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High Speed 2
18 September 2023
Lead MP
Richard Holden
Debate Type
Ministerial Statement
Tags
EconomyTransport
Other Contributors: 35
At a Glance
Richard Holden raised concerns about high speed 2 in the House of Commons. A government minister responded. Other MPs also contributed.
How the Debate Unfolded
MPs spoke in turn to share their views and ask questions. Here's what each person said:
Government Statement
Spades are already in the ground for HS2, with about 350 active construction sites. The Minister emphasises the Government's commitment to its delivery, with high-speed rail services between London and Birmingham Curzon Street due to commence by 2033, followed by re-scoped stages thereafter. The benefits of HS2 include driving regeneration in 1,600 acres and delivering 40,000 homes and supporting 65,000 jobs in outer London. In Birmingham, the area around Curzon Street station is already undergoing transformation with significant economic growth. Regular six-monthly reports on HS2 are provided to Parliament.
Louise Haigh
Lab
Sheffield Heeley
Question
The MP expresses disappointment over the lack of attendance from key ministers, criticises HS2's direction and impact on northern England, raises questions about leaked photographs reflecting government positions, and challenges the Government’s commitment to reaching Manchester by 2041.
Minister reply
The Minister responds by stating that the Secretary of State is engaged in urgent ministerial business. He highlights Labour's inconsistency regarding HS2 funding commitments and criticises their policy on housing and immigration.
Question
MP questions whether starting HS2 at Old Oak Common would realise full benefits, noting that the area lacks capacity to handle all services and that even with HS2 to Manchester, west coast mainline will not have sufficient capacity in coming decades.
Minister reply
The Minister thanks the MP for his comments and states he will take this message to Treasury.
Question
MP criticises HS2 as an overpriced project, noting Spain's successful track record in installing high-speed rail at a fraction of the cost. He asks when HS2 infrastructure will reach Scotland and Wales.
Minister reply
The Minister thanks the MP for his question and notes that this Government has delivered more than 1,200 miles of electrification over 20 times what was achieved under Labour in 13 years.
Question
MP reminds government of HS2’s importance to Northern Powerhouse Rail connectivity for Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and Hull.
Minister reply
The Minister thanks the MP and states he will take this message back to Treasury colleagues.
Graham Stringer
Lab
Blackley and Middleton South
Question
Will the Minister give an unambiguous answer to this question: is this Government still committed to building HS2 to Manchester from Euston? People in the north need to know whether they are being abandoned, because it looks like that to me from press reports, which have not been made up by journalists.
Minister reply
There is no question of this Government abandoning the north. We have put in huge amounts of funding, including on buses and new roads. The Government are hugely investing in the north of England—on rail, on roads, and indeed on our important bus network.
Greg Smith
Con
Mid Buckinghamshire
Question
Even when this project had arms and legs and eyebrows going across the whole country, it was always accepted that the business case was very weak and that, as a nation, we cannot really afford it. I hope the Government do scrap HS2 north of Birmingham and save many more communities from the human misery that my constituents endure every day of the week from the construction.
Minister reply
Spades are already in the ground for HS2, with over 350 active construction sites, and with high-speed services between London and Birmingham Curzon Street due to start between 2029 and 2033. However, I will pass on his comments to Treasury colleagues, as always.
Question
Frankly, it is a real shame that we have to put up with an ill-prepared office junior instead of the boss, because these are really significant decisions. Let us be clear: the case for HS2 was always flawed, but ballooning construction costs and changing business travel patterns post covid now make it unsustainable.
Minister reply
I thank the right hon. Member for his thoughts; I will take them back to Government.
Question
My constituents have been through absolute misery for 13 years now, ever since the hybrid Bill first started and they tried to defend their own area.
Minister reply
I thank my right hon. Friend for her question. Spades are already in the ground for HS2, as she well knows, and we are focusing on its delivery.
Wera Hobhouse
Lib Dem
Bath
Question
HS2 faces death by a thousand cuts. We Liberal Democrats are firmly behind HS2, but the Government’s catastrophic handling of the project’s delivery has meant that the Infrastructure and Projects Authority now rates it as “unachievable”. What will the Government do to fix this mess?
Minister reply
I find it very interesting that the hon. Lady says that the Liberal Democrats are firmly behind HS2, because that is not what their candidate for Mid Bedfordshire said earlier today.
Question
We had a meeting about HS2 with the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), a few weeks ago.
Minister reply
I am glad that my hon. Friend has had great engagement on the issue from the Department and from the rail Minister.
Liam Byrne
Lab
Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North
Question
When will High Speed 2 arrive in Manchester?
Minister reply
Ministers will continue to keep the House updated regularly regarding HS2, as they have done to date.
