UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 837-xl

HOUSE OF COMMONS

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE

taken before the

COMMITTEE

on the

CROSSRAIL BILL

DAY FORTY

Wednesday 14 June 2006

Before:

Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger, in the Chair

Mr Brian Binley

Kelvin Hopkins

Mrs Siān C James

Dr John Pugh

Mrs Linda Riordan

Sir Peter Soulsby

 

In the absence of the Chairman, Mr Liddell-Grainger was called to the Chair.

 

Ordered: that Counsel and Parties be called in.

10124. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I bring the Committee to order.

10125. As usual I inform the Committee of my intention to suspend at a convenient point after 11.45 so that everybody may take the opportunity to have coffee and we can go and listen to PMQs.

10126. There are many cases to hear today and we will proceed in a similar manner as yesterday. The Committee wants to hear every Petitioner's case. However, as you know, the Committee will not listen to the same case more than once. We understand that many people here today have similar concerns, and we ask you to listen carefully to other cases being made and to respond to the Promoters and try not to repeat any other Petitioner's argument.

10127. If you agree with a case made by another Petitioner you can tell us which points you support. You do not need to repeat the argument. Some of the issues regarding Hanbury Street and Whitechapel have already been raised by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets last week and the Committee will take into account what was said last week. We equally encourage counsel for the Promoters to refrain from making repetitive counter arguments.

10128. I remind everyone that the witnesses brought forward by the Promoters may be cross‑examined by each Petitioner should they wish to after they have made their case.

10129. I would now ask Mr Elvin to set the scene.

10130. MR ELVIN: I am just going to make a few brief remarks, and then Mr Mould is going to deal with the next objective.

10131. Can I just say for the record that I opened the Spitalfields area petitions generally yesterday and that our remarks are set out at the beginning of the transcript from yesterday as, indeed, is our generic evidence from Mr Berryman and Mr Thornley‑Taylor. It starts at paragraph 9792 for the information of any Petitioners who want to cross‑reference. I do not propose to repeat that unless there is anything that the Committee requires clarifying.

10132. Can I say this, and I will deal with this later in the day: on the issue of consultation, which came up a great deal yesterday, I am proposing at some point convenient to the Committee today just to introduce a little further material. We are having circulated a note which was prepared on the consultation activities in the Spitalfields area which I hope will give the Committee a little more detailed information. It includes information about the different language versions and the various aspects of the different communities within Spitalfields who were consulted. I will also show the Committee at some time at a more convenient moment later on some of the panels from the information rounds which make it clear that the information provided in the local information points clearly indicated the alignment of the tunnels between Liverpool Street and Whitechapel as well as the issues at Hanbury Street because you will recall yesterday one of the points that was being made, and I did not have the information to hand because it was over here unfortunately, was that residents did not know the alignment of the tunnels, and I will show the Committee that later today.

10133. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think that is going to be very helpful. Yesterday was a bit confusing because there were four different designs, and I do think there was a lot of misunderstanding.

10134. MR ELVIN: I will present all that as a piece at some point.

10135. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: When would that be ready?

10136. MR ELVIN: I can probably deal with it first thing this afternoon.

10137. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: That would be very helpful. Thank you very much indeed. Mr Mould?

10138. MR MOULD: Thank you, sir. You are going to hear, first, the petition of the Friends of Mile End Park, and this relates to proposals for an intervention and emergency shaft at a location in Mile End Park. If you look at your screens in front of you you can see towards the top left hand quadrant of the plan the East London Mile End Stadium shown, and that is within Mile End Park, and you can see Burdett Road, the A1205, which runs along the eastern side of the park. Just at the bottom corner of the park, immediately to the north of the London‑Tilbury & Southend railway line, which is running on embankment at this point, you will see that there is a cross‑hatched area which marks the Mile End Park shaft work site, and it is in that location that Crossrail proposes an intermediate access emergency intervention shaft to comply with the one km distance standard which you are aware of and which we are required to comply with in accordance with the requirements of the emergency and rail safety authorities.

10139. Now, this shaft is what remains of Crossrail's proposals for this location. Under the original tunnelling strategy, it was proposed that Mile End Park be used as a temporary excavated material handling site in association with the tunnelling strategy which focused upon Hanbury Street, but as the Committee is aware we are now proposing a revised tunnelling strategy and, under that, which has been notified to those Petitioners whom it concerns, including the current Petitioners, the need for Mile End Park to be used for that purpose, that is to say for the temporary excavated material handling site, has disappeared. So what remains is the proposal for a shaft.

10140. Now, looking at the effect of Crossrail's works, this is a larger scale view of the area of the shaft, with Burdett Road and the railway in viaduct past the site, you can see there is an existing football pitch and an existing coach park and the effect of the works is to require the displacement of those two facilities. What we had proposed was that we would reinstate those facilities following the construction of the shaft, so there would have been a period of time during which those facilities would have been lost to the users of the park but what we now propose, having carried out further investigations and having discussed the matter in detail with Tower Hamlets as the local planning authority, is that we should carry out the re‑instatement of both the coach park and the football pitch prior to the construction of the shaft which will thus overcome the problem of the temporary loss of those facilities to users of the park.

10141. If we can put up the second paper slide, please, you can see that what is proposed is that in this sequence the coach park should be relocated to this location, and the football pitch relocated to here, and the works to the shaft will then take place with access being maintained broadly from a new access created off Burdett Road, and that will serve the sports facilities, and for the duration of the Crossrail works also provide immediate access to the highway from the work site. So lorries will come in on a one way system broadly and then out on to the road. So in that way we are seeking to minimise the impact on users of the park during the progress of the construction works.

10142. Now, I have made inquiries and it is fair to say that I am not sure that the Petitioners have been made aware of the proposals to carry out these relocation works prior to commencing the Crossrail shaft construction works. I am bound to say that it would have been preferable if they had been told that before ‑‑

10143. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I totally agree with that.

10144. MR MOULD: ‑‑ we came today, and I would like to apologise, both to them and the Committee, for the fact that has not been done. Whilst it is very late news I hope it is welcome news to them, and I think that is probably where I should sit down and let them present their petitions.

10145. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you, Mr Mould. I do take that point on board, and the Committee does take a dim view of the information not being passed down. I accept it is not your fault but I would like to think that every effort is made to get information to the Petitioners as soon as is physically possible.

10146. MR MOULD: I am bound to say it is not the first time that the Committee has expressed those sentiments and it is not the first time we have said we are seeking to do that, and obviously the more times we say that the less convinced the Committee may be that we are. But I would like to assure the Committee that we are very aware of the circumstances when these situations arise, and I shall make sure that very clear instructions are given that the Committee is anxious that we should be as expeditious as possible.

10147. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: And we will take an equally dim view if we do not know that material has not been transferred, so thank you for coming clean!

10148. MR MOULD: We will let you know when things have not gone the way they should. I will now sit down.

 

The Petition of Friends of Mile End Park

 

MR ANDREW LYONS appeared as Agent.

10149. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Mr Lyon, you are an agent as well, are you?

10150. MR LYON: Yes.

10151. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Can I therefore ask you to present your evidence?

10152. MR LYONS: My name is Andrew Lyons. I am the chair of the Friends of Mile End Park. With my colleague Neil Sinden we will be taking you through the main points of our petition made on behalf of the Friends of Mile End Park.

10153. You have already heard today that two of our concerns have been dealt with via the amendment for end‑to‑end tunnelling. That leaves us with two remaining concerns, the siting of the ventilation shaft near Mile End Stadium and the construction of that shaft and the tunnel access and all associated works. While it is fresh in our minds I will say that I, too, am disappointed that we were given no prior warning of the latest proposal from Crossrail, particularly so as there has been dialogue between ourselves and Crossrail, and we have obviously got no time to consider their latest proposals.

10154. Just to give you a little bit of background on Mile End Park, what now comprises Mile End Park was a 1940s aspiration. There was gradual land acquisition to add to King George V playing fields by London County Council, Greater London Council and most recently by London Borough of tower Hamlets. By 1995 most of the land that now comprises the Park was in place. There was a successful millennium lottery bid which allowed final land acquisitions and development of the park for the 21st century and of regional significance, and it was on those bases that the Millennium Commission awarded the money. A total of just over £30 million was spent on developing the park that we now have and, in addition, there has been further award of money and expenditure in association with Mile End Stadium itself, and the majority of that came from UK Sport.

10155. The park is nationally and internationally recognised and CABE Space, for one, regularly cite it as a shining example of provision, management and maintenance. The park makes exceptional use of what is actually a very small area. I was in the park yesterday evening and somebody pointed out to me that at its widest it is only 300 ms wide and it can be quite astonishing, given how well it is landscaped, so every square inch of that small size is of great and increasing local and regional value, and the suggestion that we can simply move things around and accommodate an unplanned feature is bogus.

10156. The revenue funding is via a mixed economy of public funding, rents from shops and businesses in the park, events, plus very active volunteering, local groups and businesses, particularly those associated with Canary Wharf. I will now hand over to Neil Sinden who will deal with the main points of our petition.

10157. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Yes, Mr Sinden?

10158. MR SINDEN: Thank you. I am a member of the Executive Committee of the Friends of Mile End Park. I want to make three broad points, if I may, to kick off with, and please excuse the pun because the first one relates specifically to what we, until this morning, still felt was going to result in the permanent loss of a number of football pitches that we have seen displayed on the maps before us.

10159. We are obviously very pleased that the Promoters have considered the point that was made by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets in their initial petition concerning the provision of the relocated football pitches prior to the commencement of any works, and we are very grateful that the Promoters, even at this very late stage in this part of the process, have come forward with proposals of that kind.

10160. I would say, however, that because of the fact that these football pitches are very heavily used and have only very recently been provided, and they were in part funded by the National Lottery Fund, they have met an important part of what is a very strong latent demand with in the local community for such facilities, so we would be very concerned to ensure that the proposed relocation as set out on the maps before us will be deliverable and will not result in any diminishment of the ease of use of these facilities by members of the local community, and I think we probably will need some time to consider the very broad design proposals that are set out on this map in terms of those questions. That was the first main point ‑ our concern about the impact of the loss of this vital community asset.

10161. The second point I wanted to make was in relation to firstly the spatial nature and extent of the work associated with the shafting in question which we believe very strongly needs to be minimised particularly in terms of its above‑ground impact in the long‑term, but also in terms of the disturbance on this part of the park during the construction phase, and I am not convinced from the two maps that we have been shown this morning that enough consideration has been given by the Promoters to the impact during the construction phase on the immediately adjacent facilities, the football pitches and, indeed, the Mile End Park leisure centre, which itself is another recently opened, hugely successful, very well‑used asset for the local community and, indeed, the Mile End stadium.

10162. The second aspect is relating to the temporal impacts, if you like, in terms of the length of working and the disturbance to local residents and park users during the works, the construction period. We note that the Promoters' response to our petition says that it is estimated that these works will last no longer than three years and nine months. We would like to have perhaps firmer reassurance that that is the maximum amount of time during which disturbance may arise as a result of the works associated with the shaft.

10163. The third point I wanted to make by way of introduction really was just to draw attention to the very wide range of impacts that this relatively small aspect of the Crossrail project will have on a range of interests, both immediately during the construction phase and in the long term, firstly on the facilities of the park, which my colleague Andy Lyon has already talked about, notably the leisure centre and the stadium and, and this is a point that has not been made so far, the impacts both short and long term on the facilities to the south east side of the railway viaduct that are currently used for go‑karting purposes. The entrance to the go‑karting facility is on the north west side of the railway viaduct, very close to the construction work site, and my judgment is that at the very least during construction phase that access point will be rendered unusable. I am not sure whether the Promoters have heard from the go‑kart company that run that facility but I would, if I were them, be very concerned about the impact on their business and the enjoyment of that part of the park from this element of the project.

10164. The impacts will also be very serious on the users of the park, as we have already said, both in terms of the people using the pitches but also the people using the cycle track that runs through the centre of the pitches, as you can see, which is a relatively newly instated cycle track used by a large number of people already. The impacts in terms of traffic on Burdett Road we feel have not been given adequate consideration.

10165. We do understand from earlier detail that the Promoters have provided that there is a proposal to use Burdett Road as a lorry holding area, or part of it, for the construction work associated with the shafts, and yet we have no reassurances that that facility or that requirement is going to be managed effectively in terms of existing users of Burdett Road and, indeed, those people who use the Mile End Park leisure centre and who arrive there by car, which from my understanding of these maps may well overlap with the access that counsel has mentioned in relation to the construction work, so there is an issue there that needs to be resolved.

10166. Clearly this is very near a residential area as well. On the east side of Burdett Road there is a very high density residential community, and the impacts of construction in terms of service noise, dust, security, and so on and so forth we feel need to be more carefully addressed by the Promoters, and we are also concerned about the use of the shaft once it is operational, and the impact of its use during the operational phase on park users as well needs to be more carefully considered.

10167. I want to hand back briefly to my colleague, Andy, who will say perhaps a few more words about safety, security and access, and then if you do not mind I would like to make one final point about the shaft.

10168. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Of course not.

10169. MR LYONS: Obviously the park in its present form and even more recently the stadium are recent developments, so we have good experience of the potential for accidents and overall security issues associated with constructions in and around the park, and we have learned from bitter experience that constructions, if not very carefully handled, tend to make a negative statement, they do attract adverse behaviour, and they need to be extremely well secured and protected to ensure that there is not unwanted attention, access to boarded off sites and accident by those people accessing those areas.

10170. During the early redevelopment of Mile End Park there was a rather serious accident and all those involved in the construction had to raise their game as a consequence.

10171. MR SINDEN: My final point, Mr Chairman, relates to the design and the long‑term impact of the ventilation shaft on the park and its surrounding area. We would question the claim by the Promoters in their response to our petition that the shaft will "not be a dominant feature" in the local vicinity, but we are not adopting a position whereby we would oppose a ventilation shaft for the purposes of constructing Crossrail in this particular location. What we would want to say, however, is that every opportunity should be taken to make the most of the positive potential that there is to ensure that the shaft is an attribute, an asset in terms of its visual design and location to the local area, and I would like to draw the Committee's attention to some precedents in this context, in the immediate vicinity of the proposed shaft.

