to have a proper debate. He refers to the MPA report being from 2011, but he must appreciate that the costs being used on the project are also 2011 costs. He says that the Committee will sit in public and so he would be nervous about giving its members confidential material. Does that also mean precluding Committee members from having access to the financial information and financial calculations made by HS2 Ltd on, for example, tunnelling activities?
Mr Goodwill
The Committee already has the budget before it. I do not want to add anything to what I have said already.
My right hon. Friend talked about further instructions to the Committee. It is the case that further instructions to the Committee can be made only by a motion in the House. The Government believe that these instructions are correct and we have no plans to change them.
Mr Goodwill
The hon. Lady makes some very good points, I am sure. I would merely make the point that the distance from Meadowhall station, outside Sheffield, to the centre of Sheffield is less than the distance between Stratford and the centre of London. It is interesting that when we talk to cities such as Nottingham, Sheffield and others that are served by parkway stations rather than city centre stations, they see the importance of having a station in the city centre. However, I understand the point she makes about Stratford.
Should the House approve the motions, the matter will move to the Select Committee to start hearing the petitions of those affected by the scheme. This is a crucial moment in the process and one that many have waited many years for. I therefore believe that the House has an obligation to ensure that we swiftly progress to that point. I believe that the motions as drafted provide a fair and reasonable framework for both petitioners and the Committee. As I have said, I do not believe that the proposed amendments would add to the Committee’s ability to hear petitioners or progress its work effectively. Indeed, in some cases the amendments seem to work against the interests of the petitioners and should be rejected. Indeed, as I read them, many of the amendments gave me the impression that they were designed to frustrate the Committee’s work, rather than facilitate it, but maybe that was one of the objectives.
Mr Goodwill
I am moving to my conclusion. My right hon. Friend was not very generous yesterday, but I will not reciprocate.
Mrs Gillan
No, I was not very generous yesterday; the Minister is right, but it was because I was trying to leave enough time for others to speak in the debate. Let me say to the Minister that none of my amendments was intended to delay. There is a four-hour limit on the debate and the amendments were tabled in good faith to try to elicit more information from the Government. Once again, I remind the Minister that people have been abused in the process to date and I do not want him to continue that from the Dispatch Box.
Mr Goodwill
I merely make the point that if amendments were designed to waive the fee for petitioning while at the same time encouraging electronic petitioning, that could be used by some who seek to frustrate the Bill rather than to work with the Committee, using the provisions as a way of preventing the Committee from carrying out its work.
I commend the motions to the House and urge Members to vote in favour of them and against the amendments.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)
Order. I understand that the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) does not intend formally to press any of her amendments. Is that correct?
Madam Deputy Speaker
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
1. That the Bill be committed to a Select Committee.
2. That the following Members be appointed as members of the Select Committee: Mr Henry Bellingham, Sir Peter Bottomley, Ian Mearns, Yasmin Qureshi, Mr Robert Syms and Mr Michael Thornton.
3. (1) That there shall stand referred to the Select Committee—
(a) any Petition against the Bill presented by being deposited in the Private Bill Office between 29 April 2014 and the closing date (inclusive), during the hours specified in a notice published by the Private Bill Office, and
(b) any Petition which has been presented by being deposited in the Private Bill Office during such hours and in which the Petitioners complain of any amendment as proposed in the filled-up Bill or of any matter which has arisen during the progress of the Bill before the Select Committee, being a Petition in which the Petitioners pray to be heard by themselves or through Counsel or Agents.
(2) The closing date for the purposes of sub-paragraph (1)(a) is-
(a) in a case where the Petition is that of a local authority (except a parish council) or a business, 16 May 2014, and
(b) in any other case, 23 May 2014.
4. That, notwithstanding the practice of the House that appearances on Petitions against an opposed Private Bill be required to be entered at the first meeting of the Select Committee on the Bill, in the case of any such Petitions as are mentioned in paragraph 3(1)(a) above on which appearances are not entered at that meeting, the Select Committee shall appoint a later day or days on which it will require appearances on those Petitions to be entered.
5. That any Petitioner whose Petition stands referred to the Select Committee shall, subject to the Rules and Orders of the House and to the Prayer of that person’s Petition, be entitled to be heard in person or through Counsel or Agents upon that person’s Petition provided that it is prepared and signed in conformity with the Rules and Orders of the House, and the Member in charge of the Bill shall be entitled to be heard through Counsel or Agents in favour of the Bill against that Petition.
6. That in applying the Rules of the House in relation to parliamentary agents, any reference to a petitioner in person shall be treated as including a reference to a duly authorised member or officer of an organisation, group or body.
7. That the Select Committee have power to sit notwithstanding any adjournment of the House, to adjourn from place to place and to report from day to day the Minutes of Evidence taken before it.
8. That three be the Quorum of the Select Committee.
High speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill: Instruction
Ordered,
That it be an Instruction to the Select Committee to which the High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill is committed to deal with the Bill as follows—
1. The Committee shall, before concluding its proceedings, amend the Bill by
(a) leaving out provision relating to the spur from Old Oak Common to the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, and
(b) making such amendments to the Bill as it thinks fit in consequence of the amendments made by virtue of sub-paragraph (a).
2. The Committee shall not hear any Petition to the extent that it relates to whether or not there should be a spur from Old Oak Common to the Channel Tunnel Rail Link.
3.–(1) The Committee shall treat the principle of the Bill, as determined by the House on the Bill’s Second Reading, as comprising the matters mentioned in sub-paragraph (2); and those matters shall accordingly not be at issue during proceedings of the Committee.
(2) The matters referred to in sub-paragraph (1) are:
(a) the provision of a high speed railway between Euston in London and a junction with the West Coast Main Line at Handsacre in Staffordshire, with a spur from Water Orton in Warwickshire to Curzon Street in Birmingham and intermediate stations at Old Oak Common and Birmingham Interchange, and
(b) in relation to the railway set out on the plans deposited in November 2013 in connection with the Bill in the office of the Clerk of the Parliaments and the Private Bill Office of the House of Commons, its broad route alignment.
That these Orders be Standing Orders of the House.—(Mr McLoughlin.)
High speed rail (London - west Midlands) Bill: Carry-Over
Ordered,
That, notwithstanding the practice of the House, the following provisions shall apply to proceedings on the High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill:
Suspension at end of this Session
1. Further proceedings on the High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill shall be suspended from the day on which this Session of Parliament ends (“the current Session”) until the next Session of Parliament (“Session 2014-15”).
2. If a Bill is presented in Session 2014-15 in the same terms as those in which the Bill stood when proceedings on it were suspended in the current Session–
(a) the Bill so presented shall be ordered to be printed and shall be deemed to have been read the first and second time;
(b) the Bill shall stand committed to a Select Committee of the same Members as the members of the Committee when proceedings on the Bill were suspended in the current Session;
(c) any Instruction of the House to the Committee in the current Session shall be an Instruction to the Committee on the Bill in Session 2014-15;
(d) all Petitions presented in the current Session which stand referred to the Committee and which have not been withdrawn, and any Petition presented between the day on which the current Session ends and the day on which proceedings on the Bill are resumed in Session 2014-15 in accordance with this Order, shall stand referred to the Committee in Session 2014-15;
(e) any Minutes of Evidence taken and any papers laid before the Committee in the current Session shall stand referred to the Committee in Session 2014-15;
(f) only those Petitions mentioned in sub-paragraph (d), and any Petition which may be presented by being deposited in the Private Bill Office and in which the Petitioners complain of any proposed additional provision or of any matter which has arisen during the progress of the Bill before the Committee in Session 2014-15, shall stand referred to the Committee;
(g) any Petitioner whose Petition stands referred to the Committee in Session 2014-15 shall, subject to the Rules and Orders of the House and to the Prayer of that person’s Petition, be entitled to be heard in person or through Counsel or Agents upon the Petition provided that it is prepared and signed and in conformity with the Rules and Orders of the House, and the Member in charge of the Bill shall be entitled to be heard through Counsel or Agents in favour of the Bill against that Petition;
(h) the Committee shall have power to sit notwithstanding any adjournment of the House, to adjourn from place to place, and to report from day to day Minutes of Evidence taken before it;
(i) three shall be the Quorum of the Committee;
(j) any person registered in the current Session as a parliamentary agent entitled to practise as such in opposing Bills only who, at the time when proceedings on the Bill were suspended in the current Session, was employed in opposing the Bill shall be deemed to have been registered as such a parliamentary agent in Session 2014-15;
(k) the Standing Orders and practice of the House applicable to the Bill, so far as complied with or dispensed with in the current Session, shall be deemed to have been complied with or (as the case may be) dispensed with in Session 2014-15.
