I welcome the Bill, as I welcomed Lord Adonis’s announcement some years ago that first proposed this project. It is a shame that the Government have taken four years to bring it forward, but in the spirit of consensus among the majority of Members from all the major parties, I say that it is good that we have agreement on the route. I am particularly pleased that we are settled on the major interchange being at Old Oak in my constituency, which
means that not only HS2 but Crossrail and interchanges with the underground, the overground and the great western line will come to one of the poorest areas of London—an area much in need of regeneration.
There is one aspect which I raised with the Secretary of State earlier and which is not decided—the link to Heathrow. This is not a detail. It is a symptom of the political fix that is the Davies commission and affects not only the future of Heathrow, but the Piccadilly line upgrade, as well as one of the most congested parts of the M25 and M4, and HS2.
It threatens the integrity of the project that we cannot say that there is no threat to Heathrow as an airport. Yes, there is major disagreement—my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and I are at the forefront of disagreeing with the expansion of Heathrow—but there will be a major airport at Heathrow. The only person who disagrees with that is the Mayor of London, who would like to see some bloated, gated community on the site. That is fantasy. If we believe in this project and we want major infrastructure to go ahead, we should be prepared to say what the link to Heathrow will be.
I am afraid that is symptomatic of the fact that the project has not been well handled. The design of areas such as Euston and Old Oak has been appalling so far. The proposals for compensation—the weaker compensation for urban areas and businesses in urban areas—is to be deprecated. The cost of the project is a major concern, although the arrival of Sir David Higgins has improved that, and the consultation has been abysmal throughout. It is not a good way to proceed.
In the limited time available, let me concentrate on Old Oak. According to the planning document, Old Oak is 155 hectares—almost 400 acres of prime land in inner London—and it is mainly Network Rail and other publicly owned land. The area could be a major part of the regeneration of London, yet businesses large and small—such as Car Giant, a fantastic business on a 40-acre site that has grown up over 30 years, and hundreds of small businesses—are being intimidated and threatened to make them move off the site by a combination of aggressive developers and the Greater London authority and the Mayor of London.
Wormwood Scrubs, a major piece of metropolitan open land that has hitherto been protected by Act of Parliament, is threatened. That piece of land is important to the natural environment. It is not a manicured park, but that is what the developers would like. They would like it to be an adjunct, with skyscrapers, not affordable housing, overlooking the scrubs, turning it into something it was never intended to be. Organisations such as the friends of Wormwood Scrubs and many of the residents’ groups in my constituency are fighting an action against that. They will petition against it and they will have my support in that. The type of development that the Mayor of London intends, and for which I am afraid the Secretary of State has abdicated responsibility, is a mayoral development corporation along the lines of the Olympic park, which is totally unnecessary. The area should be controlled by local people.
Six months ago, I was told that there would 90,000 jobs and 19,000 new homes on the site; now I am told that there will be 24,000 new homes and 50,000 jobs. I do not have any confidence in what I am being told, but I am confident that this is another land grab. It will be
another way of avoiding providing affordable housing and homes and jobs for local people in London, so that speculators and developers can make profits from that land. I urge the Secretary of State to listen to organisations such as the West London Line Group, which have huge experience in railways, particularly in west London, and have designed a much better scheme for the operation of Old Oak—not to use compulsory powers, not to take local areas out of the hands of local people, but to allow this excellent project for the UK to go ahead with the maximum possible support from everybody across the country by bringing people with it, not imposing decisions on them from outside.
9.13 pm