10172. Just south east of the railway viaduct there is a Grade 2* listed modern church of St Paul's at Bow Common, a modern church designed by Robert Maguire & Keith Murray, which we believe is an asset in terms of the local environment which the Promoters have entirely ignored. It is the rather square block to the east of Burdett Road south of the railway viaduct that you can see quite clearly on the image, and we would like the design of the ventilation shaft to pay some respect to the design and quality of that existing structure.

10173. Also, we would draw the Committee's attention to the precedent set by the design and construction of the Blackwall Tunnel ventilation shafts, which are not too far away from this location, which themselves were designed by Terry Farrell, now one of our leading architects, and which themselves have become listed recently.

10174. So, in concluding, we would very much welcome the opportunity as a local community group to collaborate with the Promoters at some later stage in this process to ensure that the ventilation shaft delivers a positive contribution and becomes a welcome asset to the local environment in this part of East London.

10175. Thank you.

10176. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I thank you both. Mr Mould?

10177. MR MOULD: Sir, what I will try and do, if I may, is to respond to the main points that have been made; I hope that will be sufficient for the Committee's purposes. I should say that if there was a need to call a witness it would ordinarily have been Mr Berryman but I have just been told he is at No 10 Downing Street at the moment ‑‑

10178. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Very careless of him!

10179. MR MOULD: First of all, can I say overall that you have heard some very helpful suggestions from the Petitioners about detailed matters of design and environmental control. We have heard what they said; we will read what they say again when we see the transcript; and, obviously, as you know, we are at a stage in the process and detailed design is for the future rather than for now, and that is something which is on‑going, and we will take account of what they say in that respect.

10180. I cannot promise that we will instruct Mr Terry Farrell to design the shaft but let's say I will not completely rule it out at this stage! I hope I have made the position clear in relation to that.

10181. First, in relation to matters of permanent design, as you will recall that is a matter with which the local planning authority Tower Hamlets, have a very clear interest and there are powers under Schedule 7 to the Bill which provide for them to exercise powers of detailed planning and control in relation to matters of design. I have been looking at the matter rather more seriously and I have no doubt at all they will exercise those powers as they see to be appropriate in this case, and I have no doubt at all that they will take account of the views of the Promoters as consultees in relation to that matter, and I would hope and invite the Committee to share this view that through that process an appropriate design for the shaft will emerge and will ultimately be constructed.

10182. In relation to other matters of permanent impact which we touched upon, we are committed to making not only appropriate provision for final design above‑ground structures but also to reinstating, as far as is reasonably possible, and making appropriate provision for matters of hard and soft landscaping. You have heard about that in the past and that will apply to this site just as much as any other site where there is a need for re‑instatement of those kinds of facilities, and it is plain that the local planning authority will have in mind very much in exercising their powers, that when one is dealing with what is very clearly a highly valued area of recreational and leisure open space, that provision of hard and soft landscaping is to the fore, and I have no doubt that the Council will exercise their powers appropriately in that respect, and we will look to work with them in so doing.

10183. So far as construction aspects are concerned, there are concerns about the detailed working through of access arrangements both for the construction site and for existing facilities within the park with reference to the leisure centre and sports pitches, and also to the go‑karting facility which lies just to the south of the viaduct. Those are matters again which, as you know, the Bill provides powers of consultation and regulation to the local highway authority, and that in this case again is Tower Hamlets, and we would expect to work with them in relation to that. My understanding is that Tower Hamlets see no difficulties in principle with making appropriate access arrangements to accommodate the Crossrail construction provision and existing users in relation to this site.

10184. The transport assessment that we carried out anticipates that the work site during its operation will generate about five lorry loads, that is ten movements per day, and about 24 loads which would be 48 movements during the peak construction period. Now, the overall construction period is about three years to nine months, and I confirm that remains our best estimate of the overall duration of construction here. The peak overall period of construction we estimate to be about nine months, so during that period of nine months the lorry movements will move up to a rather higher figure of about 48 movements a day, for which access will be provided by Burdett Road, as I have explained earlier.

10185. In terms of the overall impact of construction upon its immediate environment, I refer again to the provisions of the Code of Construction Practice. As you know, we seek to make detailed provision as far as we can to minimise the impacts of construction in relation to dust and noise and overall impacts on amenity, and that will apply here no less than to any other location.

10186. We would hope, finally, that through those various controls and mechanisms that I have mentioned, both within and without the Bill, we can work with the Council and, indeed, with the users of the park to avoid the kind of perception of devaluation and depreciation that was mentioned to you, both on a temporary and a permanent basis, and I see no reason why that should not be a realisable aspiration.

10187. The final point I would make is this: I take the point about the need to share information and progress in relation to this shaft, not only with the local planning authority but also with petitioners, and I have expressed our regret about that earlier on.

10188. In the light of what has happened in relation to the proposals about the sequencing of the relocation process, we will, I have no doubt, be looking to embrace the Petitioners within further detailed design so we can make sure that a mutually acceptable solution as far as possible, not only to the local planning authority but also to the Petitioners, is achieved.

10189. I hope that those comments by way of response will reassure the Committee, unless there is anything else I can help you with.

10190. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Mr Lyons, Mr Sinden, have you anything else to say?

10191. MR SINDEN: All I would say is that we recognise certainly that this is not the appropriate moment to consider matters of detail, and within that context we very much welcome the comments that have just been made.

10192. However, I do want to come back to this point about seeing this part of London as not another dumping ground for operational facilities associated with this major infrastructure project. As my colleague, Andy Lyon, emphasised at the beginning of our contribution this morning, Mile End Park has very quickly become a much loved, highly used and much valued asset to the local community, and we hope that Crossrail in working out its detailed design proposals in response to our concerns about the shaft impacts will be very mindful indeed of the opportunity that exists to enhance and improve the quality of this facility for the local community rather than further detract from its value.

10193. I just wanted to come back to saying that, whilst I perfectly understand that the Promoters cannot guarantee that Sir Terry Farrell, rather than Mr Terry Farrell ‑‑

10194. MR MOULD: I do apologise.

10195. MR SINDEN: ‑‑ will be involved in this, we would very much like to keep on the table an idea for possibly a design competition that Friends of Mile End Park may well be able to assist in in conjunction with the planning authority, Tower Hamlets, and the Promoters to secure an asset for this part of the park.

10196. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you.

10197. MR BINLEY: Just a question to Mr Mould really, because I am sure you will appreciate, as I have, the presentation made by the Friends of Mile End Park and, indeed, the way they have reacted to your proposals at very short notice.

10198. MR MOULD: Indeed.

10199. MR BINLEY: I think it is fair to say that it will be more and more difficult for me personally as a member of this Committee to accept that this could not be dealt with earlier, quite frankly. I think that message needs to be put to Promoters very firmly indeed, because I think they lose our appreciation and support in that respect.

10200. I am equally concerned about the loss of this kind of amenity value in this area, and I think we all appreciate how vital this particular centre and stadium complex is and I hate the loss of football pitches, that is my personal interest and I tell you without any concerns whatsoever, and particularly in areas of this kind. I believe they make a major contribution to the well‑being of areas of this kind, and certainly I gained a lot of benefit from them, so I want to be absolutely sure that the Promoters do not see a particularly nice green bit as an easy way of solving their problems. I really am looking for an assurance from you to that end, particularly in relation to sites of this kind, because I think it has been too easily done and that does not encourage me very much.

10201. MR MOULD: Sir, I can assure you that that is not what has motivated this, that is to say taking the easy option in that way. In this case, although I have not troubled the Committee with it because, frankly, it seemed to me that it was not necessary to trouble the Committee in that way, the selection of this location for the shaft has been the result of an optioneering exercise in order to identify what was, on balance, taking account of the considerations that you have mentioned amongst other considerations, operational and otherwise, the optimum as to location. Within that context I hope I made it clear that the Promoters are very conscious of the need, both during the construction phase and permanently, to keep the impact of this structure and this site to the minimum that we reasonably can, and to ensure in particular that the recreational facilities that exist are not lost but are relocated insofar as they are directly affected by the Crossrail works, and relocated in advance of the works so that the actual loss to the users is kept to the minimum. I hope that gives you reassurance.

10202. MR BINLEY: Thank you very much. I think both of our comments are on record and that is important.

10203. MR MOULD: Indeed.

10204. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Mr Lyon and Mr Sinden, thank very much indeed. I now call Mr Akker.

 

The Petition of The Spitalfields Trust.

 

MR JOHN AKKER appeared as Agent.

 

The Petition of J Akker & E Hill.

 

MR JOHN AKKER appeared as Agent.

 

The Petition of Oliver Theis & Others.

 

MR JOHN AKKER appeared as Agent.

 

The Petition of Ali Nehru & Others.

 

MR JOHN AKKER appeared as Agent.

10205. MR AKKER: Sir, I have documents which I want to rely on. There are only two documents here which the Committee or counsel has not seen before, and I have got 24 copies here. (Evidence A117 distributed.)

10206. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you.

10207. MR AKKER: Thank you. I very much welcome the opportunity to address this Select Committee. You will be glad to hear I will not repeat the comments of others yesterday that were heard or those previously. I know that a number of members of the Select Committee were not present yesterday but I am very much aware that they will read very carefully the evidence which was given yesterday by Spitalfields Society, a leading preservation society of the East End of London, and also some residents, notably Huguenot Court Limited, in respect of that, and various assurances were given by counsel for Crossrail in relation to that.

10208. As an aside I would like to just say that there was a lot of concern, and I act for and, I should say, I am going to deal with petitions 227, 228 and 229 together, because I feel that would be very helpful to you and would save time.

10209. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you very much.

10210. MR AKKER: I say not with too much criticism, sir, I hope, that a lot of concerns particularly of Huguenot Court could have been addressed much earlier and could have been dealt with by meetings between the Promoters and people in the area, and that would have saved quite a considerable amount of expense and worry, but I will leave that point.

10211. There are four distinct points I want to submit to the Select Committee on behalf of all the Petitioners that are noted there. It is not that I do not feel very strongly about all the other points there, because I do, nor do I think that they are not of equal importance; it is just that I want to concentrate on certain themes which I think ought to be brought to the attention of the Select Committee.

10212. May I first say, sir, who I am and why I want to present those petitions on behalf of those listed. I am a resident of Spitalfields, and have been for the past eleven years. I was born within one mile of Spitalfields, and it is quite a remarkable area. I do not class myself as an important person but there are very notable people who have been born in that area, people like Max Bygraves, and I am trying to think of one of the other stand‑up comics which will come to me, but it is a remarkable area in the East End of London for people who have been associated with it.

10213. I am a member of the ward party of the Labour Party in that area and am a member of the management committee of the constituency party. I say that because I want to make certain that this is known for the record. Professionally, sir, I am a board member of the Refugee Council for England and the Immigration Advisory Service. Both bodies are pre‑eminent in the field of refugees, immigration and related matters, and I have close contacts with community organisations and NGOs that deal with refugees and other minority communities. I am a specialist in refugee matters and have close dealings with many communities in London and I hold a visiting chair at London's South Bank University. I have a very, very close relationship with the Bangladesh community and have worked closely with them relating to their concerns about Crossrail.

10214. It was characterised yesterday, I think, sir, that this is very much a David and Goliath situation in Brick Lane, and I think that is an understatement. I would characterise it as something far more difficult. I have held various positions in public life and, whatever the presentational issues that have been placed before you by Crossrail, certainly the best face has been placed upon it by them. I would wish to say to you that Crossrail has not behaved corporately with much sense in the way it has handled matters in the East End of London. Indeed, I think, because of the way they have dealt with it, they have placed the whole project in some difficulty because of their actions and inactions. I will leave it to you, sir, and your fellow members to conclude why so many from this area of Spitalfields have felt the need to petition. Even those who are not most effective have still felt the need to petition, and it is because there has been a dearth of information and because Crossrail has, in my view and the view of many, been very sparing with the information put before you.

10215. As I have indicated previously there has been no real attempt to meet first hand and directly the Petitioners. As Mr Mark Lancaster observed yesterday, he had written to Crossrail but only got back the most cursory replies and these had taken a month to reach him. I have posted a comment about the lack of information on their website about the Secretary of State's announcement re the change in tunnelling. This was done on 10 May and it was last Monday, 12 June, that I received a reply. I also had to inquire about what the implications of the changes were. This was a matter of very great concern in the East End and the statement which was announced by the Secretary of State, the Mayor of London and the Council was done with great publicity. It was me writing to them again wanting to know what the implications of these changes were that had to be done. There was no information that came from them and this was, I believe, the situation because I was told it by many other people in the area. We only received the information which allowed us to consider what the full implications of the changes were several weeks ago. The preliminary points I want to make to you, therefore, are there are very grave matters concerning the way Crossrail has dealt with it, but four specific points I want to deal with are as follows.