Martin Vickers
Con
Brigg and Immingham
Question
As a member of the Bill Committee, I have had the good fortune to visit a number of sites involved in the construction of HS2.
Minister reply
I can certainly give my hon. Friend that assurance. There are thousands of people working on site at the moment, with more than 350 construction sites up and down the country.
Diana R. Johnson
Lab
Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham
Question
The Minister said that the Government are hugely investing in the north.
Minister reply
I remember using Northern Rail under the last Labour Government, which had a zero investment strategy for the railway network in the entire north of England.
Question
May I remind the House, journalists and the Chairman of the Transport Committee that the area under discussion is beyond phase 1?
Minister reply
My hon. Friend is quite right; that is exactly what would happen in that scenario.
Andrew Slaughter
Lab
Hammersmith and Chiswick
Question
HS2 has just applied for planning permission for works to enable Old Oak Common station to serve as a temporary terminus.
Minister reply
Old Oak Common itself will deliver regeneration of 1,600 acres of London, delivering more than 40,000 homes and supporting 65,000 jobs in outer London.
Question
In order to unlock economic growth and power up northern productivity, our region must have improved connectivity.
Minister reply
As a northerner myself, I certainly take note of my hon. Friend’s comments and I am sure they will have been heard across Government as we reflect on the future.
Andrew Western
Lab
Stretford and Urmston
Question
Can the Minister tell my constituents when they will be able to board a high-speed train from Manchester to London?
Minister reply
As I have outlined, the Government will update the House, as we have done consistently, on HS2.
Question
HS2 is behaving outrageously by not paying my Stafford constituents on time.
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend for her comments. I will certainly pass on her request to the rail Minister and the Secretary of State, and I will raise it personally with HS2 Ltd.
Dwyfor Meirionnydd
Question
The Government’s excuse for denying Wales its fair share of HS2 funding is that the phase 2 connection at Crewe would cut journey times between north Wales and London. Welsh taxpayers are funding this fiasco and getting nothing back. Will the Minister admit that HS2 is an England-only railway project and that his Government owe Wales money?
Minister reply
I do not think the right hon. Lady is reflecting on what the Plaid-Labour Government are currently doing in Wales: costing taxpayers billions with their ridiculous across-the-board 20 mph scheme, and not delivering for the people of Wales.
Jeremy Wright
Con
Kenilworth and Southam
Question
It is sometimes right to ask our constituents to take local pain for national gain, but does my hon. Friend agree that the national gain of HS2 has always been argued to result from its being a network of high-speed rail lines, not a single line? If it is a single line, are we not in danger of the national gain being extraordinarily limited, and the local pain, including to my constituents, being extraordinarily extensive and long lasting?
Minister reply
A huge amount of work is already going on with HS2 at the moment, creating tens of thousands of jobs and supporting more than 1,700 apprenticeships. There is a huge amount of benefit, right across the country, to the investment going into HS2.
Jeremy Corbyn
Ind
Islington North
Question
Is this not an example of a very bad national planning process? HS2 does not link up with HS1; all the pain and disruption around Euston will have been for naught; and if it is completed as far as Birmingham, all it will do is join an already overcrowded rail network. Surely we have either a high-speed network or nothing at all.
Minister reply
I say to the right hon. Member that a huge amount of investment is already going into HS1, which will deliver transformation, particularly at Old Oak Common, where there will be a huge boost to economic growth in quite a deprived area of London as well as that massive investment.
Question
Let me start by correcting the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh), who said that the Prime Minister only flies over the north. For rail and for HS2, it is all about capacity: we need to get capacity into the rail industry. Delivery and certainty are necessary for supply-chain businesses. This constant change is not helpful.
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for his question. He is absolutely right: the Prime Minister uses those trains regularly—in fact, they are made in my hon. Friend’s constituency—to travel right across the country.
Bury South
Question
We have seen the Government give up on the eastern leg; we have seen them give up on connecting to central London; and we have seen the downgrading of Northern Powerhouse Rail. Why are the Government giving up on the north?
Minister reply
As I have said in answer to other hon. Members, this Government have put unprecedented investment into our transport infrastructure right across the country.
Question
Having chaired the Select Committee on the first phase for 20 months, I always privately had the view that Old Oak Common was a more sensible place to stop, because the Elizabeth line runs straight through Old Oak Common. However, the logic of the railway is that it does have to go to Manchester and beyond.
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. I am sure that the Treasury, No. 10 and the Department will be listening to those wise words from somebody who served on the Select Committee.
Question
Huddersfield is a proud railway town. Is the Minister telling my constituents and the rest of the country that this is an abysmal failure of the country—the country of Brunel and Stephenson, the pioneers of railway building?
Minister reply
No, I am not saying that.