Suspension at end of this Parliament
3. If proceedings on the Bill are resumed in accordance with paragraph 2 but are not completed before the end of Session 2014-15, further proceedings on the Bill shall be suspended from the day on which that Session ends until the first Session of the next Parliament (“Session 2015-16”).
4. If a Bill is presented in Session 2015-16 in the same terms as those in which the Bill stood when proceedings on it were suspended in Session 2014-15–
(a) the Bill so presented shall be ordered to be printed and shall be deemed to have been read the first and second time;
(b) the Standing Orders and practice of the House applicable to the Bill, so far as complied with or dispensed with in the current Session or in Session 2014-15, shall be deemed to have been complied with or (as the case may be) dispensed with in Session 2015-16; and
(c) the Bill shall be dealt with in accordance with–
(i) paragraph 5, if proceedings in Select Committee were not completed when proceedings on the Bill were suspended,
(ii) paragraph 6, if proceedings in Public Bill Committee were begun but not completed when proceedings on the Bill were suspended,
(iii) paragraph 7, if the Bill was waiting to be considered when proceedings on it were suspended,
(iv) paragraph 8, if the Bill was waiting for third reading when proceedings on it were suspended, or
(v) paragraph 9, if the Bill has been read the third time and sent to the House of Lords.
5. If this paragraph applies–
(a) the Bill shall stand committed to a Select Committee of such Members as were members of the Committee when proceedings on the Bill were suspended in Session 2014-15;
(b) any Instruction of the House to the Committee in the current Session or in Session 2014-15 shall be an Instruction to the Committee on the Bill in Session 2015-16;
(c) all Petitions presented in the current Session or in Session 2014-15 which stand referred to the Committee and which have not been withdrawn, and any Petition presented between the day on which Session 2014-15 ends and the day on which proceedings on the Bill are resumed in Session 2015-16 in accordance with this Order, shall stand referred to the Committee in Session 2015-16;
(d) any Minutes of Evidence taken and any papers laid before the Committee in the current Session or in Session 2014-15 shall stand referred to the Committee in Session 2015-16;
(e) only those Petitions mentioned in sub-paragraph (c), and any Petition which may be presented by being deposited in the Private Bill Office and in which the Petitioners complain of any proposed additional provision or of any matter which has arisen during the progress of the Bill before the Committee in Session 2015-16, shall stand referred to the Committee;
(f) any Petitioner whose Petition stands referred to the Committee in the first Session of the new Parliament shall, subject to the Rules and Orders of the House and to the Prayer of his Petition, be entitled to be heard in person or through Counsel or Agents upon the Petition provided that it is prepared and signed and in conformity with the Rules and Orders of the House, and the Member in charge of the Bill shall be entitled to be heard through Counsel or Agents in favour of the Bill against that Petition;
(g) the Committee shall have power to sit notwithstanding any adjournment of the House, to adjourn from place to place, and to report from day to day Minutes of Evidence taken before it;
(h) three shall be the Quorum of the Committee;
(i) any person registered (or deemed by paragraph 2(j) to be registered) in Session 2014-15 as a parliamentary agent entitled to practise as such in opposing Bills only who, at the time when proceedings on the Bill were suspended in Session 2014-15, was employed in opposing the Bill shall be deemed to have been registered as such a parliamentary agent in Session 2015-16.
6. If this paragraph applies, the Bill shall be deemed to have been reported from the Select Committee and to have been re-committed to a Public Bill Committee.
7. If this paragraph applies–
(a) the Bill shall be deemed to have been reported from the Select Committee and from the Public Bill Committee; and
(b) the Bill shall be set down as an order of the day for consideration.
8. If this paragraph applies-
(a) the Bill shall be deemed to have been reported from the Select Committee and from the Public Bill Committee and to have been considered; and
(b) the Bill shall be set down as an order of the day for third reading.
9. If this paragraph applies, the Bill shall be deemed to have passed through all its stages in this House.
Other
10. The references in paragraphs 1 and 3 above to further proceedings do not include proceedings under Standing Order 224A(8) (deposit of supplementary environmental information).
11. That the above Orders be Standing Orders of the House. —(Mr McLoughlin.)
positions for which additional salaries are payable for the purposes of section 4A(2) of the parliamentary standards act 2009
Resolved,
That the Chair of the select committee appointed to consider the High Speed Rail (London - West Midlands) Bill is specified for the purposes of section 4A(2) of the Parliamentary Standards Act 2009.—(Mr Goodwill.)
defence reform bill: Programme (no.2)
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 83A(7)),
That the following provisions shall apply to the Defence Reform Bill for the purpose of supplementing the Order of 16 July 2013 (Defence Reform Bill (Programme)):
Consideration of Lords Amendments
Proceedings on consideration of Lords Amendments shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion two hours after their commencement at today’s sitting.
Subsequent stages
(1) Any further Message from the Lords may be considered forthwith without any Question being put.
(2) The proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.—(Philip Dunne.)
Business of the House (No. 1)
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s motion. As he appreciates, I was disappointed not to secure two full parliamentary days to debate the main principles of the Bill, as I think the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) knows only too well. It is regrettable that many colleagues were able to speak for only four minutes yesterday. Indeed, I was unable to allow colleagues to intervene, because I had extra time and did not want to eat into the time for others to speak. I welcome the fact that these discussions have been split over two days, which was a good decision. I think that four hours is a good time. We need to be able to ask questions about the detailed arrangements for the Bill, not least because it is a very complex process, even for some people in the House. I welcome the motion and hope that we can proceed in an orderly fashion.
High Speed Rail (London – West Midlands) Bill
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr McLoughlin
I will give way to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), but then I must make some progress.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way while he is laying out his case. However, the case he is making for HS2 fails to recognise that there will still have to be an awful lot of work on our classic railway. It would be wrong if he did not tell people that the west coast main line is crumbling and will still need major investment and repairs, and that our classic railway will suffer. I hope that the money will be there for those railways, too.
Mr McLoughlin
I do not think that I have been misleading. I have been very open about the west coast main line. I do not think it is crumbling—as I have said, there has been £10 billion upgrade on the line north of Rugby. Between 2014 and 2019, we shall be spending £38 billion on the existing railway network, on things such as the electrification of the midland main line and a number of other schemes that I have already mentioned.
Even on moderate forecasts, services will be increasingly full by the mid-2020s. If we do not create extra capacity, people at stations such as Milton Keynes and Northampton will have to queue to get on a train to get to work. That is despite the £9 billion that we have spent on the west coast main line in recent years. More upgrades like that will not provide the extra capacity that we need. A new north-south railway line is the right answer. From day one, it will improve journey times and train services to Manchester and to the north-west and Scotland, because HS2 trains will continue on the existing network. It will free up more space for commuters and freight on existing routes, and places up and down the country will benefit from more services and seats. Although it is too early to talk about precise timetables, Milton Keynes, an area of particularly close interest for my Parliamentary Private Secretary, could get 11 trains an hour to London compared with six now, and places such as Rugby would get more non-stop journeys to London.
Today's debate is about phase 1, but when it is complete HS2 will be a wider network. We have consulted on phase 2, and I know that many Members have a strong interest in ensuring that we get the plans right. That should include serving cities on the eastern leg through the east midlands, Sheffield and Leeds as well as the north-west, and we will set out more details later this year.
Of course we must design HS2 well and build it carefully, which means making sure that our young people have the skills to get the engineering jobs it will create. We have therefore announced plans for the first new further education college in 20 years, backed by HS2. Soon we shall announce the winning location for the central facility and a network of outposts. I know that many places are keen to take part, such as Aylesbury college, Manchester and Birmingham.
One of the things that matters most about HS2 is the huge opportunity it offers to the next generation. There will be 2,000 apprenticeships—not just one-off jobs building the line, but careers. The numbers involved mean that we will take the skills base in this country to a new level, so the country will not only be better connected but better trained with the skills we need to compete not only in transport but across a range of industries. This is not just investment in steel and rolling stock; it is a huge investment in our people across the nation.
Mr McLoughlin
I am not sure what point the right hon. Gentleman is trying to make. If we only built infrastructure projects when we had the support of everyone concerned, we would be building very little infrastructure in this country.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for acknowledging that some parts of the country will take all the pain of this project but get none of the gain, unlike with the M40, which benefited Buckinghamshire and contributed to its economy by enabling people to get on and off it. I hope he is not ruling out looking at further mitigation, particularly for the area of outstanding natural beauty, which concerns not only my constituency but that of my right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr Lidington). If one is to have environmental credentials, it is important to protect our environment to the highest degree when implementing projects of this nature.