10216. Consultation. I purchased my property in Huguenot Court in the summer of 1995. Before doing so, I wrote to Crossrail and I asked them about the impact on this property. I was informed that safeguarding the route was to be north of Princelet Street. I, therefore, purchased the property. This, sir, was, of course, the old safeguarding route. In early 2004 I learned from a fellow resident that the line had changed and immediately contacted Crossrail. Further contact with them assumed that all I was interested in was talking to them about compensation. There was no question in terms of the contact which I had with them that this was a matter which was open for consultation. After I had spoken to them and sometime after I learned that there was to be an exhibition. Sir, can I ask you and other members to look at exhibit A in the list. This is the first one and it is headed "Invitation". This was a leaflet which had the intention of being circulated in the area. In actual fact, sir, it was not distributed due to a fault which the arrangements Crossrail put in place for it to be distributed and many people did not see this. Can I draw your attention to the reverse side where it is listed Whitechapel and the Community Room in Wodeham Gardens. The first thing to note I would say looking at this leaflet is if you received this leaflet, would you think your area was seriously at risk? Would you think in the words of Mr Roy Adams yesterday appearing as a witness for the Spitalfields Society that this was going to be one of the largest construction sites in Europe? I think not. It does not in any way show clearly why persons would need to be worried about the size and difficulty of the construction. The other thing that I would draw to your attention to, sir, is that many people's native language in Spitalfields is not English. I ask, had any thought been given to diversity and equal opportunities issues relating to this? It says that further copies are available in other languages, but, of course, it does beg the question if you do not speak the native language to start with how would you know they are available? I would put it to you, sir, that given the length of time of the exhibition, which was barely two afternoons, given the fact it does not describe in any great detail what is happening in the area, given the fact there certainly were not copies being made available freely in the languages that was said, I would say this is not a fair way of portraying a major construction site or a major construction exercise. Mr Berryman in his evidence on 7 June referred to the considerable amount of issues in this area and subsequently how much time it had taken Crossrail to consider this. He said in column 9509 on 7 June that the consideration of issues in this area had taken "dozens of man years" and, indeed, this was repeated yesterday. This does surprise me in the sense that certainly, as far as the social issues and relating to the impact and explanation of what was happening, there was not this degree of attention. There may have been meetings internally in Crossrail relating to what was happening in Spitalfields. Certainly as far as public awareness and public contact, I do not think that can be said. I dare say, if Crossrail had done its planning properly, it should have anticipated the great deal of indignation that would have been come about because of a plan to dig and to have a ventilation shaft so near Brick Lane. I have to say that all the consequences of the scheme were fairly explained to Crossrail. After the lack of information we obtained, we obtained the support of Mr John Bigs who was the GLA member and the league member on behalf of the GLA for transport, and meetings were held with Crossrail. It is the position that Crossrail still explained the building work in Hanbury Street as a primary ventilation shaft and not the tunneling site. This is a really key issue for a lot of the residents, that only in recent years has it been portrayed as a major tunneling site. It was a matter of great concern at the time that neither Crossrail nor the London Borough of Tower Hamlets had any meetings at all. I was equally concerned with Tower Hamlets at that stage. Both were waving away protesters, as were Crossrail, saying that the fears were greatly overplayed and that there were real benefits. The important point here, sir, I believe, is there was no transparency or plain speaking with the local community about what was happening. The only meetings that were held were by local residents. There have been at least three in recent years. May I draw your attention, sir, to A2 which is one such meeting which was held in May 2004. You will see that the resolution, which is given here, is how many people attended and the breadth of the organisations which were present from both the Bangladeshi and the resident population. There was not any input from Crossrail apart from one meeting in the House of Commons, but even that was not a public meeting; it was by invitation only. I organised a meeting with the Mayor attended by six leading members of the Bangladeshi community during its consideration of the various stages of consultation, but it was stated again that the proposal was just a ventilation shaft by the Mayor, and Mr Berryman did little to correct this impression. Tower Hamlets' Petition also indicated many of the general concerns about Crossrail and the lack of invitation. I know, sir, you have their Petition, but I am anxious it is not lost for two reasons. The lack of consultation was very keenly felt at all local levels of the local authority both at member level and officer level. Whatever - and I say this with some amusement - harmony that may have existed or broken out this week between Tower Hamlets and Crossrail, it was certainly not present at very early stages of consideration of this Bill and I believe the very plain speaking of Tower Hamlets about the lack of consultation on this.

10217. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Can I stop you there, Mr Akker. We have taken your points on board. These have been explored over the last few days, as you are well aware. We are fully aware of them. Unfortunately, you missed at the start of this morning, where I made it very clear as Chairman we are very unhappy, as a Committee, that information has not been passed down to you and others, that has been made abundantly clear. The points you are making, we take on board, we accept and we understand. What I ask you now is to move on from this. You have made the point, you cannot make it any more clearly than you have done and we are grateful to that. Can you now move on to the other points you have?

10218. MR AKKER: Sorry I missed that assurance earlier.

10219. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I understood you could not be here. I think it is important just to say to you that we are fully aware of that. Thank you.

10220. MR AKKER: I want to make a point, sir, about the exhibition in Brick Lane, if I may do so, because this relates to the relations with the Bangladeshi community in that area, and if I could just do that briefly. It is the position that there was an attempt to hold an exhibition in Brick Lane and very great exception was taken to this by the Bangladeshi community because it was held in an old brewery.

10221. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: We are aware of this. This has already been dealt with. Could you move on from there? I am sorry to chivvy you, but it is just to try and bring a new point. That was brought out very clearly yesterday and we made very clear representation yesterday evening to Mr Elvin that that was not acceptable.

10222. MR AKKER: Okay. Can I just say for the record, sir, there have been very large meetings of the Bangladeshi community and the resolutions have been put down.

10223. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you.

10224. MR AKKER: There is a point here which, with respect, I do not know whether you have considered and that is the position of the Crossrail referee.

10225. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Please carry on.

10226. MR AKKER: Many of us were concerned that there was a person in office who would or could help us with problems which we were having with Crossrail. I wrote to the Crossrail referee, as others did, but I have included in the bundle, sir, the reply which we received from the Crossrail referee. That is dealt with in A4. Now I will not go over the meetings which are listed here, though I could say all the meetings listed here were not ones called by Crossrail but were called by the local community. Therefore, to say that Crossrail was responsible for them is highly misleading. What I would say to you, sir, is that the Crossrail referee did not intervene and say that there were problems regarding consultation. It is as plain as a pike staff, as Lord Denning would perhaps say, that there was not any meaningful consultation in this area and yet the Crossrail referee did not come to any view other than to say it was ill-founded. Now, from a common sense point of view, I would either say there is something wrong with the terms of reference of the referee or that he did not discharge his duty efficiently. I ask for future reference where there are major construction sites as this that the public does have the ability to apply through an independent person who can look at these things.

10227. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you.

10228. MR AKKER: The other thing I would say in terms of the reference of the Bangladeshi community is something which you probably are not aware of, that is exhibit A3. This is a letter from the chair of the CRE. Can I draw your attention to paragraph 2 in which he says, and I paraphrase, 'We share your concerns that all the listed bodies have not been adequately consulted and informed the local community and especially the Bangladeshi'.

10229. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think, Mr Akker, you made your point. We will wait and see what Mr Elvin says about that.

10230. MR AKKER: I would also say on that, sir, Crossrail did make some attempts later on to correct that, hence the exhibition and other things, but there has been a history here, a lot of damage was done in the early stages and the Bangladeshi community have a great soreness about this as a result.

10231. On the general public face of Crossrail, could I just make one point lastly on this, sir, as an aside. We live in a modern age where information technology is very vital to us. We rely a great deal on it. A great deal of disappointment, in my mind, relates to the information that is available relating to Crossrail on their website. I would very much like you in the Committee to look at their website. It has things which are no doubt very important such as the need to encourage young engineers, the changes in the management team and things of that sort, but when you have got a situation where a major bill is going through Parliament, there are a lot of concerns in the area. It is very good avenue for getting up-to-date information. I do not think that meets that test, and I ask you to look at that. Now the second issue, sir, and I am grateful for what you have said about your earlier statements, the second issue, and I shall be far shorter on this, concerns the alignment of the route. I think it is fair to say Mr Berryman has explained this on no ends of occasions that there were two prime reasons why it is necessary for the lines to go through Brick Lane. The need to get to the railway, the Great Eastern Railway, and the siting of Whitechapel Station. I have to say that on some things - and I do not mix in influential circles - I have spoken to one or two transport correspondents and to several politicians, but there is quite a strong belief that as far as funding of Crossrail that the current proposal regarding Crossrail will be far too expensive and what has been put to me is that there may be a scaled-down version of this Bill by
Mr Berryman's comments to the Committee yesterday and there may need to be forced economies to the route. You look puzzled, sir.

10232. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: No, this is slightly outside our auspices as a Hybrid Bill, therefore, we cannot really take that into consideration. Your final remarks, please, to the matter in hand. I would be most grateful, thank you.

10233. MR AKKER: Really briefly, sir, that refers to the fact that Whitechapel might not be the determining factor in the future alignment of the route, but all the technical aspects which this Committee has considered over the last two or three days and Tower Hamlets last week all concern the compactness and difficulty of getting access to what is a very tight area of London; historic buildings, the access in terms of the ventilation shaft. I would say to you, as did the Spitalfields Society also yesterday, is that there should be consideration of the southern route. I will not go into detail because the Spitalfields Society did that very carefully. I would also say to you that, having listened to the Spitalfields Society yesterday, I agree with them that the best alternative, as it stands, is in my view Woodseer Street. I now want to turn, having dealt with Woodseer Street, to also deal with the question of the need for an intervention shaft at all in the area. This was mentioned again, but can I say to the Committee that there was some evidence of a view put forward by Mr Drabble in 9414 about the need for an intervention shaft and I hope that that will not be lost in the Committee's consideration. Can I also, and I have included this in the bundle, ask that Committee considers A5, sir. Of course the Committee will be aware of the statement made by the Secretary of State relating to the tunnelling but he does say in this statement, and it is the fourth paragraph at the end, that he has asked Crossrail to consider the residual impacts of the ventilation shaft in the area and he hopes that these can be further ameliorated. I, too, sir, and lots of other people in the area hope the impact of that ventilation shaft can be.

10234. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think that point has been very well made over the last couple of days.

10235. MR AKKER: The fourth point, sir, and I do not know whether I can ask your indulgence on this, and it does relate to the whole principle of Crossrail. It is the concern that I think a lot of people got not only in Spitalfields but I think during the whole line of Crossrail is the situation that if you are so minded that this Bill passes and the Commons pass the Bill then there will be a Bill published which will authorise Crossrail to undertake this. The question is that people's property and people's lives will be affected by this for many years. The question that is open is that the Government as yet has not indicated how this is going to be financed. If the situation is that people's property will be blighted because of the route I would hope that the Government will bring forward proposals certainly by Third Reading about further details regarding this.

10236. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: We have no say in that. We are merely a Hybrid Bill reporting back to the House on the findings of this. We have no say on the funding or the Government's response to this. I am sorry. Your point is taken on board, but there is nothing that this Committee can do to help but thank you for bringing it up.

10237. MR AKKER: Therefore, sir, I would ask you to consider the following points, that it is my strong belief that the present scheme affecting the Spitalfields area is misconceived and has been subject to imperfect information by the local community. Far more attention should have been given to the human impact and to engage with the local population. Secondly, a southern route even at this stage ought to be urgently examined and that the study being undertaken by Crossrail about the choice of the ventilation shaft, indeed if there needs to be a ventilation shaft, ought to be seriously considered and I do hope that Committee will ensure that there is the most serious and deep investigation of that because of the concerns which it has in the area in terms of the disruption. I also say, and this is with some regret, that the number of Petitioners from the Bangladeshi community has been impacted on because it has been felt that this is a done deal and that, although we are very lucky in this country that we have got procedures like the one we are dealing with, open, transparent and democratic, a number of people within the Bangladeshi community have felt that people have not necessarily realised that.

10238. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think we have got the tape on that point well worn,
Mr Akker. Thank you for making it for the third time. I am very grateful.

10239. MR AKKER: I apologise. That is all.

10240. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Who is taking this on? Mr Elvin?

10241. MR ELVIN: Sir, on the consultation issues, we do not accept all the criticisms that have been made and I am going to explain why at 2.30. Can I deal with a couple of limited points at this point just so the Committee knows where we are coming from. So far as consultations are concerned, there was not only one consultation round, there were a number. Could I ask Mr Fry to put up Information Paper F2 H2, please, just to remind the Committee it is a long time since I referred to the information which I gave in opening on 17 January. You can see there that in terms of consultation there was a public awareness campaign in September 2003, which is item 3A. There was a major consultation round, the first consultation round, for 12 weeks, in the latter part of 2003. There was a supplementary public awareness exercise later. There was then a second major consultation round for another 12 weeks in 2004. Finally, there was an information round which accompanied the Bill Deposit to give information about the scheme as it finally emerged at the time of the Bill Deposit and Environmental Statement.

10242. Can I say this? The issue with regard to the old Truman's Brewery, I make no bones about it, it was insensitive given the nature of the community. But I am going to explain why - and it is not a good excuse because it was insensitive, as I accept. The problem was that in terms of obtaining proper accessibility it was the only available site at the time, and it was moved when an alternative site became available - it was moved to the Brady Centre for subsequent consultation. It was force of circumstances but I nonetheless acknowledge the lack of sensitivity involved in that. Can I also make it clear that information was given at both consultation rounds one and two that Hanbury Street would be used for tunnelling as well as ventilation and intervention? By way of illustration now - and I will deal with this more fully later - can I have put on the scanner the information panels that were displayed and which were also available in A4 format, and they were also available in Bengali. This is the 2003 version and you will see in the text at the right hand side the last two paragraphs make it perfectly clear that this is to be a launch and retrieval point for tunnel boring machines used during tunnel construction. So we do not accept that information was somehow concealed about the true nature of the then Hanbury Street shaft and the purpose for it. Of course, the position changed in April of this year when the tunnelling strategy was changed and letters went out to Petitioners on 22 May, but a public statement was made in Parliament, a statement was made, I think - I cannot remember whether it by was me or somebody else - to the Committee and a new version of the Information Paper on Hanbury Street and on the tunnelling strategy was published in the last week of April and made available from that date. So in terms of the role of Hanbury Street and then in terms of the change we do not accept that there was not transparency or notice.

10243. I am not going to deal with other matters at this stage on consultation; I will make our position clear this afternoon.

10244. So far as the CRE is concerned and the Quality Impact Assessment, as I indicated to the Committee yesterday there has been a correspondence with Mr Trevor Phillips. This is only the first letter and there are others. Mr Trevor Phillips now knows that an initial assessment has been carried out, that another assessment is underway and if the Committee wishes to see the full range of correspondence I am quite happy to provide it. But there are later letters than this, this is the first letter from Mr Phillips that we had in correspondence.

