U.K. High Speed Rail Project Wins Backing From Chancellor
U.K. High Speed Rail Project Wins Backing From Chancellor Javid
(Bloomberg) -- Chancellor of the Exchequer Sajid Javid will back the U.K.’s HS2 High Speed Rail project linking London to northern England, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson also reported to have come down in favor.
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said Thursday the decision, on what would be the country’s biggest ever infrastructure project, will come in February. That’s more than a decade after the line was first proposed in 2009, something that reflects the controversy of building a new fast train line through the electoral districts of many members of Johnson’s Conservative Party.
Over that time, the estimated cost of the line has risen. Latest estimates by the National Audit Office show the project may cost as much as 88 billion pounds ($115 billion), eclipsing the initial price tag of 50 billion pounds. Johnson commissioned a review of the project when he took office last year, and although that hasn’t been published, the review’s deputy chairman issued what he described as a dissenting report at the start of the year calling for the line to be scrapped.
But Javid will support the line in a meeting to decide the fate of the project on Thursday with Johnson and Shapps, according to a person familiar with the matter. The Times reported that Johnson, a fan of big infrastructure projects, was also in favor. It chimes with his goal of helping the economy in the north of the country.
Before the December election, Johnson hinted that he backed HS2, saying his instincts were to proceed. The government is also planning to boost investment in infrastructure as part of its strategy to tackle regional inequality.
Last month, Johnson won the biggest Conservative majority for more than 30 years in an election that saw his party seize swaths of territory in northern England and parts of central England which the left-wing Labour Party had held for decades.
A spokesman for Johnson’s office said no final decision had been taken.
Answering questions in Parliament on Thursday, Shapps did nothing to play down the idea that the line will go ahead. “We’ll have an announcement next month,” he told one questioner.
Later Philip Davies, a Conservative MP critical of the plan, called HS2 “a catastrophic waste of money” and said the cash should be spent on other rail projects. But Transport Minister Chris Heaton-Harris replied: “They’re not either/or. These are additional investments that we’re making.”
--With assistance from Olivia Konotey-Ahulu.
To contact the reporters on this story: Jessica Shankleman in London at jshankleman@bloomberg.net;Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Robert Jameson, Stuart Biggs
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