Mr McLoughlin
Of the 20.8 km of the route that passes through the Chilterns, only 3.3 km will be on the surface—at the moment the rest will be below ground level. I understand my right hon. Friend’s point, and that is something we need to bear in mind. She is right that her constituents benefited directly from the M40, and that was paid for by taxpayers across the whole country, rather than just by those in that area. I will give way to my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans (Mrs Main), as she has not yet intervened.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:
“this House, while accepting the need to increase overall railway capacity, declines to give a second reading to the Bill because there has been inadequate opportunity for Members and those affected by the Bill to consider and respond to the report of the Assessor appointed under Standing Order 224A, which was not published until shortly before the Easter recess; because assessments of the relative costs and benefits of works envisaged by the Bill have been repeatedly unconvincing and still fail to demonstrate a sound economic case for the proposed works, particularly in relation to other options; because the Secretary of State has declined to publish the Major Projects Authority report on High Speed 2, with the result that Members have been denied access to highly significant evidence on the viability of the project; because the case for starting further high-speed rail construction in this country with a line from London to the West Midlands rather than in the north of England has not been convincingly made out; because the Bill will cause widespread environmental disruption to many areas of the country including areas of outstanding natural beauty; and because the Bill should be preceded by proper consideration of and a strategy for integrating high-speed rail with other transport modes including the UK’s international airport hubs.”
This cross-party amendment commences by stating that we accept the need to increase overall railway capacity, and I make my remarks against that background. It is good to follow the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh), but I am afraid my speech will break the cosy consensus over this project between those on the two Front Benches, which will be no surprise to anybody in this Chamber.
It has been four years since Labour first announced HS2, and I want to thank the vast armies of people from all the conservation groups, including the Chiltern Countryside group and the Chilterns Conservation board, lobby groups such as HS2 Action Alliance, district and parish councils, individuals, and volunteer engineers and county councillors, who have contributed to trying to put this project under scrutiny. In Buckinghamshire I am most grateful for the support of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr Lidington), and to Mr Speaker himself. All our constituencies are affected by this project.
I believe that more than 50 Members have applied to speak about this project, and in the short time available I hope to register the risks associated with it and the pain and anguish that it continues to bring to so many people, and to ask the House whether this is really the top priority and the best way to spend £50 billion of taxpayers’ money. I started as a nimby, but over time I have come to look at this project and I do not believe it is the answer to the UK’s transport issues.
Let us consider some of those issues. Originally, the costs totalled about £20 billion, yet they have now doubled to £42.6 billion and we should not forget that that does not include the trains, which are budgeted at £7.5 billion. An apparent leak from the Treasury to the Financial Times estimated that the costs as they stand could run to £73 billion or more. In fact, such high risks are attached to the project, that the contingency is £14 billion. We are now on the fifth business case for phase 1 and the benefit-cost ratio is now 1.4, so for every £1 of taxpayers’ money spent, only £1.40 comes back. If we strip away the flawed assumptions and replace them with a more realistic value of time, the true benefit-cost ratio falls way below £1, and there would actually be a loss to the taxpayer.
Mrs Gillan
I am sorry; I do not have enough time to give way.
Economists claim that the benefits of HS2 are also exaggerated. Some 79% of those benefits arose from the value allocated to time savings by businesses assuming no valuable work was done on trains and a huge increase in business travellers. If that is now not correct or has been overestimated, the benefits fall again considerably. Looking back, HS1 predicted 28 million passengers per annum—the reality is 9 million. Should we really trust the projections by the Department for Transport? The National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have already raised significant concerns about the project and the passenger projections for HS2, but despite that the figures have not been revised.
Mrs Gillan
I am awfully sorry, but if I give way to the right hon. Gentleman I will have to give way to others, and so many people want to speak that I will eat into the time allowed to them. The right hon. Gentleman can make his own speech.
The Secretary of State for Transport claims that HS2 is essential to deal with an impending capacity crisis on the west coast main line. However, the available figures show that intercity trains on the west coast main line coming into Euston are on average just 52% full in peak hours. There is severe commuter overcrowding on many commuter lines into all our major cities, and HS2 will do very little, or in many cases nothing at all, to relieve that. Is the commute into Euston really the priority over other areas?
The big picture is the claim that HS2 will heal the north-south divide. Even today the Institute of Economic Affairs has again questioned the promises of an economic transformation of the north. There is no academic peer-reviewed evidence to show that the presence of a high-speed rail line will lead to increased economic output at the levels suggested in what is now a questionable report from KPMG, commissioned by HS2. The report claims that HS2 would bring benefits of £15 billion per year. However, it assumes that rail connectivity is the only variable driving local economic growth. We know that that is simply not the case; if it were, Ebbsfleet in Kent would be a boom town.
However, London could be the winner. The majority of academic evidence available in other countries shows that where a high-speed rail line connects a dominant city to a less dominant town or city, it is the dominant city that gains. HS2 will suck skills and businesses to London rather than to our regions. If HS2 had a viable business case, it should have been built starting in the north, connecting the northern cities to each other and then eventually to London.
We are getting a project that has markedly changed since it was first proposed. HS2 was going to allow someone to jump on a train in Manchester and travel straight to Brussels, but that has now been ditched. The direct link to Heathrow has of course now been dropped, but in any event why are we not going for maximum connectivity to our airports in the south by finalising our high-speed rail policy after the result of the Howard Davies commission?
My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield would also like assurances from the Government on the so-called Heathrow spur, on which he still has many questions. Even the much vaunted connections between the towns and cities are far from perfect. In fact, HS2 connects only four city centres. The proposals for Euston are not settled and Old Oak Common will require an enormous amount of work to connect it to the rest of London’s transport infrastructure. The HS2 station in Birmingham is a 15 minute walk through an underpass to Birmingham New Street, where the rest of the city’s trains come in. If we look to the plans for Sheffield Meadowhall, Toton and Derby, the HS2 stations will be miles outside city centres. The latest business case included £8.3 billion of cuts to existing rail services, affecting many towns and cities, and the KPMG report showed that many local economies away from the line of the route would suffer. The main objective to shorten journey times drastically has now been questioned by calls from the Environmental Audit Committee to decrease average speeds. That means that HS2 may not even achieve its original aims on either speed or connectivity.
Finally, HS2 is not really green. A meagre 1% of HS2 passengers are predicted to transfer from air, and just 4% from cars. The remaining 95% of passengers are predicted to be new journeys or transfers from less polluting modes of transport, and that is before we examine closely the vast amount of power needed to power the railway. If the project goes ahead, it is important that we protect the environment and the people who will be affected. People expect the project to be implemented to the highest standards, ensuring the best environmental protections and giving support to the communities and individuals who are severely affected.
The Chilterns area of outstanding natural beauty is in my constituency, as everybody now knows. It is known as the lungs of London and is the last large expanse of protected unspoilt countryside in the south-east of England. There are more than 50 million visits annually, and many of the villages, hamlets, ancient woodlands and hedgerows remain largely unchanged since Norman times. The Chilterns is designated under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, and the Government have a legal duty to adhere to those protections: anything less would make a mockery of all the Government’s pledges to protect our natural environment.
The Environmental Audit Committee’s report of 7 April was highly critical of the project and said that the Government have “significant work to do” to prove that they are prioritising environmental protection. Some 40% of the route is yet to be examined. If the project does proceed, I now believe that the only way to mitigate properly the damage to the AONB is to fully tunnel the whole area. The demand for longer tunnelling through the AONB was the most frequently raised concern in the responses to the environmental statement, with more than 8,000 people raising it as an issue. The line will already have a devastating impact on the AONB, including destroying 10.2 hectares of irreplaceable ancient woodland, as well as communities such as South Heath and Wendover.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury and I have worked together on considering HS2 and the long tunnelling option. He has said to me that if he is not satisfied with the arrangements for mitigation of the AONB and compensation, particularly where Dunsmore, Wendover Dean and Wendover are concerned, he will join me in the Lobby and vote against the project on Report and Third Reading. As it stands, Buckinghamshire will take all the pain and have no gain. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield has constituents in Denham who remain entirely unpersuaded by the arguments put forward both in respect of the generality of the proposal for HS2 and of the detail. The impact of the Colne valley viaduct travelling through a site of special scientific interest, with no details on how the noise will impact on the local community, is a source of real anxiety. His constituents have argued for further tunnelling under the Colne. It is important to remember that the voices of our Buckinghamshire colleagues in Government are as equally important as the voices of Back Benchers, if not more so. I want allies inside the Government, as well as on the Back Benches, as we scrutinise this project.
On compensation, we have had no fewer than five consultations and still those people whose homes and livelihoods have been devastated by HS2 have had to wait for over four years for the final compensation scheme to be announced. The eventual compensation announcement on 9 April was not popular. I know that the concerns are shared by Mr Speaker. He believes that the fact there is no provision for homeowners whose properties are further than 300 metres from the line but who have seen their property fall in value as a result, is unacceptable and so do I.
Mrs Gillan
I am sorry.
People blighted by HS2 will not only be negatively affected by the line itself, but by the construction, noise, traffic, impact on our blue light services, decrease in tourism, and the disruption to our waterways; I need not go on. The effect of these has not been explored fully to any adequate degree.