10245. In terms of the other issues, those are matters that have already been covered in evidence, both on Day 38 with Tower Hamlets; and why an intervention shaft is needed has already been covered by Mr Berryman. On questions such as the alignment and the need therefore for an intervention shaft at all and the Woodseer Street option, evidence has already been presented on Days 38 and 39. I do not propose to add anything else unless the Committee would like me to clarify any further matters?

10246. MR LIDDDELL-GRAINGER: Just one matter of clarification, Mr Elvin. Who appointed the Crossrail referee?

10247. MR ELVIN: Appointed by the Secretary of State for Transport.

10248. MR LIDDDELL-GRAINGER: And paid by the Department?

10249. MR ELVIN: It comes out of project funds.

10250. MR LIDDDELL-GRAINGER: So it is actually paid by Crossrail but it is honoured by the Department.

10251. MR ELVIN: It is paid by public funds and made available to Crossrail.

10252. MR LIDDDELL-GRAINGER: Mr Akker, do you have anything else that you would like to add?

10253. MR AKKER: No, sir, I think it has been fully dealt with.

10254. MR LIDDDELL-GRAINGER: I am very grateful. Thank you for your evidence, it was extremely well put.

10255. Since we have no other evidence I therefore call the Committee to order and we will now re-sit at 2.30.

 

After a short adjournment

10256. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I call the Committee to order. Mr Elvin

10257. MR ELVIN: I have various pieces of housekeeping and I then propose to call a witness and, in part, myself, just to present some material on the consultation to assist the Committee in its considerations.

10258. Can I first, for the purpose of the record, record that a statement has been made by the Minister, Mr Twigg, this morning to announce that changes have been made in the scheme with regard to the main Crossrail depot, and what Mr Twigg said to Parliament this morning was that the government is aware of the concerns that have been expressed by the London Borough of Havering and others in that borough about the impacts of the proposed Crossrail train depot at Romford. Cross London Rail Links have been working for many months to reduce those impacts and at the same time to identify whether there is a viable alternative depot strategy that would remove the facilities at Romford altogether. Following a fundamental review of the depot strategy and in the light of changes in the occupation and expected future use of existing depots, CLRL has concluded that it is possible for Crossrail to operate entirely from the existing rail depots at Old Oak Common in West London and Ilford in East London. As a result Crossrail would not need to continue with any of the proposed facilities at Romford or to make use of the sidings at West Drayton in the London Borough of Hillingdon. The revised depot strategy will reduce the overall environmental impacts of the Crossrail project by removing the need for the construction of new facilities in Romford. CLRL estimate that the cost of the revised strategy will be up to £80m lower than that of the Romford scheme. The revised strategy will require the acquisition of a small amount of open land at Old Oak Common to allow for improved rail access. The land lost will be replaced by an equivalent amount from an adjacent brownfield site. In order to implement the revised strategy the Bill will need to be amended; the government will promote an additional provision in due course, including a detailed Environmental Statement, which will be subject to the agreement of the Select Committee. Those affected by the additional provision will be able to petition Parliament. As part of the revised strategy it is proposed to move EWS Limited from Old Oak Common to North Pole - that is North Pole and not the North Pole! -which is to become vacant in 2007. It is also proposed to move Bombardier Transportation Limited from or within Ilford Depot. CLRL will continue to work closely with these organisations to try to minimise the impacts upon them. CLRL will in due course write to existing Petitioners affected by this announcement and undertake information rounds in the relevant areas to explain the details of the revised depot strategy and the implications for the local area.

10259. Therefore, whether or not of course Romford now wish to appear in two weeks' time is a matter which will need to be considered.

10260. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: We will need to address that.

10261. MR ELVIN: Indeed, and it will be another matter along with the tunnelling strategy which will be needed in AP3.

10262. The next matter is a matter which the Committee raised this morning, which is the Referee on consultation. I am afraid the documents were provided to me about two minutes before I came into the room, but can I put them on the scanner? These are the terms of reference for the appointment of the Referee. The Committee will see in Section 1 it is intended that this be in Operation 3 of the Government Codes of Practice which apply, and they are set out - The Code of Practice on Dissemination of Information During Major Projects, the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information and the Code of Practice on Consultation, issued by the Cabinet Office. Therefore the Referee has been appointed to fulfil the requirements of those Codes and it is said that the Referee must be accredited by a recognised dispute resolution organisation. The role of the Referee is dealt with in Section 2 and the Referee, as recommended by the Code on Dissemination, should be independent, appointed with the authority to investigate complaints from members of the public who believe that they have not received information provided by the Code, and the Referee will assess the validity of the complaint and send a report of his findings to the parties; that is generally by written representation. And you will see that any duties may be added to by the High Level Forum, which is chaired by the Minister, and you will see that the Referee should act in a personal capacity, declare any interests, reach a decision within 28 days or longer period as is agreed, and send a report of his findings to the parties concerned. Therefore, his duties in this respect are firstly to act and to be seen to act impartially; secondly, be afforded access to any relevant records or documents held by the Promoter, except those which are protected by the Code of Practice. It then excludes certain matters and the Referee is, you will see from 2.5, to adjudicate on his own; he is to have his own office facilities and supporting staff; and he can produce information. It then sets out the role of Crossrail, which includes informing relevant parties, public and others interested in the existence and role of the Referee, and will seek to resolve differences by agreement. And reporting of the Referee will be to the High Level Forum. If I can put a leaflet on the scanner, this is an information pamphlet of the Referee which summarises the information that you have just seen for the purposes of the public, and it names the Referee as Professor Tony Kennedy, who is also the Complaints Commissioner for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, so Professor Kennedy is experienced in dealing with these matters, already discharging that function for CTRL. You will see that it says that Professor Kennedy has already established a sound reputation for independence and fairness. You will see that he is also an Arbitrator for ACAS. He is supported by Tony Gregory, who was Assistant Channel Tunnel Rail Link Complaints Commissioner, bringing a similar quality and experience to his new role. It explains to those who receive the pamphlet what the Referee can do to help. There is a photograph of the Referee, and multiple language versions giving information on contact at the left hand side and key contacts in English in the middle.

10263. The Referee has adjudicated on complaints during the course of the consultation rounds so far and we have an email which summarises the position to date, and that is from Tony Gregory who is assisting Professor Kennedy, and you will see of the complaints that those that are unsupported are noted as "U", those that are supported in whole or part are as "S", and you will see that round 1 had 52 complaints of which three were supported in whole or part; round 2 had ten, of which two were supported in whole or part; and the 2005 information round had one.

10264. I also have for the Committee the minutes of the High Level Forum of 6 June 2005, chaired by Mr Twigg, the Minister, with a report from the Referee at paragraph 14. "Professor Kennedy noted that he had previously reported on the consultation carried out by CLRL and that it had been good compared to previous projects." I appreciate that that begs certain questions but I hope to make good some of that in a moment. "Then came the information round which he also commended. We are now at what the Code of Practice categorises as stage 3, which is characterised by a shift away from discretionary dissemination of information to a statutory requirement," and that of course is embodied in the Environmental Impact Assessment Procedure. "Tony noted that in future his office will also be available to deal with any written representations that may arise from the proposed consultation on the Maidenhead-Reading extension." That is the information on the complaints Referee and I hope that that provides further information to the Committee.

10265. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you very much, Mr Elvin.

10266. MR ELVIN: In which case is it convenient if I deal with the public consultation issue at this stage, or would you prefer to hear the Petitioners first? I think the Spitalfields Medical Practice would like to be heard fairly soon because of the need to get away. I am quite happy to deal with this later.

10267. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Would it help you to do it now or do you feel that it would wait for a few minutes?

10268. MR ELVIN: It is going to take half an hour, I should think. (The Petitioner from the Spitalfields Practice indicated that he was content to wait)

10269. Thank you. In which case can I introduce a witness which the Committee has not seen yet, and that is Mr Simon Dean?

 

MR SIMON DEAN, Sworn

Examined by MR ELVIN

10270. MR ELVIN: If I can introduce Mr Dean as an economist. He is the CLRL Equality and Consultation Adviser. Mr Dean, you have spent 17 years planning and developing major transport projects, mostly in London, is that right?

(Mr Dean) That is right, sir.

10271. You have worked on the East London Line northern extension?

(Mr Dean) That is correct.

10272. And you led that through the first TWA order application. You also worked on the Croydon Tramlink, South Central Rail Franchise and Network Rail infrastructure improvement projects.

(Mr Dean) Amongst others.

10273. You have worked in the public affairs field of Crossrail for four years, helping to deliver the consultation programme, analyse the responses and comments and prepare subsequent reports and coordinate the Bill deposit.

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10274. For the last two years you have been responsible for managing the Race and Equality Impact Assessment and you are now working on TfL's Age Equality Scheme?

(Mr Dean) That is correct.

10275. Can you explain briefly to the Committee how the Crossrail consultation process was designed, first of all?

(Mr Dean) Yes. I think it is helpful to try and set some context. We looked to prepare a set of objectives to take us through the whole programme and to base those objectives on the GLA's advice, the TfL toolkit consultation and also the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister's Code of Practice on Dissemination of Information during major infrastructure projects. Trying to follow that guidance we designed two rounds of consultation and then an information round. It was all preceded by a public awareness campaign, and that did exactly what it said in the plan and it was trying to introduce the principle of the project and to raise awareness throughout London of the proposals. Round one consultation tried to present some detail of the route and definitions, but at times it was presenting too much detail and there were problems with the Code of Best Practice. But then to seek feedback not only on the proposals themselves but of course the consultation process allows consultees and the wider community to comment on the process itself, and so we have had some useful feedback. I would like to mention early on that we held lessons learnt exercises after every round on consultation and we took on board all the comments received, whether they be verbal, whether they were things that we noticed ourselves, and then round 2 was held. We looked to add fresh initiatives into round 2 and I think an important one to mention today is the introduction of information exchange, which was a permanent facility open two days a week in the Spitalfields area. That was then finished off with an information round which provided more detail still and that looked to present the content of the Bill to be deposited. I can come back and explain the process itself and all the activities in greater detail if I could take some time later to run through the report on Spitalfields.

10276. What I will ask you to do in a moment is to take the Committee briefly through the Spitalfields consultation report so that you can take the Committee through the stages. Before we do that I would like you to address again briefly to the Committee on the basis upon which you proceeded in trying to design the consultation around to be inclusive, having regard to the various community and different ethnic interests involved in the areas affected by Crossrail.

(Mr Dean) One of our headline objectives was to be socially inclusive and with that in mind we tried to offer a whole range of media from which consultees could find out information about the project or contact the project. First of all - and I think it is an important one to start with - all of the documentation was prepared in accessible formats, and we had 11 community languages at the outset, and that grew to 16 at one point, I believe. There were also large print versions, Braille, easy-read, audiotape cassette versions also available. The easy-read documents we hope are something that are accessible to everybody. We ran a 24-hour help desk seven days a week and that has been running since 2002. There are obviously facilities to email, send letters or faxes to us, and there is a freepost mail facility. There is a "Bobby" accredited website, Bobby being the accreditation of access and ease of navigation, and clearly that is available to all at all times, and on there is the community language translations microsite; there is a Young Crossrail microsite, which is another important area of work that I will come back to later. We tried to present the information in a whole range of different styles and formats - you have obviously had the written documents - and we used photography, artists' impressions, diagrams, drawings, mapped plans, architectural models, usually with explanatory text. All of this was held on the website and most of it was used on the exhibition panels. Again, I will come back to the exhibition designs which I think are currently in the Spitalfields Report.

10277. Envelopes were provided and the Committee can see here the multi-language instructions written on the envelopes. In terms of the exhibition materials, particularly in the Spitalfields area, were they provided in multi-language versions?

(Mr Dean) Yes, we provided material translated primarily into Somalian and Sylheti, the local dialect, and you will find on all of our documents that there are these community language translation contact details, so that people of various first languages can get in touch with the project, and we translated some of the key documents. We have had briefing material available since April 2004, so that precedes the first consultation round, translated into all the community languages.

10278. Can we just give an example? This is from consultation round 2, and this is the English first panel for Hanbury Street, and if I could put it side by side with the Bengali version, and this is one of the versions that was produced for the Spitalfields consultations.

(Mr Dean) That is right. There were a number of site-specific translated panels. There was a welcome banner in Sylheti; we had an interpreter available who attended most of the sessions but was always available on request and he made the best endeavours to try to be socially inclusive and aware of the local needs of the area.

10279. The second Hanbury Street panel from consultation round 2, and again we have it in English and Bengali.

(Mr Dean) That is right, and just to reiterate that these were available obviously on the A1 panels in the exhibition and also as A4 takeaway handouts and also then as downloaded documents from the website. They could be requested from the help desk and men at work.

10280. At this point it might be best to go to the report. Could I have the report demonstrated to the Committee? (Report distributed) The first page is a note which has been prepared by you to explain the extent of consultation in the Spitalfields area.

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10281. The Executive Summary on page 1 effectively says what you have just said in terms of the overall approach. We can see from the penultimate paragraph that there were 34 days of staffed exhibition held in the Spitalfields area.

(Mr Dean) That is right. It is over 20 per cent of the total number of exhibition days. There were 184 in total across the project over the consultation programme.

10282. Page 2, you set out the background. Can I ask you with regard to understanding the identity of the stakeholders, that is the various groups within the area who might be both representative and interested in the issues, did you have consultation with Tower Hamlets Borough Council to identify those?

(Mr Dean) At the risk of spoiling what has become a very productive and constructive relationship with the local authority, I am afraid at that time they resisted helping identifying stakeholders in the area, and I fear that this may have put us at a disadvantage and perhaps slowed down the ability of the project to engage with the local community.

10283. So how were the stakeholders identified?

(Mr Dean) We had to do it by desktop research and then just during the consultation exercise we have gradually built up what I believe to be now quite a robust and comprehensive directory.

10284. You then set out the policy, which you have already referred to.

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10285. And it includes the GLA policy and the TfL consultation toolkit, and we see that on page 3. Social inclusion is addressed and again that sets out what you have just summarised verbally to the Committee, so I do not think we need to go into it. It includes the Bobby accredited website and the help desk and the various multi-language versions of the documentation.

