High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Ellman]

The whole point of major infrastructure is that it makes a major difference in connectivity across the country, which benefits all parts of the country. If that benefit is fragmented, it will not accrue.

I certainly support economic development in the regions, and I deplore the abolition of the regional development agencies, but I hope that the local enterprise partnerships—alone, working together, or working in transport cores—will ensure that economic benefit comes to their areas, and that the Government provide the support that will enable that effort to be private sector-led and succeed.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Obviously we are talking about a lot of money, but if it is true that the rail capacity of the three main north-south lines will be exhausted within about 15 years, what impact does my hon. Friend expect that to have on the economies of the cities north of London?

[Mrs Ellman]

My hon. Friend has made a crucial point, which goes to the nub of the matter. If those lines run out of capacity—which, indeed, they are rapidly doing—a grave blow will be dealt to the economies in the northern regions, in terms of passengers and freight. One of the reasons more freight cannot travel by rail now is the fact that no freight lines are available. High Speed 2 will solve that problem.

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[Steve McCabe]

I have great sympathy with my hon. Friend’s predicament, but is not part of the problem that the Government are missing a trick? This uncertainty is allowing opposition to the whole project to develop. Were we to focus on reducing domestic air travel as part of the project’s value by tackling some of the uncertainty, that would help everybody.

[John McDonnell]

My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), who chairs the Transport Committee, has made the point time and again, with regard to the overall matter of strategic planning—with regard to aviation, I think that she and her Committee are absolutely clueless—[Interruption.] She knows that she has my respect and affection. If we are planning for transport infrastructure in the long term, we must ensure that it is integrated. The way to have integration for this project is by ensuring that the timetable set out for HS2 is integrated with the Davies commission’s report, which means having the report sooner. That could be within six months of the initial report being published this month. The decision could then be taken before the next general election. It is also about being more honest with the electorate on rail and aviation, and not only in my constituency, but nationally.

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[Mrs Gillan]

I am very glad that we managed to get through the preceding group of amendments without a vote. I think it is clear that the Government have not allowed enough time for proper scrutiny of the Bill, and it worries me considerably that a wider audience beyond the House will not understand that we reached that point. I shall therefore try to speak fairly briefly on this group of amendments, although it is one of the most important groups, apart from—if the Government press on with their proposals—the group relating to compensation, which is of great concern to everyone in the House.

HS2 is a huge financial risk. For some time, people—including, I believe, the Information Commissioner—have been pressing for the Government to release the Major Projects Authority report in full, but, as far as I am aware, neither that full report on the implications nor the amber-red report has yet been made available. Certainly neither has been made available to my office.

When I asked the Secretary of State

“if he will publish the report from the Audit and Risk Management Committee presented at the board meeting of HS2 Ltd on 18 July 2013”,

he replied:

“The update from the Audit and Risk Management Committee was given verbally at the meeting. HS2 Ltd does not hold a written report.”—[Official Report, 8 October 2013; Vol. 568, c. 193W.]

In the absence of the transparency that would enable us to read the risk analysis from the Major Projects Authority, and given the Secretary of State’s response to a request for a regular update on financial risk, it is difficult for us to assess whether the Government are sticking to their guns.

In amendment 20, I have sought to provide the cap that everyone is talking about. I had expected Labour Members to table such an amendment, and I am surprised that they did not, because they have made much of the fact that they will not give this project a blank cheque, and that the expenditure can go only so far and no further. Amendment 25—which I think the Government are minded to accept, as two Conservative Members have added their names to it—is limited to some financial reporting, and some crystal ball-gazing on the effect that an underspend or an overspend would have. It reminds me rather of “The Merchant of Venice” in many ways. I think that the Labour party has bottled out completely and remains sitting on the fence, and I do not think that people will forgive it for that.

[Steve McCabe]

I want the cost to be contained as well, but does it not worry the right hon. Lady that if she presses ahead with her amendment, she will effectively put a cap on transport links to northern cities, in which none of her side was interested when we were talking about London and south-east developments?

[Mrs Gillan]

I do not think that that is true at all. I think that what I am doing is giving Members—such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns)—who claim that the project will come in at bang on £42.6 billion, or indeed less, an opportunity to enshrine that in statute.

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[Mr Straw]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that he and I have had direct experience of dealing with Sir David Higgins on a micro-level as well as a macro-level, and very impressive he is too. I do not criticise anybody who either holds or might hold the purse strings for wanting to ensure that we bear down on costs, but those on my Front Bench and the whole of the parliamentary Labour party, as has been made clear, support the project and the Bill. That is why, if a Division is called at 5 o’clock, we will be in the Lobby with the Government in support of the Third Reading of the Bill. Let me make that clear. We started this project and I hope very much that the Labour party is in a position to ensure that we finish it.

[Steve McCabe]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that it might help those who want to support the project and perhaps make it easier for the softer opponents if the contingency figure was reduced? At a third of the projected total cost, it seems remarkably high, and it might risk inflating the project’s costs.

[Mr Straw]

I know about optimism bias contingency costs because I faced exactly the same situation when I chaired the Cabinet Committee for the Olympics. My initial reaction was the same as that of my hon. Friend and my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras: “Why on earth are we building in a contingency reserve on this scale?” I got the Treasury officials in and cross-examined them—I bumped into one the other day who remembers it—but in the end I was convinced that what was proposed was prudent, to use an adjective that used to be owned by the Labour party, and still is. Contingency reserves of that size are sensible and realistic. Yes, the cost is £42 billion, but that is over 20 years, so we are looking at a cost of about £2 billion a year, of which the optimism bias contingency reserve is about £700 million. In my judgment, such things are manageable.