Question
As my hon. Friend knows, I am proud to host the UK’s fastest-growing ports in my constituency, and one of the things those ports are investing in is more freight connections to transport more containers by rail, rather than road. Will the Minister assure me that all the implications of any changes to the timetable for HS2 will be considered?
Minister reply
I thank my hon. Friend for making that important point—I was delighted to visit some of those freight services in her constituency with her just last week.
Question
What estimate has been made of the cost in contract litigation alone if the Chancellor were to conceive of scrapping phase 2 of HS2?
Minister reply
What I would say is that the Government are putting a huge amount of money into stage 1 of the scheme. Thousands of jobs have already been created, as well as hundreds of apprenticeships.
Mark Francois
Con
Rayleigh and Wickford
Question
For the record, the roads Minister is a very good one, who has had to swap lanes today at short notice. How many of the HS2 stations will have ticket offices? Last Thursday in Westminster Hall, there was a train crash of a debate in which not a single Back Bencher from any political party backed the Government’s proposals.
Minister reply
I thank my right hon. Friend for his comments—he has always been a champion of our road network, and now he is a champion of our rail network as well.
Tonia Antoniazzi
Lab
Gower
Question
I used to live in Wigan in the north-west of England, and I am very disappointed for my family and friends who are still there that this project is not going ahead—disappointed, like the people in Swansea are disappointed that the electrification never got to Swansea. HS2 is an England-only project.
Minister reply
I do not need to talk down the Welsh Labour Government; they do it themselves.
Question
HS2 is already being built in Buckinghamshire, and it is a blight on the lives of my constituents in Aylesbury. Residents are experiencing massive disruption from noise caused by HS2’s contractors working well outside their contracted hours.
Minister reply
My hon. Friend is a real champion for his constituents. I will certainly take the message back to HS2 Ltd and, if necessary, arrange a further meeting between him and the rail Minister to discuss the matter.
Question
For over a decade, I have been highlighting in this House how the Welsh taxpayer is being fleeced as a result of HS2. The spurious response I receive from Ministers is that north Wales will be linked via Crewe. Considering that it is highly unlikely that the line will make it north of Birmingham.
Minister reply
I just point out to the hon. Member that I think Welsh taxpayers will feel fleeced by the Welsh Labour Government, with the longest waiting lists in the country.
Tom Hunt
Lab
Question
Of course it is right that we discuss investment in our rail network in the north and the midlands, but we also have to have a discussion about East Anglia. Time and again, Ely North junction and Haughley junction have been deprioritised. Both those projects would cost a fraction of the cost of HS2 but deliver transformative benefits to the east of England. Will the Minister have discussions with his colleagues and the Treasury to see how we can get those two key projects back at the top of the agenda?
Minister reply
I certainly will. I was delighted to be in East Anglia just last week at the opening of the new A11 road, where there has been £65 million of investment, and I have been delighted to visit my hon. Friend’s constituency on multiple occasions, including to see the investment that is going into his local bus network. I will certainly pass on his representations on behalf of his constituents regarding Ely junction.
Question
We had great news a while ago when the Government said they would scrap the 2b arm of HS2, which would have devastated hundreds of homes across Rother Valley in Bramley, Wales and Aston, but many of those homes are still under safeguarding measures, meaning their owners are stuck in limbo. I know that the Government still want high-speed trains through the area, but the only financially viable way of HS2 getting to Leeds is by using existing track. Why is it taking so long to release the land when everyone knows and accepts that we will not be building a new track through Rother Valley to Leeds? Will the Minister release the safeguarding and release people’s homes?
Minister reply
I know that my hon. Friend has raised this issue multiple times with the rail Minister. I will certainly take it back to the Department and discuss what can be done.
Alun Cairns
Con
Question
My hon. Friend has received a number of challenging questions from Opposition Members about Barnett consequentials for HS2. Is he aware that the Leader of the Opposition does not support Barnett consequentials for HS2?
Minister reply
I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. It is sometimes difficult to know what the Leader of the Opposition supports or does not support. We have had a three-way flip-flop in just the last few days. It is interesting that the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh), from the Opposition Front Bench, raised the fact that I am here today rather than the Secretary of State, given that the shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster seems to have a very different opinion from the hon. Lady about what is going on with Labour policy.
Shadow Comment
Louise Haigh
Shadow Comment
The shadow Secretary of State for Transport criticises the Government's mismanagement and broken promises regarding HS2, particularly the decision to terminate the line at Old Oak Common. She raises concerns about the economic impact on northern England and questions whether the project can deliver its original promise without reaching key cities like Leeds or Manchester. The Labour party pledges to deliver Northern Powerhouse Rail and High Speed 2 in full but does not clarify funding.
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