(Mr Dean) Could I just add something?

10286. By all means.

(Mr Dean) Just to mention that with the mass of contacts that the project has to deal with we have set up a bespoke contacts database that enables us to record all the communications that are held with outside and interested parties, and that has enabled us to send out mail shots, email project updates and the like, and produced reports from these.

10287. Page 4, you refer to the education programme which has been running since 2003, which is known as Young Crossrail, in which 93 schools in Tower Hamlets are participating, 32 in the E1 postcode district, which includes Spitalfields, and I think you have listed the schools at the ingested pages 012 and 013.

(Mr Dean) It is appendix 2. Sorry, I have made the wrong reference in the document itself; they appear at appendix 2.

10288. I have actually read it, Mr Dean.

(Mr Dean) It is a curriculum based programme that looks to engage with young people and there are a number of competitions, colouring competitions, story writing competitions, all based on the Crossrail concept, and it is something that seems to have been welcomed by all the schools involved and they participated in the consultation programme itself, attending the information centres, undertaking surveys on behalf of the project and then presenting their findings to local dignitaries at the end of the day.

10289. Then of the public consultation exercises generally you first refer in the second half of page 4 to the public awareness campaign, which was a three-week campaign which included 18 advertisements, including not only in the Evening Standard and the Metro but the East London Advertiser and East End Life, which is the weekly newspaper for the council for the borough.

(Mr Dean) It is delivered through every door in the borough.

10290. 60,000 leaflets were distributed in the Whitechapel, Liverpool Street and Canary Wharf stations and they gave information about forthcoming public consultations with a reply-paid card inviting comment and registration.

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10291. And Tower Hamlets were given copies of that information to display in public buildings such as libraries and the civic offices.

(Mr Dean) The council, councillors and the local MP at that time, Oona King, were also all invited to the preview exhibition where they could see the material, understand the process, meet the staff who were going to man the centres, and that was made available to them to make early comment.

10292. We then have the first public consultation round, which ran from October 2003 to January 2004. This is not the consultation round that took place in part in the old Truman's Brewery, this consultation information centre was at Vallance Road.

(Mr Dean) Yes. We tried to find permanent sites which were local to the areas most interested in the project. Obviously they needed to have a catchment area and they needed to be spread route-wide, and in order to try and access the communities themselves quite often we used mobile units, but we always preferred to have something that the local community knew, that was near high footfall and hopefully high profile in the area.

10293. The details are there set out and there is a preview exhibition for the councillors and the MP and you note in that section the difficulties that you had in identifying the stakeholders that you mentioned earlier.

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10294. You also sent Press releases to journalists for local Bengali-speaking media.

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10295. That consultation round was reported on and there is a report which I think is available on the website.

(Mr Dean) Yes, all of the published material is.

10296. MR ELVIN: In the second public consultation round, going back to the report, which was August to October 2004, preceded by a public awareness campaign. What does a public awareness campaign mean in this context?

(Mr Dean) It is based on advertising, leafleting at relevant stations along the line of route, accompanied by mail outs and emails to everyone who is registered on the database.

10297. We see that further information centres at Spitalfields, Whitechapel, Isle of Dogs and Liverpool Street Station, two public information exchanges were provided which were walk-in centres, one of which is the one that the Committee has already heard was at the old Truman Brewery. Can I ask whether in fact it remained at the old Truman Brewery for the whole of the period?

(Mr Dean) No, at the end of September it was moved to Bray Gallery and this was based on certain and criticism from the local community.

10298. Display panels you have referred to and those have been translated into Bengali and Somali. Other community languages were also used and interpreter-based services were available. 92 advertisements, including local authority publications and local journals, and you have listed a number of community language-based advertisements, if we can move down a page. You have listed them and I do not want you to read them out, but they include Bengali journals?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10299. Advertisements, newspaper and radio, including Muslim Radio at Tower Hamlets Station?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10300. Then you say that following complaints, the direct leafleting exercise in round one had not reached some recipients, leaflets were posted by Royal Mail to more than 176,000 address in 100-metre corridor either side of the proposed route.

(Mr Dean) That is right. We widened the corridor and used the Royal Mail service who were able to identify every postcode within that corridor.

10301. You say on the foot of the page, land and property referencing continued to refine details of interests of those likely to be affected and as you learned of new directly affected property interests, they were written to directly?

(Mr Dean) Yes, it is probably important just to mention that we tried to develop a special relationship with those directly affected. They were offered discussions with a panel of property experts.

10302. We then if we go to the next page please had the information round which accompanied the bill deposit and you again note information centres were held in Spitalfields and Whitechapel, where was the Spitalfields information centre?

(Mr Dean) The Spitalfields information centre?

10303. Yes, for the information round.

(Mr Dean) For these exact dates?

10304. No, where was it?

(Mr Dean) Sorry, it was moved to the Brady Centre.

10305. The Brady Centre.

(Mr Dean) Yes, the Brady Centre, I think, would have been our preferred venue earlier, but it was non‑accessible and being refurbished. By the time of the information round it had been fully refurbished and made accessible and so it was used then

10306. As before, information was disseminated and displayed in a number of languages including Bengali and Somali and an interpreter was present?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10307. You then sent out bill deposit, publicity and additional provisions, I am not going to focus on those because the complaints are focused on pre-bill deposit consultation and the Committee is well aware of what has happened with the deposited bill. Can I ask you about the equality workshops which are referred to at the foot of the page, please?

(Mr Dean) Yes, we held three workshops, one in the west, one in the central area and one in the east to which we ought sought to invite priority group representatives, obviously race, faith, part of the seven priority groups that are categorised where we looked to present the proposals and understand perhaps some of the more subtle concerns and interests and hopes of those priority groups.

10308. If we can go to the next page, please, you summarise the communication history of the Spitalfields area to date, you set out the number of contacts in the database, over 25,000, and the total number of communications, nearly 340,000?

(Mr Dean) That is right. I should imagine it has gone up quite a bit since the report was first drafted.

10309. And you have given some specific examples, the Spitalfields area itself, just over 6,000 communications from the Spitalfields area and you have given the details for stakeholders in Spitalfields, the Small Business Association and the Woodseer and Hanbury Residents Association?

(Mr Dean) Yes, I could have put some more in. I hope those are representative.

10310. The next steps you set out at the bottom of the page, continue to provide a 24-hour seven days a week help desk and a regularly updated website. I do not know to what extent members of the Committee have had an opportunity to look at the website, Mr Dean, but how much information is available on the website?

(Mr Dean) Everything you need to know about Crossrail and probably an awful lot more. Everything is published and then we obviously publish it in all the accessible formats. There are 20 micro-sites on there. The Young Crossrail microsite is something you can get lost in, there was a virtual train on there and results of all the competitions. There is a wealth of information.

10311. One of the micro sites, this is a print-out I did at the beginning of the year just as the Committee was starting to sit but part of the site includes all the supporting documents for the Bill. It includes the various environmental statements, the supplementaries, of which there were two at the time, the amendment to provisions of ES, of which there was one at the time, all the specialist reports and the technical reports that form the background to the environmental statement and the plans are all available and can be viewed from the website?

(Mr Dean) That is correct.

10312. Can I then ask you to go to the next page?

(Mr Dean) Are you at the appendices now?

10313. No, page 9. I want to ask because this is something that Tower Hamlets indicated satisfaction with, community cohesion adviser has been appointed to assist the project. Can you just explain that?

(Mr Dean) Yes, it has taken some expert advice on how to improve community relations, to engage with those who are more difficult to reach and really looking just as always to improve our processes. I hope that at every juncture we have tried to learn from what has happened behind us and try out some new initiatives to freshen up what it is we are doing and also to improve the overall process.

10314. The race equality impact assessment and equality impact assessment have been completed. That is a continuing process, is it not?

(Mr Dean) That is right, yes. We envisage that the assessment exercise will continue right into operation of the project so through the design phase, through construction and then once the railway is operational.

10315. So we have got the ongoing level of the Community Cohesion Adviser and the agreement to work with Tower Hamlets on future consultation of community relations exercises, continuing dialogue with the various affected communities and then the equality impact assessment monitoring a development process?

(Mr Dean) That is right. We also have a community relations team who are expert in major construction projects.

10316. The appendices, we have seen appendix 2, if we can briefly look at appendix 1, that summarises the consultation events at Spitalfields, consultation round one which we have discussed consultation round 2, the information round and the additional provision at Whitechapel Station which also generate a centre. Appendix 2, we have seen, appendix 3 set out the stakeholders registered now on the Crossrail data base.

(Mr Dean) Stakeholders in Spitalfields.

10317. In Spitalfields, I imagine the complete one is longer than that for the whole scheme?

(Mr Dean) Indeed. I possibly missed some off myself from the overall list. Sometimes obviously groups outside Spitalfields may have an interest in the area.

10318. In appendix 4, you summarise the meetings with the community and stakeholder groups 2004 and 2006

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10319. Before I turn to the CRE, I would just like to show the Committee briefly some of the materials provided on the consultation round and the Committee has already seen some of them. Can we just put up these. This is consultation round 1. Mr Dean, you will confirm which is showing the central London stations and this is the 2003 to early 2004 early consultation round and we can see that it shows clearly the route going from Liverpool Street to Whitechapel not to Stratford directly or bypassing Whitechapel?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10320. In terms of that time, members of the public were also informed that an environmental impact assessment had been commissioned and was underway?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10321. The regeneration issues that were involved with Crossrail?

(Mr Dean) That is right. We had a number of generic panels that were shown at all the exhibitions and then some site‑specific and regeneration was one of the generics

10322. Hanbury Street I have already shown the Committee. As a reminder, this is the first Hanbury Street panel, which refers to the fact it was to be used for the launch of tunnelling. You can see the paragraphs in the right‑hand column.

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10323. And then options for the shaft at that time, which was before the tunnelling strategy was changed?

(Mr Dean) That is correct.

10324. Can I then look, please, briefly at consultation round 2. If you recall the points that were made about the alignment of the tracks, the Liverpool Street Station map we can see the alignment of the tracks and the curvature that was discussed yesterday clearly shown on the plan?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10325. Hanbury Street, the first sheet. As in consultation round 1, the alignment of the tracks under Hanbury Street, Princelet Street and crossing Brick Lane and its proximity to Hugeunot Court are all shown on the plan?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10326. Shaft design, sheet number 2, referring to Hanbury Street at that time as a location for starting the tunneling boring machines?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10327. And indeed there was a third sheet which is now, of course, completely obsolete which was the Pedley Street arrangement which has been dropped?

(Mr Dean) Correct.

10328. It has then showed station proposals for a new station at Whitechapel?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10329. Were there individual sheets or multiples of sheets for each station and shaft location provided as part of the consultation round?

(Mr Dean) We tried to make it consistent in terms of design across the project and there were panels dealing with service proposals or service improvements.

10330. This is the total document?

(Mr Dean) There are 189 panels.

10331. Yes. Can we then just look at the equivalent of the exercise for the information round. There are general sheets on various aspects, regeneration, what is Crossrail, things such as that, can I just ask you specifically again just to look at Hanbury Street. Again in two sheets, sheet one is much the same as on consultation round 2, showing the tunnel alignment?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10332. Sheet two is very similar to consultation round 2, referring to the tunnel boring machine launch?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10333. And Pedley Street again now superseded?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10334. And at this stage in the information round Whitechapel had been updated to show a western ticket hall?

(Mr Dean) That is correct.

10335. You referred to the fact that consultation reports were provided for the various rounds. Can I just draw the Committee's attention to the report on consultation round 2. That is the one that took place in 2004 because it sets out the response to some of the issues that were raised which has some bearing on the matters that were raised by Petitioners. They include a reference to settlement at item two, referring to an information sheet which has been produced which I will show the Committee in a moment. It says it explains how settlement will be predicted and monitored and how action will be taken to mitigate it. It also deals with the opposition to the construction site of Hanbury Street and it notes and this is in relation to the consultation round in 2004 that seven possible locations have been considered including Woodseer Street. It notes in the third paragraph that alternative alignments to the tunnel to the south were also considered and explains why Hanbury Street was the best option and it referred then to the justification for Hanbury Street as a launch site for the tunnel boring machines?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10336. So far as the information sheets are concerned, what was their function?

(Mr Dean) It was to try and provide some additional information on some key topic areas, some of which we could foresee were going to be of interest, others were specifically raised either during comment or by requests straight to the project but still remaining mindful that by making them overly complicated they may be unhelpful rather than helpful. They tried to strike a balance and tried to be helpful in giving sufficient information for those concerned to understand what we are about and the issue or topic.

10337. This is the introduction. The reason I put it up is because it lists all the others, EIA, the approach to development which is about the construction code?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10338. Getting approval to progress, that explains the procedure for the Hybrid Bill, noise and vibration, roads, settlement, stations and tunnels?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10339. I would just like to show the Committee briefly again because it touches on the matters the Committee have been asked to consider, the settlement paper. You see here an overview referring to the experience from other schemes; extensive experiences have been referred to. Basic information on ground movement, application of appropriate measures to control and mitigate are referred to and then listed in the third column. It says "settlement assessments will be undertaken for buildings within the zone potentially affected". The Committee can relate that back to what Professor Meyer said on 1 February and the Information Paper. We go to the next page which is the second sheet. That continues to include mitigation measures at source, ground treatment and structural measures, the pre-construction surveys and in particular there are two specific paragraphs relating to listed buildings which says specific consideration has been given to listed buildings in order to protect the building and its sensitive features, the specific mitigation measures to be used will be detailed during the detailed construction and design planning phases?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10340. So far as the noise and vibration issue, which is another matter which has been raised, we can see there that two of the most likely noticeable effects, practical ways of managing them, identifying design and construction methods to reduce potential numbers of noise and vibration impact, the requirement for an environmental statement, mitigation measures, effects of noise and vibration depends on a number of factors and it lists them. What are the likely effects and it refers to the use of the construction code which is what is proposed and the Committee is aware of that from the various Information Papers of the significance of that?