Lastly, what worries me most, and what is in my reasoned amendment, is this: if the project goes ahead, this House should be aware of the risks. Many people are concerned at what I consider to be the wholly deplorable position of the Government in not publishing the Major Projects Authority’s reports into the project. The Information Commissioner is now challenging the veto placed on it by the Government in the courts and maintains that the release of the documents is in the public interest, as do I. The reports rate the project as amber/red, meaning that successful delivery is “in doubt” because of major risks or issues in key areas. The Government expect the support of Members to carry the Bill, so they should be expected to produce this information and make it accessible to Members of this House. All projects carry risk. It is unacceptable that we should not be aware of the risks when we are spending such vast sums of taxpayers’ money.
I will be voting for my reasoned amendment to halt the project and I hope that colleagues will join me in the Lobby. I know that many colleagues will abstain, but I hope that the vote tonight—even though this is David and Goliath and for once Goliath is going to win—will ensure that, as the Bill passes through Committee, our colleagues who are scrutinising it will be able to support the maximum environmental protection and compensation for those communities and people who will be paying the highest price for this project with their homes, businesses and local countryside. They will be gaining none of the benefit. Whoever joins me tonight in the Lobby, I am grateful for their support. I do not expect that we will win the vote, but my goodness we are giving notice to the Government, and any future Government in charge of this project, that it will be scrutinised inch by inch.
Frank Dobson (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
In the ridiculously short time available, I will have to confine my remarks to the impact on my constituency.
I should point out the ridiculous situation whereby the hybrid Bill before the House proposes major works in my constituency, none of which the Government now intend to carry out. The Bill also provides for a link from HS2 to HS1. That ridiculous proposal has been abandoned altogether. The Bill provides for the option 8 design of the station at Euston. That ridiculous proposal, we are told, is shortly to be abandoned, but the design, cost and construction timetable for the alternative to it have not yet been worked out, so there’s nowt to vote on.
The neighbourhoods to the east and west of Euston station and its railway approaches are densely populated with a variety of uses. Most of the streets are overwhelmingly residential. They are home to large numbers of residents living in high densities in settled and varied communities, with a wide range of incomes, housing tenures, jobs, ethnic origins and religions. Most of those residents want to continue to live there. They rightly resent patronising references to their neighbourhood by the much lauded chair of HS2 Ltd and have asked me to remind him and everyone else that where they live is not like the Olympic site. It is not a brownfield site, ripe for redevelopment.
The HS2 project as now proposed would wreak havoc on those neighbourhoods. It would expand Euston station by 75 metres to the west, demolish the homes of 500 people and subject 5,000 more to living for a decade next to the construction site or beside roads that will be made intolerable by the heavy goods vehicles servicing the main site and the 14 satellite construction compounds. No consideration has been given to the cumulative harm that all this would do to the quality of life of my constituents. The proposed working hours regime enables work to proceed at any hour of the day or night. Every little park and play space near the site is to be taken over. Small, locally owned and locally staffed businesses, especially cafes, shops and restaurants in Drummond street, face financial disaster. Between 40% and 70% of their business is passing trade from pedestrians going to and from Euston station, which, for the duration of the works—10 years—will be cut off by a solid, 3.6 metre-high security fence.
The people I represent believe that HS2 should not go ahead. Failing that, they believe that HS2 should terminate at Old Oak Common, at least temporarily, to test its capacity and permit the assessment of any capacity needed at Euston to be based on experience rather than the guesswork used so far.
Frank Dobson
No, I do not think I should.
If the Government insist on Euston, local people want the new station to be designed to fit within the curtilage of the existing station. HS2 has failed to properly appraise such alternatives, including the double-deck down design put forward by local professionals, who also want the bulk of the space created above the station to be devoted to housing that local people can afford or low-cost units available to spin-off companies developing and exploiting products of the biomedical research organisations in the area.
In December 2010, the right hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond), then Transport Secretary, told the House:
“it is right and proper that individuals who suffer serious financial loss in the national interest should be compensated.”—[Official Report, 20 December 2010; Vol. 520, c. 1207.]
That promise has not been kept. The arrangements for compensation in my constituency are infinitely worse than those in the rural areas. Right-to-buy leaseholders—Mrs Thatcher’s children—will get compensation, but not enough to buy an equivalent property in the area. People living next to the site—within 5 metres, not 500 metres—whose houses are not demolished will not be entitled to a penny of compensation. That is ridiculous. Neither financial nor practical mitigation measures are being offered to enable the diverse communities in Euston to survive 10 years of turmoil. They do not object to the railway; they object to 10 years of destruction.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)
Everything about my background, and recent history in Parliament in particular, suggests I should support HS2. I am the co-ordinator of the RMT parliamentary group and have supported every campaign for investment in rail over the last 17 years in Parliament. I have also used the argument about high-speed rail and taking capacity from aviation on to rail to obviate the need for a third runway at Heathrow. However, I cannot vote for the Bill tonight—I will be voting for the reasoned amendment—because I must be one of the few MPs who does not know what is going to happen in his constituency.
Initially, when high-speed rail was put forward, I was told that there would be consultation on the main route and then, last autumn, that there would be consultation on the link between the main route through my constituency to Heathrow. I was looking forward to that, because we were told that we would look at about nine options and have a detailed consultation, and that I would be able to organise community meetings and we would come to a view on whether or not we supported the link to Heathrow from the main route—or at least on what option we would support. My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter) alluded to the fact that a grubby compromise was subsequently made, including across the Front Benches, whereby an Airports Commission would be appointed, in order to get every political party off the hook before the general election about deciding honestly what they supported on aviation expansion. Howard Davies’s commission has already confirmed that it could report by next January but has been told to go away on holiday between January and the general election and not report until after it.
Therefore, my constituents, like others, will not know what the political parties’ views will be about their options in respect of expansion at Heathrow, Gatwick or elsewhere. That has meant that the whole process of consultation about high-speed rail’s link to Heathrow has also been delayed. So I am the only MP in this place who cannot go to their constituents before the general election to explain to them what the implications of HS2 are. What does that mean? It means blight. It causes upset and distress for those people whose homes, businesses and community resources will be at risk, and it causes long-term blight in the area. My area is already blighted by the threat of a third or a fourth runway, but we are now blighted by the threat of a high-speed rail link that could go under us, over us or through us. We do not know which way it will go. That is just unacceptable politics.
Mrs Gillan
Does it also not send out a poor signal internationally that it is taking us so long to decide where our airport capacity lies? Surely we should be ensuring that we have the best connectivity internationally because, after all, we are in a shrinking global marketplace in which we should be competing.
John McDonnell
I agree. I just wish we had some certainty and that certain politicians kept to their word. Who said:
“no ifs, no buts…no third runway”?
That came from the Prime Minister. He never said, “No third runway during just one Parliament.” What he said was interpreted by most of us as a permanent commitment. I agree with the right hon. Lady that we need certainty on this matter, and the one group of people who have no certainty are my constituents. I would like the Secretary of State or the Minister to explain to me what the process will be for consultation and decision making on the link with Heathrow. Will there be additional legislation? Clause 50 enables further expansion of the route to go on under a transport works order and not full legislation, so I fear that there will not be full consultation and that we will not be presented with a Bill that we can debate in this House and vote on with regard to the link to Heathrow. In that way, yet again, my constituents will be left with uncertainty. This is no way to run a railway, no way to plan a railway and certainly no way to spend £50 billion—on a project that could be going nowhere.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)
I am delighted, Madam Deputy Speaker, to catch your eye in this debate. Many Members wish to speak and so our time is constrained. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on spending so much time in the Chamber, but having done so, I hope that he will listen to some of the concerns that have been raised, because we will have spent almost £1 billion on HS2 Ltd planning this railway by the end of this Parliament, and, as far as I can see, there have been no changes whatever from when it started to now. It seems to me that this is a visionary concept, but it could be made so much better if some of the concerns that have been raised tonight were taken on board.
My hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Craig Whittaker) was right to say that we live in an increasingly interconnected world. I have just come back from China where a large number of high-speed lines have been built. It was right to do so because its environmental pollution is horrendous. This is where I start to get involved in this whole concept, because 80% of my Cotswolds constituents who travel 75 miles to Heathrow go by car. If HS2, with proper connectivity to Heathrow, were better designed, 80% of them would go by rail.
