The British government refused to commit on Thursday to the construction of the northern section between Birmingham and Manchester of the High Speed 2 rail project, causing new concerns about the project.
Speculations about the future of this scheme have been circulating since a meeting took place between Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, and Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, to identify additional potential savings.
The Independent newspaper first reported that a government official was seen carrying a document related to the meeting. It included a savings table showing the costs for each part of the scheme in the area north of Birmingham.
The section between Birmingham to Manchester could be cut, saving almost £30bn. The government has spent over £2bn already on designing the project and purchasing land.
The price of HS2 has increased by more than twice the initial budget, which was £33bn a ten years ago. Originally the line was to run from London through Birmingham and then split into two sections for Manchester and Leeds.
It has become a symbol in recent years of the Conservative Government’s flagship policy to level up regional economic imbalances. Ministers cut back on the service in order to control costs, and scrapped most of the eastern section between Birmingham, Leeds, and London.
The estimated cost of the project as a whole has increased from £37.5bn (2013 prices) to over £70bn (2019 prices). The government will update the costings this year to reflect the higher inflation rate, which is expected push up the price by tens and tens billions of pounds.
The government stated that it was committed to . You would expect Treasury and Number 10 to discuss large infrastructure projects regularly. The HS2 project is already underway and we are focused on delivering it,” a spokesperson stated.
The Treasury, Downing Street and the Department of Transport all refused to commit themselves to the construction of the line between Birmingham & Manchester.
George Osborne is a former Tory Chancellor and one of the driving forces behind HS2. He called any decision by the government to abandon HS2’s northern section a tragedy.
Osborne is the president of Northern Powerhouse Partnership – a group of business and civic leaders – who said in his podcast Political Currency: “You cannot build these railroads overnight.” We’ve all learned that, right? “It’s fine to say cancel this leg, and build the next, but you can’t cancel this leg, which is 13 years’ worth of planning and work in parliament and endless studies.”
Henri Murison added that reducing the scope of the project to this extent would “do severe damage” to government relations with businesses and investors who “made long-term investments based on prior promises”.
Louise Haigh is Labour’s shadow minister for transport. She accused the government mismanaging this project, at an enormous cost to the taxpayer. She said, “They need to clarify urgently the future of the flagship project of levelling up and make sure it reaches the north of England.”
Andy Burnham, Labour Mayor of Greater Manchester, claimed that the government treated the north as “second class citizens”, leaving “Victorian Infrastructure” in place while investing in modern rail links in the south.
Ministers have announced earlier this year that, as part of recent efforts to reduce costs, they will halt the work on the 7km final section of the line to central London. They also plan to rebuild Euston Station in London which is supposed to be the terminal. The Birmingham to Crewe line is also facing delays.