(Mr Dean) That is right.

10341. MR ELVIN: Unless the Committee want to see any further materials, I appreciate I have shown you quite a lot. It is the tip of the iceberg, but I hope that, at least, has given the Committee a flavour of the sort of information that has been disseminated further materials can be provided and if and when necessary.

10342. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you.

10343. MR ELVIN: Can I ask you, Mr Dean, to deal with the issue of the Commission for Racial Equality?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10344. We have got a complete, or as complete as we could put together over lunch, bundle of correspondence. Would the Committee like copies of that or simply have Mr Dean summarise it?

10345. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: We would like copies, please, if you could circulate that. (Same circulated)

10346. MR ELVIN: I should have said that the consultation refer notice P 91, I imagine this will be P 92.

10347. CHAIRMAN: We will let you know in a second.

10348. MR ELVIN: I am afraid it is in reverse dated order in the way that files are often copied. The first letter is July 2004 which I think comes in just after the letter that was produced this morning which was a letter to local people rather than to CRL or the Department. Mr Dean, try to summarise this without going through it in detail. Is it fair to say the CRE raised initial concerns about engagement of the various community and ethnic groups and requested the issue of quality impact assessment, is that right?

(Mr Dean) That is true. I think it was the first time there was formal notification or correspondence with the project but there had been correspondence to the project from outside parties and we then reacted to that by formulating a strategy for undertaking quality impact assessment work.

10349. And can you summarise what then occurred?

(Mr Dean) The correspondence took place between primarily the Chairman for the Commission for Racial Equality and senior management of Cross London Rail Links and it started off by notifying the project of its general duty. There was a certain amount of confusion and I think it was largely borne out of the fact that Crossrail had two stakeholders, one of which was the SRA, and whilst they both had their own equality schemes, Crossrail itself did not technically fall under the statutory duty. The project decided in any event that it was the right thing to do and forged ahead with this piece of work. The demise, if I can call it that, of the SRA then saw TfL become a major stakeholder. Then we had the issues of assimilating the DFT statutory duty under its race equality scheme with TfL's race equality scheme and coming up with a cohesive and robust way forward. More latterly then there has been continued correspondence from the CRE where they reminded us of their expectations under the duty and have expressed themselves content with progress and welcomed the fact it is an ongoing piece of work. I think it is possibly relevant they have not chosen to comment on the race equality impact assessment nor the comprehensive race equality impact assessment nor can I recall them commenting during any of the consultation rounds but perhaps that is all overtaken by the one-to-one correspondence.

10350. Can I just get this clear, of course the CRE can serve notice if it considers that there are significant failures in terms of their area of interest, can they not?

(Mr Dean) They can serve a compliance notice.

10351. Has any such notice been served or threatened in this instance?

(Mr Dean) No mention.

10352. MR ELVIN: I do not know whether you require any further summary other than that.

10353. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: At the moment I do not think so.

10354. MR ELVIN: I thought it was better you had the complete documentation so you can see it warts and all.

10355. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I can assure you we will come back to you and if necessary call.

10356. MR ELVIN: That concludes the information I was going to present to the Committee on consultation.

10357. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Have you any questions to ask? Please come forward?

10358. MR AKKER: I do, sir. Could I just indicate that a lot of the material just stated by counsel will come as a complete surprise to many people, constituents and Petitioners, certainly the breadth of it and the detail. I would like to give an initial comment, sir, but what I would like to seek with your permission is since this goes to the heart of so many Petitions, principally Tower Hamlets London Council and Spitalfields Society and to a number of others, that I would like to seek whether we could put in a written comment to you based on what has been said not because we want to lengthen the process but it would just be a fact sheet. I say that because the leaflets and information which have been stated here many of us have not had any sight of these before. There has been a view put forward that these were available at exhibition centres, but the issue which many people have found with the exhibition centres, sir, is that the exhibition centres have been staffed by people or staff who are unaware of many of the principal features of the scheme and they have not been put forward and accessible in a way that has been suggested. What I would like to do, sir, with your permission is to ask the witness from Crossrail ‑ I will not go into great detail at this stage - a number of questions in relation to what he said. First, could I ask, since your responsibility is very large indeed, how did you go about assessing which of the principal areas of the Crossrail project that would be likely to cause maximum impact and maximum disruption?

(Mr Dean) I am not sure whether that is my area of expertise. There was an environmental impact assessment conducted and the results of that exercise identified where the likely impacts arose and what the nature and extent of those impacts was likely to be.

10359. Your job was communicating what were the principal issues to the public which would affect the project. It has been put in many Petitioners' evidence that the impact on Spitalfields was very severe, to have drilling machines going from Spitalfields in a very condensed area was clearly of major importance as far as the local community is concerned. I am asking you what level of special considerations of Spitalfields played, in your view, of how it should be communicated to the people in the area and to the public at large? I think as a general answer the response was to use all available media and extensive formats to invest heavily in the programme of consultation and to try and provide access to the project in best way we could. I mentioned earlier that we have had a special relationship with those directly affected. We have looked to introduce information exchange so there was a semi‑permanent presence in the area during the second round of consultation and over and above that we hope that we have been accessible to consultees and I do think it has to be a two‑way process rather than us trying to come out and give information to parties. There is also the ability for them to approach us via the website, the help desk, by members of the consultation team which, I think, was over a dozen strong at the time. We employed a professional company, Lime, whose expertise is in planning and staging consultation events. We widely advertised, we sent press releases to media in the area and I think very few, if any of them, choose to run stories at the time of the consultation and we were hopeful that they would; I stand corrected on that. I am not sure whether we were very successful in getting co‑operation of local media. You heard we tried the radio. I could go through the list again. Perhaps one area where we were hoping that we would be able to filter information back to the community was via the schools programme, by students taking home their work, talking about a project or attending competitions as competition winners with their parents. These sorts of things were just supplementary ways‑ they were mainstream ways‑ of us trying to engage with the community.

The consultation process itself, as I mentioned, was another avenue for the community to say: "Hang on, why don't you try A, B or C?" What we did have was some criticism of inadequacy but I cannot recall having any suggestions that we could have taken on board to improve the process.

10360. Could I go back to my question, which was there are major impacts in certain areas which Crossrail clearly was going to bring about. Perhaps I could put it like this. You did a public awareness project concerned with raising the public awareness about impact of Crossrail?

(Mr Dean) Yes.

10361. Where was it in any of the leaflets that a major issue was in relation to the area of the Spitalfields?

(Mr Dean) No, it was not. What the public awareness tried to do was to introduce the concept of Crossrail, saying: "Here is a major new railway scheme in London, these are the destinations, these are the general routes, this is how you can find out more information." To have tried to do that on a leaflet, bearing in mind the scale of the project, I think would have been counterproductive. What it was trying to do was just to alert the London and the south east community at large that the project was moving into a progressive mode and that there would be opportunities, therefore the public awareness campaign said: "Look, this is how you come and find out more", and it also presented the project's contact details.

10362. So many of the leaflets you put out were not really designed for the process of actually aiding the consultation or the process of actually informing people who were going to be affected?

(Mr Dean): I think that is right. It was not part of the consultation. We had round 1 and round two of consultation. That is why it was specifically called "public awareness".

10363. So why did you not consider putting out a special leaflet in the Spitalfields area?

(Mr Dean): We did a lot of special work for the Spitalfields area.

10364. But you did not put out a leaflet, did you? You did not actually show what learned counsel put on the pages as any information about the impact in Hanbury Street or the fact that there were going to be very large drilling machines put in there? You did not put the fact that there would be increased lorry movements or the hours of work?

(Mr Dean): I think it was the preferred way that we would hold information centres where people could explain this. It would be a lot of information and possibly rather upsetting for people to receive that through the letter box. There was not a leaflet as such but there has been a mass of information prepared, and we have looked to provide that to stakeholder groups, community groups, they were sent brochures, documents, explaining the project. You have seen the information papers so not a leaflet as such, but there would be more comprehensive documentation than that.

10365. Did you ever check that all this information was going to the people within the area? Because can I put to you an observation here ‑ that there are a very small group of people in here but I do not think there is anyone of the group in this room who has seen the large amount of information that you have said is available.

(Mr Dean): Well, in the first instance we used a professional distribution company and they do checks of their work, and then we look to try and safeguard any mishaps by using Royal Mail, and we entrusted ourselves to their good service to make sure that all of the leaflets were posted through the doors.

10366. Can I put it another way to you? You will be aware that a large number of people from the Spitalfields area have petitioned Parliament in relation to their concerns. Why has Crossrail not said: "Here are your petitions, this is the information we have already circulated about Crossrail? This is what is happening in the area?"

(Mr Dean): Sorry, I am not quite sure what the question is.

10367. The question is, if you say there is all this information available, a lot of our concerns we have put forward have been about the information that is available. Why have you not said: "Well, you are very much mistaken." You could have done an individual reply to every Petitioner saying that all this information was available?

(Mr Dean): I think we are replying here today and I am aware that there have been individual responses to petitions where it is sought to explain that position. The trouble is with perhaps issuing you with information that was produced, say, for a round one consultation is that some of it is out of date and it has been superseded, and there is a need to always use current information. Well, that was the Bill deposit which contains, I think, a huge amount of information. I guess this is where petitions arise ‑ either the information that is provided is something that causes concern, or you want further information or clarification, and that is what the negotiation team will seek to do.

10368. Thank you for that. I am reminded of a question which a lot of people would be interested to know. How do people know to go to the information centres at all? How would they know that there was relevant information to find out there?

(Mr Dean): First, in the ways I have mentioned; there was widespread blanketing advertising in newspapers, local as well as regional. There were leafleting exercises, they were staged in high profile locations. One thing I did not mention earlier was we used what we referred to as satellite teams standing, giving out flyers, leaflets, within a close vicinity of the event. There were events that tried to be local to high footfall with good access. We also sent out the leaflets to all those registered on the database. We sent out information to stakeholder groups, community groups, and we hoped that they would disseminate information as well, the local authority had all the information, we put information in libraries, in civic offices ‑ we really did make a huge effort to try and notify people. There are probably other initiatives as well that will be recounted in the report.

10369. I appreciate what you say in terms of the number of leaflets which you have sent out. What I think would be quite interesting to find out would be what steps you took to see that it was having any impact on the local community?

(Mr Dean): There was some market research conducted, and I have not got the findings with me but we obviously have constantly had area consultation managers in post. We get feedback from the local authority. I guess the main way is getting comment back through the help desk, the website, comment cards with free post facility ‑ those are the main ways that we got comment back, and sometimes people are not necessarily that interested. I am not saying that is not true of this area; it is difficult to gauge whether you have been successful in reaching a target and, as I said, perhaps we could slightly suffer from not having a comprehensive directory of local groups from the outset.

10370. Could I ask why no public meetings were held about this? Why did Crossrail not consider having a meeting where people could come along and hear at first hand what was involved?

(Mr Dean): I do not know. There were some public meetings. I am aware ‑-

10371. But none given by Crossrail?

(Mr Dean): I think there were. I remember one that Oona King called ‑‑ here it is, 18 October, House of Commons.

10372. But that was by invitation. That was not a public meeting; that was by invitation of Oona King?

(Mr Dean): My own personal view, and I am not sure whether this was the decision, is that sometimes those sessions can be counterproductive and really what you are trying to do is deal with sometimes differing circumstances within the same community, and sometimes it is better to do that ‑ either by written correspondence, which I do not think people appreciate, or by information centre if it is general information, but also then by identifying those with specific concerns and obviously dealing with those either in separate meetings or correspondence, but I participated in a number of public meetings myself over the years, and I am not always sure that either side gets what they are looking for out of them.

10373. Were you aware that there were some really big meetings that were taking place in the area concerning Crossrail? Were you aware, for example, of one meeting at the Brady Centre which attracted over 300 people, and that was reported in the East End Advertiser?

(Mr Dean): To be fair I am more involved in managing the process and analysing the comment and reporting on it. In terms of what actually is going on out on the ground I am afraid I would have to get some advice from one of my colleagues, one of the area consultation managers.

10374. That would be quite an important aspect to reflect on, would it not, because if there were public meetings, if large groups of people were getting together, it would be a really good measure of what was happening on the ground.

(Mr Dean): It depends what they are discussing.

10375. But it was really clear from all the press that there was very great concern in Spitalfields about Crossrail?

(Mr Dean): Certainly I have been aware that there has been a high level of misinformation and I am aware that there has been constant reference to Brick Lane being used as a lorry route, which I understand has never been proposed by this project, and I fear there may also have been some confusion with another major project in the area, the (?) extension, which does have impact in the same area, and perhaps there has been an issue there where there has been a degree of misunderstanding.

10376. But it could be said that, if there was any misinformation, it was in Crossrail's interest to put out the correct information?

(Mr Dean): Certainly we have endeavoured to try and address that issue.

10377. I will not be long, sir, there are two other points. Could I ask, since it was raised by me this morning and answered by learned counsel, about this exhibition in Brick Lane which offended the local Bangladesh community? It is the position that there are a large number of public meeting halls in Brick Lane area which could be used other than the Brady Centre?

(Mr Dean): Of the ones we identified it seemed that the Truman's Brewery was suitable against our criteria that we set out. We regret that has caused any level of concern or even offence. My understanding at the time, and it is called the Old Truman's Brewery, was that it had not been set up for its original function for some 15 years, but it was very popular with the local community. There are cottage industry and craft shop type facilities within the building and, on the face of it, it seemed to be a good location in terms of everyone knowing where it was, with good access, access for those with mobility difficulties, and unfortunately the Brady Centre was not available. We did correct ourselves as soon as we received the criticism, and I must admit that I was surprised myself by a short petition that was received, I think, with ten or twelve names, and the first two names on that petition were the owners of the local off‑licence, so we could not fully understand or agree with the concern on that basis. However, we took corrective action as soon as we could, and we took a lease on the Dray, which was nearby, so we could re‑direct people there and anyone who did travel would still be able to find it easily, but I would like to end by saying that we do regret having used that as a venue and shall not in the future.