Our forefathers, almost 200 years ago, bequeathed us a visionary rail system that enabled the industrial revolution to take place, and we have the opportunity to do the same thing today. We need to get the route and the details right, which is why I formed an integrated transport group, with my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (James Wharton). We have done a lot of work on this subject. We have produced a comprehensive report. If any Member has insomnia one night, they might like to read it, or at least the two-page executive summary. We make a number of points in the report that are worth repeating in the short time that I have available today.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind), called in all the evidence at the last moment. HS1 was going to come in via south of London, but the route was changed and it then came in via Stratford. Had he not done that, the Olympics would never have taken place. It is a huge shame that the instructions to the Committee have taken out the HS1-HS2 link. It is still something we should consider, because passengers coming from Europe and flying into this country will want to get on an interconnected railway from this country to Europe. If there are problems with Camden, let us tunnel underneath London; let us be visionary about it, but let us ensure that we do have the HS1-HS2 link.
The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) made a very good point. I thought that I was going to disagree with everything he said in his speech, but he made one very good point towards the end, and I ask the Secretary of State to listen to this very carefully. If this railway had been a fast railway going at 300 kph rather than 360 kph, we could have varied the route very slightly, but with huge benefit, especially to the Chilterns. HS1 was built along the existing transport corridors—along the motorways and often along the existing rail links. If we had built a fast rail rather than a high-speed rail, we could have swept it out along the M40 and tunnelled under the shortest bit of the Chilterns. We would not have done any environmental degradation to the Chilterns at all.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way and for coming well behind me to defend the Chilterns. Is it not true that, in the run-up to the last election, that is the route that we believed would be adopted by any Government of whatever complexion? Imagining that they would go through the widest route of an area of outstanding natural beauty and damage it so greatly was almost beyond credibility. We were going to go through the narrowest route, and should that not have been where it went anyway?
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
My right hon. Friend is entirely right, and she has been basing her case on that. The advantage of doing that is that roads, rail, freight and air would have all coalesced into one Heathrow hub. The one thing that has not been said in this debate is that we need to be visionary about this, because 15 years ago, the latest technology, the internet, was just coming into its infancy. Who knows what technology will be available in the next 15 years?
Let us future-proof this railway as much as we possibly can. There will be all sorts of new technology to track people and suitcases and to make travel on an international scale hugely better than it is today. If we do not do that, we will already be losing business by the day because of the experience of passengers who have to go through Heathrow. If we do not get this right, we will lose even more business to the likes of Schiphol, Charles de Gaulle and Munich. The complete passenger experience, door-to-door, is what will matter. People will simply not come into Old Oak Common and take the underground for one station to get to HS1; they will fly from wherever they were coming from in the first place straight to continental Europe and further afield.
We need to consider HS1-HS2, the route and a Heathrow hub. We must think about how we will link to the world’s busiest airport. I have little doubt that when push comes to shove, Davies will come up with Heathrow as our major hub airport, yet we are not going to link the most expensive civil engineering project ever carried out in this country with our major airport. That is crazy.
I want to make two final points. First, I do not believe the case for business being sucked from the north to the south is true, which is why earlier I advocated starting equally from the north and the south if we can afford the cash. Finally, I must tell my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that I am one of the very few chartered surveyors in this House. I know how the law on compensation for property works and the French and Germans are far more generous than we are. If he is generous with the compensation, he will have far fewer opponents to the railway line, which will be built far quicker without so many legal battles.
Mrs Gillan
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I understand that some colleagues who live some way out of London have been encouraged to make their way home because of the tube strike this evening. Is the Chair able to offer any advice to colleagues so that they might be able to stay for the votes and proceedings, particularly when this House is sitting to such a late hour?
High-speed Rail
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
The hon. Lady, as Chair of the Transport Committee, has spent a lot of time looking at that, and indeed has taken evidence from me, Network Rail and Sir David Higgins over recent months. She will know that there is huge investment. In her city, for example, in May this year we will see the first express train running from Liverpool to Manchester, which I welcome. It is part of the northern hub, with over £500 million of investment linking Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and, eventually, Hull.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
It is a reflection of the poor genesis of the project that, four years down the line, the Secretary of State is still making fundamental adjustments to the plans for HS2. It does not matter how many studies or justifications he puts forward, he needs to understand that for many of my constituents, it is like putting lipstick on a pig. However glossy the lipstick, HS2 is still a pig.
I am sad that the Secretary of State can stand at the Dispatch Box and say that he respects the environment when we are still not to have full tunnelling under the whole area of outstanding natural beauty in the Chilterns and when neither Front-Bench team has had the decency to talk about compensation. My constituents, and many people up and down the line, still do not know what the compensation package is, and it is about time that he came to the Dispatch Box and announced the generous and fair compensation that the Prime Minister promised.
Mr McLoughlin
I hope very soon to be able to make announcements about the Government’s proposals for compensation. I would just say to my right hon. Friend that on the one hand I am attacked for listening to people, and then on the other hand I am attacked for not listening to people. I suppose that is just one of the problems of dealing with big infrastructure projects—wherever we take them, there will always be people who are directly affected, and they will not be convinced of the necessity of them. However, I am convinced of the necessity of high-speed rail for our cities in the north.
Oral Answers to Questions
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
I am not in a position to announce what will be in the future legislative programme for this House. It is no secret, given that it has been announced by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, that the state opening of Parliament will be in June. There is certainly no time left in this Session.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
The Institute of Directors surveyed more than 13,000 directors for its spring report to gain their views on HS2. More than half of them thought that it was poor value for money and more than 60% thought that the budget that is earmarked for the project would provide a better return if it was used to improve the existing road and rail networks. Why do the Government not listen to the wider business community, rather than to the lobbying of businesses with vested interests, such as the High Speed Rail Industry Leaders Group, most of whom turned out to be on the Government payroll?
Mr McLoughlin
I listen to the Institute of Directors, and I also listen to the CBI, which supports HS2, and to the British Chambers of Commerce, which has written to the Prime Minister about it. I also listen to the local authority leaders, who are united in their view that HS2 is the right thing to do to close the north-south divide in this country and provide the north with the type of rail services that it deserves. I would also point out that we have had significant investment in London transport, and it is about time that the rest of the country got some of the investment as well.
Flooding: Transport Disruption
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
In my answer, I tried to be open with the House on all the problems being faced by passengers and our constituents across the country. I do not think it helps when the Opposition try to suggest that money is not available. When I was here last Thursday, I was the one speaking up for all the passengers who were being inconvenienced by strikes that the Opposition were deliberately incredibly quiet about. I need no lectures on speaking up for passengers and the people who use our public services.
As far as money and investment is concerned, the simple fact is this: as the Prime Minister has made absolutely clear, there is no limit to the amount of money that the Government are providing for immediate flood relief. We will do everything we can to help those people who are very badly affected and will be affected for months to come. That is a commitment from the whole of the Government: the Government certainly speak with one voice on this subject.
I also point out very clearly that, between 2014 and 2019 in the next round of investment in the railways cleared by this Government, we will see record sums invested in our railways. Indeed, as part of the investment programme, a tunnel that is very important for the south-west, has just been relined. A lot of the money we are talking about—the £850 million being spent on Reading station—is all about improving resilience in the long term. A lot of the money being spent by Network Rail over the next five years—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden), like a parrot, keeps saying, “It’s not new money.” The simple point is that it is new money. It is the £38 billion that we are going to invest in Network Rail over the next five years. It is important, too, and represents a record level of investment—a level of investment never reached by the previous Government when there was plenty of money available. When the buckets were overflowing, they did not invest in our infrastructure; we are investing in it, rebuilding the British railways, and the roads as well.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I would like to associate myself with the remarks of both Front Benchers about the victims and those people working around the clock to help people in trouble. I also congratulate Ministers on getting a grip of this situation and offering support wherever they can.
Following the flooding in 2008, the UK received about £127 million from the EU solidarity fund, which, in exceptional circumstances, can be used for regional disasters to help with clear-up work and infrastructure restoration. Our Welsh Conservative MEP, Dr Kay Swinburne, has been calling on the Government to co-ordinate with the Welsh Government to unlock funds from the solidarity fund in particular. Will my right hon. Friend work with Dr Swinburne, the Welsh Government and other parts of the country to ensure we unlock the maximum amount of money from this European fund during these terrible times?
Mr McLoughlin
I can reassure my right hon. Friend that this matter was discussed last night in the Cobra meeting, and my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General is looking at all the avenues for collecting any money that might be available.
Oral Answers to Questions
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
The other day I heard the leader of the RMT say that his holiday last week was planned 11 months ago. Presumably, when he called the strike date, he knew when his holiday was. The least he could have done was to abandon his holiday before the strike action and be in the country, ready to negotiate. I am waiting for the hon. Lady and other Opposition Members to condemn this outrageous strike action, which is causing nothing but misery to millions of people who work in London. They should condemn it, as I do.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
The spend on transport services in Yorkshire and London must also include the compensation paid to people adversely affected by services such as HS2. When are the Government going to pull their finger out and announce the compensation package for my constituents and others affected up and down the country, and let them know what they can expect to get for their properties, which are being rendered worthless by this scheme?
