High Speed 2

Richard Burden Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Robinson]

I will in a moment if my hon. Friend will hang on just a tick. I have only got 10 minutes, and time taken now will shorten someone else’s time.

We really do not need this project. What we need is for the pinch points to be relieved and some of the capacity bottlenecks to be relieved, and we could get the whole capacity increase we need on that line. Centro, which is responsible for the west midlands portion of the line, has said that it desperately needs that to be done now. That is the way to do it, not to wait until—

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Robinson]

I will give way in a moment, but I know what my hon. Friend is going to say because he represents a Birmingham constituency. I take those points too, but on the argument about this being a regional policy, let me say that any remotely sensible study that has been done on it says that 75% of the jobs are going to be created in the south-east, so we should forget the idea that it is a regional policy: that does not stack up. It is a convenience for certain metropolitan centres in the north, and the idea is that if ever it gets up to Edinburgh and Glasgow it could be a spinal cord that unites the country despite the tensions we feel at present—so why not start it up there? Why not start it from Leeds or York? That is what needs doing—and urgently—but of course they will not do that, because everyone knows that the subsidy for that area would be enormous and could not be justified. It can be justified only for the small London-Birmingham stretch where the subsidy will be highest, and it will not benefit ordinary travellers in any sense. It will be subsidised to a massive extent by the taxpayer and, by those businessmen, and others—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robinson]

I do not accept that at all, and the hon. Lady should look at what Centro and others have said. There is a capacity problem. The Government’s capacity projections are way over the top, just as they were for HS1, which was the biggest flop ever. Their capacity projections said that the minimum would be a fifth of the maximum, but they could not even get the capacity up to that level. It lost money from day one, and it was flogged off recently to someone in Canada who has no interest in it at all, at a whopping loss of £2 billion or £3 billion. That is the truth.

[Richard Burden]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Robinson]

No, I will not give way any more.

[Richard Burden]

You are talking about Birmingham.

[Mr Robinson]

I live next door to Birmingham; I know all about Birmingham.

[Richard Burden]

Would you like to hear from Birmingham at all?

[Mr Robinson]

I just mention in passing that when I was being selected—those few years ago—

--- Later in debate ---

[Tony Baldry]

It is really important, for the benefit of the whole House, that the Select Committee should consider all these issues. None of us has had the benefit of hearing all the evidence and there is a slight danger—as with liquorice allsorts—that Members will pick only the evidence they want. If we as a nation are to spend £30 billion, I am concerned that it should be money well spent. I am sure that the Committee will diligently consider all the evidence and report back to the House. The hon. Lady represents a Manchester constituency—[Interruption.] I apologise. She represents a Sheffield constituency—[Interruption.] Well, it is a Yorkshire constituency. She clearly has a preconceived view that HS2 will somehow benefit her constituents. I hope that she will reflect on all the evidence submitted to the Committee. She shakes her head. I hope that she will not dismiss it and that the whole House will have the opportunity to consider the matter in the round.

Even if the nation’s finances start to improve substantially after 2015, as we all hope they will, £30 billion is still a very substantial sum. We have a collective duty to ensure that such a significant sum is spent in the best possible way. My concern is that the project started very much as a vanity project. The previous Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), went up to Birmingham before the general election to announce the project in the hope that it would win him a few votes there. I simply do not think that that is a good way to start such a massive project.

[Richard Burden]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is important that the Select Committee looks at all aspects of this and follows the evidence—that is what Select Committees are for. He mentioned my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson) who used the word “we” rather liberally when referring to the west midlands. I should point out for the benefit of the House that my hon. Friend’s views are not universally shared in the west midlands, in Birmingham, or even in Coventry.

[Tony Baldry]

That demonstrates the divisions in the Labour party in the west midlands, but I think we all agree that the House should listen carefully to all the evidence.