10378. And I did hear you correctly saying that there was a check done on the Brady Centre ‑‑

(Mr Dean): We checked the Brady Centre and it was being refurbished, and it was not suitable for people with restricted mobility getting access, and when it was refurbished and fully accessible then we used it in the information round that we gave. If I have got that wrong then I apologise but that is my recollection.

10379. MR AKKER: I, in fact, visited the exhibition in the Truman's Brewery, and my experience was that the exhibition was staffed ‑ and I have got nothing against Australian I add ‑ by some very young Australian students who knew absolutely nothing about Crossrail?

10380. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think that is enough; you are going off the point now, Mr Akker. I have let you go on for quite a long time. You have made your points very clearly, have you any other specific points?

10381. MR AKKER: Just about the website, sir. I looked again after I said what I did this morning about the attractiveness of the website and how user friendly it is. Do you accept, Mr Dean, that there is little information relating to the concerns of Spitalfields on that website in relation to trying to address their specific concerns? There is a lot of technical data about Parliament which needs to be explained in terms of ordinary language, and it is not explained in ways which many organisations would explain a complex and difficult arena.

10382. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Mr Akker, I think we will get counsel to look at the website. I must confess I have not seen the website myself; I do not know if any of the Committee members have, so I think we will come back to that point. Mr Binley?

10383. MR BINLEY: I have two very quick questions which really concern the general attitude of consultation within the national government and local government scenario, because the whole business of consultation came upon us rather quickly and became a fashion item in this respect. I want to ask two questions about the depth of professionalism and ability that you feel the public sector has in effective consultation? I know we are throwing a lot of money at it but I want your view on how professionally we do this as a general response, first.

(Mr Dean): I am not sure whether I can speak for the whole industry and all consultation exercises. What I would say is that a number of respected commentators in the transport industry have complimented on the standard and quality of our work, and they have said, and I quote, "We have raised the bar for every other project", and the work we have done has been warmly received.

10384. Let me then be more specific, finally, and I need to declare an interest. I come from the marketing world and I have been horrified to learn that you did no market testing of the work you undertook in this respect, and that concerns me in two ways. One, you can throw a lot of money at a project and not get any effect from a project unless you market test, so I want to be absolutely sure from you that there were no elements or that you did not really consider market testing to be important or to be a sizeable part of this project, is that the case? I want to know what market testing you did, because you could be throwing your money in the wrong direction unless you actually knew how the market was reacting to your marketing thrust.

(Mr Dean): I think there was a continual exercise of market testing. We have had approaches ‑‑

10385. Let me cut this short. Then you will be able to show us the results of that market testing?

(Mr Dean): Well, the results are the number of people that we engaged in the project ‑‑

10386. No. I am talking about professional and specific market testing. You can show us those results.

(Mr Dean): There has been market research undertaken ‑‑

10387. No, market testing. You can show us those results?

(Mr Dean): What I am saying ‑

10388. I am asking the question at this moment. Can you show us the results of your market testing?

(Mr Dean): I am not sure whether "market testing" is something that I fully understand.

10389. Let me explain it to you very briefly. It is talking to the people that you are targeting to find out if your thrust is getting through to them and being understood by them. That is what market testing is about. So, it saves you a lot of money because you could get it wrong. Can I ask again: you say you did market testing. If that is the case can you show us the results of that market testing? It is a yes or no answer.

(Mr Dean): I can only give you my previous answer, that the results of the market testing are in all of the reports where people ‑-

10390. Well, I have not seen any yet.

(Mr Dean): ‑‑ have commented on the adequacy of consultation.

10391. MR BINLEY: I will leave it at that, but I have not seen any, quite frankly, and I think that is a shortcoming.

10392. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Mr Akker, we will not take written submissions but what we suggest is if you would like to come tomorrow to conclude I would be happy with that, but could you be concise, please, and I will stop you again, or Mr Meale, when he is back, will do so, and I thank you for your questions.

10393. MR AKKER: It may not be necessary, sir ‑‑

10394. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I leave that in your capable hands but I do say again, please keep it concise. We do want to hear everybody.

10395. MR ELVIN: May I just try and help Mr Binley by saying that there are two NOP surveys which we have not produced because we have not been asked for them yet, but if Mr Binley would like to see them I have not got them to hand but I will make surely copies are produced.

10396. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: That would be helpful. Thank you. Mr Deans, could you stand down, please? Thank you very much.

10397. Could I call Dr Jeff Safir?

 

The Petition of the Spitalfields Practice

 

MR JOHN AKKER appeared as Agent.

10398. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Dr Safir, can I apologise to you for the slight overrun? It was unexpected. We felt as a Committee it had to be dealt with now and I think it has been a good use of time.

10399. DR SAFIR: I have already arranged a locum for this evening, so thank you.

10400. My name is Jeff Safir. I am senior partner at the Spitalfields practice in Old Montague Street. We have 7.2 doctors, seven full‑time and one one‑day‑a‑week doctor and three full‑time nurses. We are the nearest practice to the proposed site and an awful number of patients of mine will be represented in the discussions we are dealing with today, so I welcome the opportunity to give what I consider to be a non‑biased factual report to the Committee. I hasten to say I am not a resident of Spitalfields, I have no vested interest in the properties, I am not against Crossrail in concept, I am not an expert witness on pollution, and if you want that I can call on people who are, but I will tell you that pollution in very deprived areas has a much greater effect than pollution in not so deprived areas. Also, my practice is three streets away, so directly I will not be affected by the drilling or the vibrations or whatever. So I am trying today to give a factual report on what the health and social environment of Spitalfields is.

10401. I would like the Committee to understand that Spitalfields is unique, it is not a normal inner city area. We are one of the most deprived areas in the whole of the UK and under my old GP contract there was a thing called the Jarman Index which listed deprivation on social, medical, health, housing, unemployed, et cetera, et cetera, and under the old Jarman Report which was done away with under the new contract, and I will not go into that, Spitalfields was joint top in the whole of the UK, so you are dealing with an exceptionally deprived population, top of the pops.

10402. I have been working in Spitalfields for 33 years, I was supposed to stay for six months but something went wrong and I am still here, so I really feel there is nobody better than me to present information to the Committee on what my population is like.

10403. Our practice has 12,500 patients. 75 per cent call themselves Asian, we have a sprinkling of so many other, South Asian, Somali, AfroCaribbean, and an increasing amount of people coming from the new European Union. We have an enormous amount of unemployment, an enormous amount of housing problems which I will touch on, an enormous amount of illiteracy, and I hear today learned counsel saying about all the documents that have come through and they are bilingual and everything, but we have an enormous amount of Bengali people who are illiterate in their own language.

10404. They are also, not wishing to be racist or rude in anyway, totally unaware of concepts of health, housing, of major impacts on social undertakings that would have perhaps influenced different populations. I imagine an awful lot of my population would have no idea what Crossrail is about. I will reiterate Mr Akker's concept that I think it is very poorly publicised. I do not remember seeing any leaflets coming through my door, and I think an awful lot of my population, especially the Bengali population, will not have understood concepts even if due consultation as described by Crossrail has gone ahead.

10405. I would like to touch on the health issues and the social issues by just saying that Spitalfields is a medical disaster area. I called the health authority in six months ago to point out our problems of disease entities and prevalence of diseases and they were absolutely amazed, so not even our health authority have really understood the problems we are facing, the deprivation in Spitalfields. We have an enormous birth rate which adds to overcrowding in housing. We have 3‑4 new births a week which is probably double what it should be; every single disease entity under the chronic disease register, I have brought figures which I will not bore you with, that GPs are supposed to look at are massive for Spitalfields. This is compounded by the ignorance, the non-compliance, the difficulty in understanding concepts, the difficulty with language even though we have interpreters in our surgery ‑ we are dealing with a very unique population who really are not on the same wavelength as all the people in this room, and that has to be taken into account when we are talking about impact on population. We are dealing with a very poor illiterate people who do not understand loads of concepts, who have not got computers, who have no idea about internets or whatever. I have people living in the country for 20/30 years who do not speak a word of English, and people who would have no idea who the Queen of England is or the Prime Minister. We are one mile from Tower Bridge and I often ask people: "Have you ever been to Tower Bridge?", and the answer is invariably "No", because they live in their little community a few blocks square. That is where they live, that is where they survive, and that is their life. And what is going to happen with the Hanbury Street project is it is going to have a major impact on the Spitalfields community, far more than any other community of similar population.

10406. What is going to happen with the Hanbury Street project, it is going to have a major, major, major, major impact on the Spitalfields community, far, far more than any other community of similar population. Just to give you an example of non-compliance, we see three new diabetics a week in our practice alone. Already our total population is seven per cent and countrywide it is three per cent. We tried converting people to insulin when all else has failed. We have a highly trained nurse-practitioner, with interpreters, who spends ages and ages and ages showing the people how to inject themselves with insulin. So it is not a language problem. We have shown them how to prick their finger to test their blood and tell them how to adjust the insulin doses according to the blood test results. Invariably - maybe that is a bit too strong - in the majority of cases when they are called back a week later they have been injecting themselves with the starting dose of insulin, they have not been taking the blood testing meter out, and when asked why they have not bothered testing their blood there is just a shrug of the shoulder. There is no concept of health wellbeing in the area. As I say, every disease entity - asthma, chronic obstructive airways, which is the in-word for basically chronic lung disease, we have enormous amounts. We have the worst of the worst. I was at a recent meeting and unfortunately they did charts of hospital admissions and the cost to the health authority, and unfortunately on the top of the list, my name, Dr Safir, "top of the pops", most admissions, most expense, most everything for hospital admissions due to lung disease. There is this thing called FEB1, which basically is a disease which is the amount of air you can get out in the first second, and according to the lung specialists this is the biggest indicator of premature death - far more than cholesterol or blood pressure and all the other things that we read about in the papers all the time.

10407. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think we have what you are saying. Can I ask you what you would like from us? I accept that you have an enormously difficult job as a doctor.

10408. DR SAFIR: What I would like you to do, in a nutshell, is accept the fact that our population is going to be far more affected by the Crossrail project in Hanbury Street than any other population that I know of because of all the problems I have said, because of the non-compliance, because of the housing problems. I would very briefly like to say that it is not uncommon to have four families living in a four bedroom flat - 20, 30 people, including children. So although you have already a very close-knit community with fairly close housing together the devastating effect on the Hanbury Street project will affect far more residents than I think people understand.

10409. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Doctor, I think you have put forward a very eloquent case. Is there anything else that you would like to add?

10410. DR SAFIR: I would say, number one, that it is a very highly sensitive area at the moment with the Muslim population, and I think we need to retain race relations. I am not aware of any detailed assessment of health issues that have already gone through that Crossrail have asked for. I am sure there is going to be a big impact on the health of my population. I feel that there is a different route that can be taken that does not involve Hanbury Street. I am not political, I do not know the ins and outs, but there is a different route that could be used that would totally avoid the Hanbury Street population.

10411. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: So you would prefer to see one of the other routes?

10412. DR SAFIR: I would much prefer to see the route not going through the middle of my patch, for all the reasons that I have said.

10413. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Your point is taken.

10414. DR SAFIR: I just would really like to say again that the impact on the community is not going to be the same as the impact on another similar community - I really feel that very strongly.

10415. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I think that is a very fair comment, and I do not think you can add to that.

10416. DR SAFIR: I will not add to that.

10417. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: This Committee has taken on board your concerns as the local GP for this area. Thank you very much indeed.

10418. MR MOULD: Sir, all I want to say in response to Dr Safir's presentation is this. The need to consider carefully the impact of the project both during the construction phase and during its operation upon the health of people and communities through whom the railway will pass, both directly and indirectly, is something that the project has very much in mind. We have carried out a Health Impact Assessment and that has been the subject of public consultation. It is available, as I understand it, on the website and it is also available on application in paper copy. We have also had carried out and are in the process of continuing with an Equality Impact Assessment, and I emphasise that in particular because the particular concerns that Dr Safir has identified are in what are known in the jargon as the differential impacts of the scheme on particular communities, particularly those who suffer from social and economic deprivation. We are engaged in that process and that is focused specifically upon the kind of issues in terms of the potential for markedly greater impact upon areas of social and economic deprivation, whether it be in relation to matters of health, environmental impact and so on, and we are focused specifically on that in that Equality Impact Assessment. It seems to me that Dr Safir is very well placed to provide us with detailed local knowledge and understanding in relation to that. That has been the subject of public consultation already but that public consultation round, as I understand it, is continuing, and certainly it would be the subject of further consideration through consultation as the detailed design of the project emerges. I would urge Dr Safir to engage himself and to use the benefit of his local knowledge and expertise in contributing to that process - we welcome him doing so, frankly. And the gentleman who was giving evidence to the Committee a few moments ago is an obvious point of contact for him if he wishes to take advantage of that offer. That Equality Impact Assessment has specifically focused, amongst other areas, upon the area of Tower Hamlets and upon the area around Hanbury Street in particular, as indeed has the Health Impact Assessment, and I can say that to you because I was involved in the preparation of that document and I know how much focus and attention we attached to impacts on Tower Hamlets and Hanbury Street, precisely because of the particular problems of social deprivation that he mentioned. So I can assure this Committee that from this end those concerns are not by any means new to us. So I think those are the points I wanted to raise. I am not going to say anything about routes because you have heard about that.

10419. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you very much.

10420. DR SAFIR: Could I just say, sir, that I have not been advised at all about any previous ---

10421. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Just one second, I am going to come on to that. I would ask two things. First of all, a copy of the Health Statement for this Committee and for the doctor.

10422. MR MOULD: Yes.

10423. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: And I would also like to think that perhaps there will be contact made from the Promoter to the doctor's practice, to actually discuss this at greater length. I think there are issues here that need to be looked at and I would like to think that the effort would be made to do so.

10424. MR MOULD: I can see no good reason why we should not.

10425. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I will take that as read and there will be contact made.