Mr McLoughlin
My right hon. Friend knows that I take the issue of compensation incredibly seriously. We promised to consult again on this and we have done that. I will attempt to come forward with the conclusions of that consultation as soon as possible. I am in no doubt about the problems faced by many people on the proposed route, and I take those responsibilities very seriously indeed.
High Speed 2
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
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Sheila Gilmore
I accept my hon. Friend’s point about green benefits in the long term, certainly in terms of air travel, although that will not necessarily be the case in the short term, as people will constantly argue.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I am not going to attack the hon. Lady aggressively on this matter, but she is making the point that she wants to see economic benefits spread throughout the country, so does she not agree that it would have been more sensible to look at connectivity between northern cities and with Scotland well in advance of running yet another line between Birmingham and London, especially as we do not even know yet whether that line will connect well or properly with HS1, or with Heathrow, Gatwick or wherever it is decided that our future airport capacity will be in the south-east? Does she agree that the project would have been better started in the north?
Sheila Gilmore
The right hon. Lady will not be surprised that I do not entirely agree with her view. We have to remember, for example, that the lines between cities across the north are already being electrified, quite separately from HS2.
Sheila Gilmore
I certainly agree that their views should be listened to and that they have their cities’ best interests at heart. They want them to develop and widen. Of course there will be an environmental impact and I understand people’s concern about that. It is never easy to develop such projects. It would be foolish to say that there will be no disruption or environmental damage, but on balance the country must weigh up the benefits. We must accept, as we have done and will continue to do, that enabling the country to develop as we want and in a much more balanced way means that we must take that on board, while always trying to mitigate the environmental problems.
Mrs Gillan
Is the hon. Lady telling the Chamber that sacrificing homes, businesses, ancient woodland and the area of outstanding natural beauty in my constituency is a price worth paying for HS2?
Sheila Gilmore
I certainly hope that there will be as much mitigation as possible. Any other option, and even expanding some existing rail lines, would also cause damage and loss of housing, because when lines were built there was development around them, so it is difficult to expand them.
If we are serious about expanding our economy, we must find a way to improve capacity because I firmly believe that it will increase. We have to move forward with the project as quickly as possible. There would be regret if in future we looked back and asked, “Why did we not do it 10 or 20 years ago?” This is our opportunity to grow and distribute our economy throughout the UK.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I will try to be considerate, Sir Edward, but as you know, this project has a very deleterious effect on my constituency. I am grateful to be called by you, first of all, and to have the opportunity to put some points from the position of Chesham and Amersham.
I start by congratulating the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) on obtaining the debate. She has shown interest in this railway for some time, although I have to say that I am not sure it is a priority for her constituents, as 92% of all Scottish rail journeys begin and end in Scotland. As I understand it, some flagship improvements to the Edinburgh-Glasgow route have already been cut by £350 million. I have to say that if she is interested in the issue, she has failed to acknowledge that her constituents and anybody else travelling from Scotland will have years of disruption at Euston station. If she looks carefully at the plans for Euston station and where the long-distance trains from Scotland arrive, she will see that there will be fewer platforms and reduced services for many years, so her constituents and many people in Scotland will face a lot of disruption at the end of their journey if the project goes ahead.
Sheila Gilmore
Perhaps I should just point out that most of my constituents—although not necessarily all the people from Scotland—will be travelling to Kings Cross.
Mrs Gillan
I am sure that most of the hon. Lady’s constituents will be travelling to Kings Cross, but plenty of people from Scotland travel to Euston. As she does not appear to want the route built to Scotland immediately, nor to want the northern routes to be constructed first, she can rest assured that there will be a lot of disruption right across the network as the project develops. I was surprised that she did not ask for the line to be built from Scotland to England, because there is to be a referendum in Scotland and, as I have always said, if we want Scotland to remain as part of the United Kingdom, connectivity to the rest of the United Kingdom is really important. Despite any differing views about HS2, I think that most people in the Chamber would agree that we want Scotland to remain part of the United Kingdom.
Mr MacNeil
Does it not show London’s priorities that, rather than building high-speed lines to the north, it built high-speed lines to the south and towards the continent—indeed, to countries that were not in political union with London?
Mrs Gillan
No, I do not at all agree with the hon. Gentleman on that, and he knows it. If that is a mischievous way of pushing the SNP’s message, I have to say that I believe that we are better off together and that the people and economy of Scotland will be a lot better off if it remains firmly as part of the United Kingdom.
Today we have a fightback from HS2, because Sir David Higgins takes up his appointment; we have already had the PR charm offensive from HS2 this morning, conducted from Old Oak Common. We heard that we will have a new further education college to train the 2,000 engineers that we do not currently have to complete the build over the next 20 years of HS2. The Government are constantly trying to talk up the project. We have had more fightbacks and comebacks on HS2 than we can possibly imagine. More alarmingly, we heard this morning that over the next six weeks, Sir David will prove that he can produce HS2 cheaper and quicker. That is what he has been charged to do. That will be interesting; it means that the past four years and the work by the Department for Transport and HS2 Ltd is obviously not good enough, and that a great rescuer can come in and show us, over the next six weeks, how we can do it quicker and cheaper. I wish him the best of luck, but it makes me wonder what we have paid nearly £1 billion for in terms of the work that has been carried out so far.
Mike Thornton (Eastleigh) (LD)
Is it not always a good idea constantly to make savings and improve delivery? Is that not what every businessman would do every day of his life? To say that that is not a good idea is very strange.
Mrs Gillan
I am not saying that it is not a good idea; I am asking what the hundreds of people who have been working on the project have been doing over the past four years. Surely—
Mrs Gillan
The former Minister here is responsible. When we have a project for which the Secretary of State has had to come to the House and announce that the figures are wrong and that the cost has gone up by £10 billion, surely it is amazing that we now have a new chairman coming in who is already charged with trying to reduce that cost. What is going on with the costings for the project? Neither the Department nor HS2 Ltd have got a grip. I give way to the former Minister.
Mr Burns
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. I can certainly say that people have been working, over the past four years, on fine-tuning and improving the line of route and the delivery of it, and on mitigation, which, for example, directly benefits my right hon. Friend. She knows as well as I do that 19 km of HS2 go through her constituency; 14.5 km are in a tunnel and the other 4 km are in a cutting.
Mrs Gillan
I am so glad that my right hon. Friend can remember his brief from when he was a Minister. I am grateful for the tunnel, as are my constituents and the environment, but the fact remains that the area of outstanding natural beauty will be drastically affected by the project. If the issue is about connectivity and capacity, there is no reason why alternative routes cannot be found. The reason why it goes straight through my constituency is speed. There are alternative strategies—I am sure that he remembers the 51m alternative strategy that was produced. There are ways of achieving the connectivity and economic renewal of the country other than HS2.
The business case, which the hon. Member for Edinburgh East mentioned, is dreadful. At the end of October, the Government released yet another version of it, which confirmed the shrinking benefit. The benefit-cost ratio for phase 1 is now estimated to be 1.4, excluding the wider economic benefits. However, experts working on the figures—particularly those in HS2 Action Alliance, which includes some great experts on transport and economics—have estimated that the real figure could be under 0.5. That is less than 50p back for every £1 spent. Even the official figures now beg the question whether the project is value for money.
In order to deal with the bad publicity that HS2 was getting about the benefit-cost ratio and the project’s value for money, which is a shrinking benefit, a report from KPMG was commissioned. That was supposed to build a positive view of the railway, as we all now know. It claimed that the economy would be boosted by £15 billion a year. Within days of that report being published, that claim was challenged from many angles. In September, Robert Peston, the BBC’s business editor, drove a coach and horses through the report. He rightly pointed out that many of the gains that KPMG had calculated were based on a reasonable notion that companies would be established in places where there were better transport links, but the report took no account of whether those regions contain available land to site new or bigger companies, or actually have the people with the relevant skills to employ. As those two features are the fundamental causes of poor growth in many parts of the UK, it is amazing to me that the report even stated:
“The methodology employed makes the implicit assumption that transport connectivity is the only supply-side constraint to business location.”
That was a coach and horses through the report.
Kate Green
I recognise how strongly the right hon. Lady feels about the matter and on behalf of her constituents. She referred to the KPMG report and the criticisms that were levelled at it. I also point out—and invite her comments on this—that aspects of economic gain were not referred to in the report. For example, it did not take account of the added economic benefits to us in Greater Manchester of investment in a station and of bringing the line through Manchester airport.
Mrs Gillan
The hon. Lady could be right. An awful lot was missed out of the report. It was in September that Robert Peston came up with the criticism. In October, a freedom of information request from “Newsnight” revealed the bad economic news that was missed out in detail from the report. The potential losses to some of our regional economies from this rail link will cause real problems. The negative impact on the north-east of Scotland, for example, was described as “significant to say the least” by the Aberdeen chamber of commerce. Areas from Cardiff to Kettering have been identified as ones that will lose millions of pounds from their annual GDP. I agree—that was missed out of the report. There was a nice little map that was supposed to disguise the figures behind, but a freedom of information request from “Newsnight” flushed out that important detail.
By November, the Select Committees were getting their teeth into the HS2 project, and so they should, although one cannot help feeling that the Select Committee on Transport is really an extension of the Department for Transport, given its latest thin and rather inadequate report.
Mr Simon Burns
Can my right hon. Friend answer a very simple question? Why is it that anyone who expresses any criticism of HS2 is 100% accurate, but anyone who sees any benefits in HS2 is either an appendage of the Department for Transport or just downright wrong?
Mrs Gillan
We could turn that question around to the former Minister, because he seems to think that everyone connected with HS2 is absolutely right, that this is the project that will solve all our economic problems and woes and that anyone who opposes it is not worth listening to. He is on dangerous ground with me, because he knows that I have been—
Mrs Gillan
There is an answer to the question. We could easily be wrong on some points, but that is not to say that HS2 is not totally wrong. Besides, they have been set off in a certain—
Sir Edward Leigh (in the Chair)
Order. We are in danger of going round in circles now, so perhaps the right hon. Lady could get on with her speech. Perhaps if she gives way to the Minister, we can get on and hear from other people.
Mr Goodwill
I understand that my right hon. Friend is entitled to her own opinions, but I do not accept that she is entitled to her own facts.
Mrs Gillan
Perhaps the Minister will intervene and give me the facts that I should have. Would the Minister like me to give way? How are my facts wrong?
Mr Goodwill
There will be plenty of facts when I make my concluding remarks.
Mrs Gillan
I will be grateful for a reply from the Minister then, of course. He knows that what I am doing is talking common sense and repeating what has happened, as opposed to making anything up. If this project is so good, perhaps the Minister will also, when he replies, let us know why the Government have still not published the Major Projects Authority reports, which highlight the risk. I believe that they have been classified as amber and red. If the Government are so convinced that this is such a wonderful project, it is important that those reports are made public. After all, we came into government saying that we would be the most transparent Government ever.
The hybrid Bill, which has been deposited, has also proved to be contentious. I think that tomorrow the Standing Orders Committee will meet for the first time since 2008 to examine the 14 Standing Orders that it may have transgressed. Alongside the hybrid Bill was deposited an environmental statement of nearly 50,000 pages, from which, as the Minister told me in answer to a question, some 877 pages were omitted. That and the fact that 56 days is the shortest period that has been given for any consultation on HS2 matters reflect the fact that the Government are not wanting to listen in detail to people who are raising valid and very worrying concerns about where we are going with this project.
It is widely known that Buckinghamshire gets all the pain and none of the gain. I am not sure whether the new college that is being promoted by my colleagues in government will be dangled in front of Buckinghamshire —whether it could come to Buckinghamshire. If that were considered, at least it would be something more than we are getting at the moment, because if people start to look in detail at what is proposed and the impact on Buckinghamshire, they will see that it is very worrying.
I talked to my right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr Lidington) before this debate. We were talking about the effects on the local economy and particularly on tourism in Wendover and beyond, and also in Great Missenden in my constituency. But also, more worryingly—my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford, who is also a former Health Minister, will know about this—concern has been expressed, because of what is proposed in changing the transport architecture locally, that even blue-light services could be affected during the construction phase of the project.
Mr MacNeil
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for giving way; she has been very generous. She is painting a truly frightening picture of high-speed rail. I just wonder where high-speed rail has been constructed whether she would advocate digging it up and taking it away, because it does seem to be a very frightening project indeed.
Mrs Gillan
I think that I understood what the hon. Gentleman just said to me. We all know that we need to have a balanced economy and that we need to get growth across the country, but there are alternative ways of doing that. It always seems to me that HS2 was a project dreamt up by politicians—by Andrew Adonis in opposition—and adopted by the coalition when it came in and that no one really and truthfully sat down and said, “How do we get an integrated transport system? How do we join up our roads, railways and airports?” We do not appear to have done what I consider to be the overarching work to deliver an integrated transport system. [Interruption.] It is not yet going ahead. As we know, the hybrid Bill must pass through this House and the other House, so it has not got the final stamp of approval.
Mrs Gillan
I am not digging up anything. The project has not got the final stamp of approval. There is still the option of pursuing other ways in which we could improve our economy.
Let me get back to my local picture, because I think that it is only fair to my constituents that some of their grievances are aired. The agricultural holdings in Chesham and Amersham will be severely impacted. Several farms will be badly affected by the construction, to such an extent that they will probably be put out of business. People cannot run an equestrian business next to a major construction site; nor can they use ground that has been submerged in 50 feet of soil. Will the Minister, although he is rightly going to defend his position, as he must, let me know what detailed work he had done on the losses that will be sustained by the businesses and particularly the farming and agricultural holdings in my neck of the woods? HS2 Ltd estimates that, across the whole route between Birmingham and London, about 300 existing businesses will be required to relocate to new premises, but people cannot relocate a farm and people cannot relocate a family business, when its land has been divided into two or part of its land has been appropriated.
I referred briefly to roads that will have to be closed, realigned or diverted during the construction phase. The impact on communities and local facilities will alter people’s travelling patterns and shopping habits, perhaps even for life. That is a great threat to the local economy. If people start to read through the detail of the environmental assessment, they can see some of the estimates of traffic congestion at the junctions of School lane and the A413, the Amersham bypass and the A404, and Chesham road and Bottrells lane—I could go on, but people will have got the idea. But I want to know what estimates the Department has made of the losses to our local economy from the delays, traffic congestion and disruption that years of construction will bring to Chesham and Amersham.
I believe that some of the claims made by consultants are not correct. There will be a lot of substitution in the economy. Yes, businesses will be attracted to the high-speed rail line and may move, as they did when the BBC, which the hon. Member for Edinburgh East referred to, went to Salford. That move has attracted many production companies and media companies to that area. However, that is substitution, because the businesses have been drawn from other parts; hence one of the very important things that was highlighted in the KPMG report was the disinvestment and the permanent loss to GDP of other regions as businesses are attracted falsely to the line.
This will be a distorting project. Many MPs around the country do not realise that there will be an effect on their constituency, which will suffer disinvestment as businesses move closer to new conurbations, for example into buildings created with Chinese investment, as we have heard, for the Manchester airport area and in other centres where they intend to build buildings that will accommodate businesses or shops.
Sir Edward Leigh (in the Chair)
Order. The right hon. Lady has been speaking for 20 minutes, so I think she might bring her remarks to a close now.
Mrs Gillan
That is exactly what I intend to do, Sir Edward, and I am grateful for your latitude. I think everybody understands how badly Chesham and Amersham will be affected and how strongly people feel about the matter.
I do not believe that HS2 will deliver all the benefits that have been laid out, but I can see at first hand the terrible effect that it will have on my locality and the businesses there. Many commentators, including the Institute of Directors, the New Economics Foundation and the Institute of Economic Affairs, have said that the project is not the answer to economic growth. I urge the Minister to be sympathetic to my constituents and what they are going through, and to question hard whether the project is the right one. It is still not too late to look at the alternatives.
Mark Lazarowicz
I recognise that there is a strong case for work to start as soon as possible on the London to Birmingham section. There are particular capacity issues there, so I do not think that that should be left until the end. At the same time, I feel that we should be discussing trying to do more work much earlier on in the process to benefit parts of the country that are further north as well.
I have taken longer than I intended, Sir Edward, so I will try to make my last few comments as brief as possible.
Mrs Gillan
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the only thing really stopping HS2 from being started in the north, and therefore from achieving the connectivity between the northern cities that they so dearly require, is the legislative timetable? It would simply be a case of stopping what we are doing on the hybrid Bill on the line between Birmingham and London, and progressing quickly with the northern connectivity. We could, for example, bring in a Bill at the back end of the year for the northern stages, which could go through Parliament first. It is a shame that we are not doing it the right way round, for the sake of a few months. We could meanwhile discover, for example, what we are going to do about airport capacity in the south.
Mark Lazarowicz
I do not know whether the former Minister, the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), who is commenting quietly at the right hon. Lady’s side, wants to intervene, but it is not my position that we should stop what we are doing with HS2; we should be developing and bringing forward plans for the next stages of the line.
Mr Simon Burns (Chelmsford) (Con)
I certainly will be more high-speed, Sir Edward. I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) on securing this important debate. It is refreshing to have the opportunity to discuss the positive impacts of High Speed 2 and the benefits that it will bring to many areas of the country. I have considerable sympathy for my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), because I appreciate that there is tremendous pressure against the scheme in Buckinghamshire. However, benefits will also come to her constituency, although not in the same way as to Manchester, Birmingham or other areas along the line of route.
The most important thing about High Speed 2 is that high-speed rail is the future. We already have an example of high-speed rail in this country in High Speed 1, which runs through Kent and London. The benefits that it has brought to the economy of Kent in particular have been immeasurable, so it is not that we are talking about this while looking at a completely blank canvas; we know the potential benefits and impact of a high-speed rail system in this country.
There is an air of déjà vu about the criticism of High Speed 2. Like you, Sir Edward, I was in the House in 1987, 1988 and 1989, when legislation for High Speed 1 was going through Parliament. I vividly remember colleagues with constituencies in Kent talking about how it would be the end of the world and would destroy Kent and its economy while bringing it no benefits. Of course, since then, High Speed 1 has been built and is up and running. It has brought considerable benefits to Kent, particularly around Ashford and Ebbsfleet, where the stations are, to the point that Kent county council, which, along with Kent’s MPs, was opposed root and branch to High Speed 1, is offering to talk to county councils along the line of route of High Speed 2 to explain to them why it was wrong in its opposition, and what benefits high-speed rail brings.
Unfortunately, the county of Buckinghamshire does not wish to participate in any discussions with Kent. I am sure that if my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham tried to persuade Kent county council, it would benefit by having some of its fears allayed.
Mrs Gillan
I would be grateful if my right hon. Friend confirmed who made that offer to whom and when, and what meeting was turned down. I happen to know that the chairman of Buckinghamshire county council, Councillor Martin Tett, has put tremendous effort into considering HS2 and all the alternatives. Indeed, “Better than HS2” is a strategy produced by 51m, which is headed by Buckinghamshire county council. I cannot believe that he would refuse to talk to anybody.
Mr Burns
I suggest that my right hon. Friend has a word with Councillor Tett; as he is a constituent of hers, it should not be difficult for her to contact him. Certainly, when I talked to officials at Kent county council as a Minister, they made it quite clear that they were more than happy to talk to county councils, and officials there told me that Buckinghamshire was reluctant to engage in any meetings with them on the subject.
On the economic benefits, the most important thing is capacity. Faster speeds for the rail network are important, but so is capacity. The west coast main line will reach its full capacity by 2024-25. Given that it is the spine of the country up to Scotland, and that we need those communications for passengers and freight, it is crucial that we relieve that capacity. People in Buckinghamshire and parts of London will say, “It brings no benefit to us.” Of course it will bring benefit to them as well. Although High Speed 2 will not stop in Buckinghamshire, the released capacity on the conventional west coast line that goes through Buckinghamshire and other related conventional lines will ensure that passengers using those lines to commute to London will have more capacity and a better journey experience, because others who might otherwise have been on those conventional trains travelling to London will be using the high-speed line.
High Speed 2 will also give eight of the 10 largest cities in England far greater connectivity, as was said by the hon. Members for Edinburgh East, and for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds). That is crucial. As the experience of Kent has shown, it will also create jobs through the actual building of the railways and through increased business activity, particularly around stations, whether at Birmingham, outside Sheffield, at Manchester, or elsewhere where there might be stations. The figures that I have seen, which some people would say are on the conservative side, suggest that 100,000 extra jobs will be created, although a conglomeration of local authorities has come up with the bolder suggestion of 400,000 jobs. Equally importantly, 70% of the economic benefits of the project are expected to be seen outside London, although obviously parts of London will benefit from the project.
I would like to mention the KPMG report. I know that people who do not support High Speed 2 rubbish it, but people like me who do support the project have a more open and reasonable approach to it. According to the report, when High Speed 2 is up and running to Leeds and Manchester, the annual benefit to the economy is anticipated to be in the region of £15 billion a year. Of course, as was said, some businesses and jobs may well be pulled away from other areas. That is part of economic life, but it does not mean that we should not allow a project that will bring a potential £15 billion a year in improvement to the economy once it is up and running. People must be careful about rubbishing a report that shows the potential for job creation, increased and enhanced economic development and growth, and an improvement in the growth abilities of our economy as a whole.
I believe also that we must embrace high-speed rail beyond Leeds and Manchester. That is why I am so pleased that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport, along with the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), set up a project in October 2012 to examine the benefits of extending a phase 3 into Scotland, to Glasgow and Edinburgh. Personally, freed from ministerial responsibility, I believe that that is an important next stage for High Speed 2. I also see HS2 as a spine. In time, when there is a business case and financial resources available, it should have spurs to other parts of the country that could benefit economically. The areas that come to mind as potential candidates for a continuation of High Speed 2 are Liverpool, south Wales and the south-west of England.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Robert Goodwill)
As ever, it is a joy to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I thank the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) for securing this morning’s debate and everyone else for their most useful contributions. I will try to address some of the large number of questions asked.
To respond to the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), we are well aware that there are real concerns about not only the environment, but people’s property and businesses, in the areas through which the line will be driven. We have done as much as is reasonably possible to avoid or reduce environmental impacts. We will, for example, provide more than 150 miles of tunnels and cuttings, make extensive use of sound barriers and plant a total of 4 million trees along the line of route. In my right hon. Friend’s constituency, 77% of the line will be tunnelled and the rest will be in a cutting, which is a great achievement that she has managed to secure for her constituents, who will understand how she campaigned to secure it.
Mrs Gillan
I am grateful for the Minister’s kind acknowledgement of the work that I and others have put in. Will he assure me that he will not rule out at this stage looking at mole tunnelling further to protect the area of outstanding natural beauty, which environmental organisations in my constituency have forcefully proposed?
Mr Goodwill
The hybrid Bill process, which we hope to commence this year, will provide an opportunity for those who want to make representations. As I say, however, 77% of the line in my right hon. Friend’s constituency will already be in a tunnel.
My right hon. Friend also referred to the KPMG report. HS2 will of course not serve all areas of the UK, which is reflected in the figures, and the benefits will naturally be greater in the places directly served by the line. Of course, the analysis does not include the benefits of other investments to boost the transport system. Indeed, the Government will invest £73 billion in the next Parliament, of which only £17 billion will be spent on HS2 and which will help the places not being served by HS2, particularly those in the north of England.
Oral Answers to Questions
Cheryl Gillan Excerpts(10 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Stephen Hammond
Again, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will recognise the huge amount of investment that is going into the railways under this Government. We recognise the benefit of that. It is for Network Rail to prioritise these matters, along with the local train operators and the local authorities. Should he want to write to me about this particular scheme, I would be happy to look into it in more detail.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
3. What assessment he has made of the most recent estimate of the costs to the public purse of High Speed 2.
The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Patrick McLoughlin)
The most recent cost estimate for both phases of the project is £42.6 billion and £7.5 billion for rolling stock. This includes a contingency of £14.4 billion for construction costs and £1.7 billion for rolling stock. The project currently assumes that the cost of HS2 is to be funded by the public purse. However, my Department is exploring the scope to draw in third-party funding to lessen the cost exposure to the taxpayer.
Mrs Gillan
Mr Speaker, I wish you and the Secretary of State a very happy Christmas. The Secretary of State could of course give both our constituencies an early Christmas present by cancelling HS2, but I do not suppose that that is on the drawing board. If everything in the garden is so rosy with regard to the finances, why does he feel it necessary to continue to suppress the Major Projects Authority reports on the risks associated with the project? Suppressing those reports does not send out a very good message to people about the project, whether they are for it or against it. In the absence of any response to my questions about this from the Cabinet Office Minister, will the Secretary of State tell the House what his intentions are with regard to the reports? Will he confirm or deny that he is continuing to try to prevent their publication?
Mr McLoughlin
The one thing that HS2 is not short of is reports from various committees, either of this House or across the wider spectrum. The simple fact is that the report my right hon. Friend refers to is one direct to Ministers, and it is not usual to publish such reports. That report is two years old and it gave an amber/red—I think that is in the public domain—but the latest report has given an amber, which shows that even the Major Projects Authority recognises that we have made major strides forward.
Mr McLoughlin
I would be delighted to meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss that point. I would point out that we are spending a huge amount of money on train services that link into the north. The northern hub will bring a substantial improvement. Huge improvements are also going on at Manchester Victoria station.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
T9. Sir David Higgins takes up his job as the head of HS2 in January with instructions to bring the costs of HS2 down. Will the Secretary of State promise that any reductions or savings will definitely not come from the compensation for people whose lives are affected by HS2 or from the costs of protecting and restoring our precious environment?
Mr McLoughlin
As I said earlier, one of the reasons the costs have increased, which my right hon. Friend often attacks, is that we have gone to extra lengths to protect the environment. There will be a huge amount of tunnelling in her constituency, which will cost more money. Sir David Higgins is a well respected engineer and has been a leader of great projects in our country, including the Olympics, which were delivered on time and below budget. I am sure that when he takes up this post, he will bring that expertise to the job.