10426. MR MOULD: Yes. We will make sure that the HIA is ingested into it.

10427. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you. Dr Safir, are you happy with that?

10428. DR SAFIR: I am, sir. All I would say is that the Health Authority has no idea what is going on either.

10429. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I do not say that we can rectify that one, but thank you for coming along. Could I now call Miss Eleanor Ferguson?

The Petition of Eleanor and Alistair Ferguson.

 

The Petition of Gerald Collins and Mona Hatoum.

 

The Petition of Caroline Hamilton.

 

The Petitioners appeared in person

 

BIRCHAM DYSON BELL appeared as Agent.

 

10430. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: You are Miss Eleanor Ferguson?

10431. MISS FERGUSON: Yes.

10432. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I would just like to say that I will be calling the Committee to order at half past four and we will then, if you have not finished, bring you back tomorrow morning, not tonight, although there is a session but it is a separate session. So would you like to at least start?

10433. MISS FERGUSON: Yes. I am Eleanor Ferguson and I am one of the owners of the properties of flats at number 61 Princelet Street. I have a second floor flat and Caroline Hamilton, behind me, and Gerry Collins, are the owners of the other flats at number 61, and we are immediately adjacent to Britannia House, which has been the subject of a lot of discussion with others. What I would like to do - and I think with the best will in the world I am not going to do it between now and half past four - is to give an overview on behalf of the three of us, because I am conscious that what you do not want to listen to is the three of saying the same thing one after the other. So my proposal is, if that is acceptable to you, for me on behalf of the three of us to give an overview of the concerns that are common to all three of us and then I am sure that Gerry or Caroline will pick up on anything that I have omitted. But then maybe just very shortly, just in a couple of minutes if each of us perhaps could address you on our specific individual concerns in relation to the whole aspect of the project.

10434. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: You start and let us see how we get on.

10435. MISS FERGUSON: Fine. The other thing which I am not going to do - and I am sure you will be glad to hear it - I do not intend to go through each and every portion of our Petitions; you have them, they do reflect our views and the points that we have raised. I would just like to make it clear that we do not accept Crossrail's responses, even if it is not something that we specifically address either this afternoon or tomorrow, because what we would like to concentrate on is simply our personal aspects of the impact on us and what we would like you to do about it.

10436. Going straight to that, Crossrail have said that obviously they are not intending to tunnel from the Hanbury Street site and they are going to go for the end to end tunnelling, no need to demolish Britannia House and no need to construct adits, et cetera, and this was communicated to us in a letter of 22 May, and I think it is reflected in the answers to our Petition. That letter - and I think the general responses that come in for the Petition - gives a view of, "Well, this is a much smaller project. What is all the fuss about?" From our perspective at number 61 Princelet Street we are not fooled and we would like to stress that this is a major construction project. It is two years of construction work on our doorstep, just behind our windows, with all the dust, the excavation, the vibration and the noise, and it will have a major impact not only on our properties as such but on our lives as well, and I think that is very important. I think yesterday when you had the Spitalfields Society talking to you they had a number of pictures, and I think they were looking at them from the comparative aspect of Hanbury Street versus the Woodseer Street site, and in order to set the tone so that you have this in your mind as a Committee, when I am talking about what is personal to us and what is happening at the site and how we see it impacting on us, just to look very briefly at a couple of these photographs, and that was number 24. If you look on that picture there, what you see is going straight into the site at Hanbury Street, the three windows you see dead straight ahead in front you. The middle one is a flat I own, the one on the top is a flat owned by Gerald Collins and the one below is a flat owned by Caroline Hamilton. The building to the right, as we are looking at it, is Britannia House and the blue lorry poking out is the loading bays in the Britannia House section and that is their car park. The bit at the front, I believe, is the part that is going to be demolished. This is where the work is going to be taking place and if I can go on to the next one, number 25; this is a slightly more close-up version. I think what you can see quite clearly is that the distance between where these windows are and the site of the car park where it is quite clear Crossrail are going to be doing the work. This is where the actual digging et cetera is going to take place, where the cranes are going to be and where the lorries are going to be coming to and fro. It is there right underneath our windows. It is as close as that. There is no distance between ourselves. It is minimal distance between ourselves and that back white wall that you see there. It is essentially having us as close as it is possible to be without being on top of the drilling site.

10437. The next picture which we have, number 26, is simply to show this is the building next door, what we have is Britannia House, as you saw in the first picture, us joining on and then we have this building going towards the end of the pub at the corner, which you cannot see because the ledge is here. I think you can also see from the height, as you are looking over, this is Princelet Street. This is the back of the houses; the front is in Princelet Street. You cannot see the houses on the other side. The elevation of these properties there is, in fact, about a story or so higher than the properties on the other side. That is a kind of shielding effect that comes from the additional elevation that comes from ourselves and from Britannia House to which we are joined on. There is a lot of talk about Britannia House as if it was almost a separate, freestanding entity; it is not. It is joined on to us and joined on to this which is 63 and on to 65.

10438. The next picture which you have there, number 27, was taken from Caroline's window which gives a very clear perspective of just how close this is. You are at the level where you can see exactly what is there, the bits are going to be demolished and where, as far as I am concerned, all the work is going to be done. It is a tiny site so the work is going to be there, as you see it, for want of a better word bang smack in front of these windows. We have heard I think when I put in my Petition - and this was literally at the time when we were talking about the drilling being done from this side - that the sort of construction we were talking about was about equivalent to the size of one of the towers at Tower Bridge. Crossrail have come back in their responses and it is section G 3, paragraph 6.1. They say it is 50 per cent of the size of Tower Bridge. In anybody's view that is a massive structure in such a tiny area such as this. It is kind of hard to imagine half the length of Tower Bridge sitting in there.

10439. I think some of you may have been on a site visit when everybody was walking around. At that stage because no information had come to me as to the actual dimensions of what was going to be above and below ground, I asked the question at that stage, "Where is this going to be and how big is it going to be?" I was told at that stage that what would be above ground would be about 11 metres in diameter and 11 metres high. Perhaps that does not sound much. 11 metres is the equivalent of a four‑story house and it is large, huge, and it is right outside that window. It is not only a question of having that above-ground structure, the work that is supporting this project, I believe, and I may be a metre or two out in my figures here, goes down below the ground to something like 30 metres. In effect, what we are talking about is a ten-story house down below and a four‑story house up above. What I think I am trying to get here a good image in everybody's mind of exactly what that means to us on that particular site. None of the three of us are engineers. I cannot say to you with any technical evidence or any proof whether this is a better site than Woodseer Street. I cannot say for technical or engineering reasons it should be aligned in some other place. What we can say and do say is if you do not need to build the shaft here, if it can be avoided, then that is exactly what should be happening.

10440. MS FERGUSON: For us, personally, but also for all the other reasons that you have heard from the Spitalfields Society and the likes of the doctor that you have just been listening to, we would also say Crossrail should be looking properly at the impact of all the options not just picking one to suit the plan that they have. I think you heard a lot from the Tower Hamlets Borough Council about this and the relative merits and the relative assessments. I think you also heard from the Spitalfields Society about looking into the southern option. The three of us would certainly say it would be our view if you do not need these shafts, do not put them there; if this is an alternative, look for it. You as a Committee have heard from people on behalf of the council, Dr Bower, Dr Whalley, Dr Turner, the experts. It is possible. It is not impossible to do it and what we feel is that if there is a way and a will, then it can be done.

10441. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Can I just stop you just there. One of the things you are obviously concerned about is rehousing or housing?

10442. MS FERGUSON: Yes.

10443. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Just to cut you to quick, are you looking for rehousing compensation to stay where you are or temporary?

10444. MS FERGUSON: We are looking for rehousing.

10445. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: What you are looking for is permanent rehousing. I let you nod at that stage, yes. I am quite happy to put this to counsel now, if you like, because I can understand exactly what you want. I think this Committee understands, yes, we are happy to ask counsel now.

10446. MS FERGUSON: Crossrail, what they propose to do? I am happy to ask Crossrail what their proposals are. I would love to hear. I have been waiting for three years.

10447. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: If we get to the stage where we know what the three of you want and this is cannot go anywhere else, I am quite happy to ask counsel now to reply to that. Would that be acceptable?

10448. MS FERGUSON: I am acceptable to do anything that gets me to my end result, which is to be brought out.

10449. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I should ask, Mr Mould, if you can reply to the specific point which the Petitioners would like their answer.

10450. MR MOULD: The answer is that we are not prepared to offer permanent rehousing. What we are prepared to say, what we do say, to you in the light of what you heard from Mr Thornley-Taylor yesterday is that we accept the impact of the work site on Hanbury Street under current proposals, particularly in relation to noise impact, will certainly justify the provision of noise insulation and will justify temporary rehousing for the duration of the most significant period of the work. That was made clear by Mr Thornley-Taylor yesterday. It has been our position in written responses to the Petitioners. I am not instructed to make a commitment for permanent rehousing. That is the position. We have told you what the nature of the noise insulation provisions that we offer under our mitigation policy are, which is set out in information paper D9, you have heard evidence about that. We have explained to you how the housing policy operates. I cannot tell you precisely what the duration of the housing offer would be in relation to these resident, but I can tell you that we accept rehousing would be acceptable for a period of time in this case.

10451. MR BINLEY: Might I cut to the quick because I am sure you believe, as I do, that we would do on to others as we would have done to ourselves. I quite frankly would be very unhappy if this were happening to me, and that is the judgment I bring to this. I am sure, Mr Mould, in your heart of hearts you would be very unhappy too. On that basis, are you prepared to go away and talk to Mr Berryman and the proposers and say to them "we need to have a bit of human compassion to be applied here, that this looks to me to be a special case for these three people" and maybe you can come back to us with a slightly different proposal?

10452. MRS JAMES: My concerns are that this is practically on top of the plan here. It appears to me unacceptable. I certainly would not be happy if it was happening next to me and I certainly would be expecting you to go away and look at this. I echo everything that my colleague has said because what level of noise insulation would be sufficient to guarantee?

10453. MR MOULD: Of course, the Committee has put a particular proposal to me. It is a proposal I think probably for the Secretary of State rather than Mr Berryman, but I will certainly take instructions on that. I will report back to you with what those instruction are. I should make it clear, perhaps in referring to noise insulation at all, I deflect attention to the real question. As I say, we accept the certainty of noise insulation and temporary rehousing to provide mitigation to take the residents away from the work site for the most severe duration of the works. Now the difference, therefore, between accommodating them in that way, paying, of course, all the costs of temporary rehousing and then allowing them to return to the property when the worst is over or we buy their property straight out. The Secretary of State will then be able to deal with it as he sees it fit. That is the choice. It is between temporary rehousing and them being able to return to their homes at a later stage or them having financial compensation for their homes straight off.

10454. MR BINLEY: Mr Mould, if you are as happy about what you can do, as you say you are, then purchasing and having property to resell thereafter is not a problem, is it?

10455. MR MOULD: Sir, I have told you I will take the Committee's concerns away and take instructions, but I thought it right to clarify where the difference between us lies.

10456. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I will, therefore, ask on behalf of Ms Ferguson, Mr Collins and Ms Hamilton you do that because this Committee is concerned looking at the photographs, we can see exactly where this is, and I think précis to what Ms Ferguson has got to say, I know that is what she would want. We accept the realignment; the ideal solution for these Petitioners, the reality is it cannot be changed, they will be living on top of a shaft.

10457. MR MOULD: The message is loud is and clear.

10458. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Therefore, to come back to the Committee as soon as possible after deliberations.

10459. MS FERGUSON: Can I ask the mechanics of it. Mr Mould has grossly oversimplified the position. He talks blithely of moving us out. If admitted, we would be subject to noise insulation or temporary relocation for 9 to 12 months but they will not commit themselves that that would be a continuous programme. What it looks from their timeline schedule is they seem to have in mind shuffling us out for three months and moving us back in for a couple of weeks. That is not certainly the way that we would come; they have not given us any alternative. What I would like to say is if they are prepared to make proposals clearly with indications from yourselves on that, how does that work from my point of view and, practically speaking, will I be notified?

10460. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Let us see when they come back. We can get you back, we know where you are. Let us find out what the Promoters come back with. Would that be acceptable for the time being?

10461. MS FERGUSON: I am happy to come back at any time.

10462. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: I thank you for that and, Mr Mould, there is anything you wish to say?

10463. MR MOULD: No, sir, I am very clear on what the Committee would like us to do and we will take that and follow that up.

10464. MR LIDDELL-GRAINGER: Thank you very much. Therefore, I will end the session to say on the record that we will be back in touch with all three of you as Petitioners. Thank you for giving your evidence, I am sorry we cut you to the quick. This Committee will now meet at six o' clock in public not as published on the audit paper in the House as said privately. We will be in public session at six o' clock.

 

The Committee adjourned until 6pm

 

Mr Alan Meale resumed the Chair

 

Ordered: that Counsel and Parties be called in.

The Petition of George Galloway MP.

The Petitioner appeared in Person.

10465. CHAIRMAN: The Committee will continue hearing the petition this evening of George Galloway, MP. Some of the issues regarding Hanbury Street and Whitechapel have already been raised by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets last week and, of course, by the petitioners who appeared yesterday and today to this Committee. Just to remind those present, the Committee will take all of these cases into account and consider them in their entirety at the end. Can I remind those present the Committee does not really wish to hear the same argument being put time and time again, we do not think it would best help their case. We also encourage counsel not to do the same thing either. Before I call Mr Galloway, would Counsel for the Promoters like to set in context the petition itself?

10466. MR ELVIN: Sir, the petition by Mr Galloway raises in very similar form to the other Spitalfields' Petitioners, follows a very similar format, issues which I described to the Committee yesterday, Day 39. I do not propose to go over those matters again. We have called evidence in the context of the main issues which have been raised, they are recorded in the transcript for Day 38, which is the hearing of the petition of Tower Hamlets, and in the petitions heard yesterday to which we have added evidence this afternoon from Mr Simon Dean on the consultation process which took place. The context of the petitions for Spitalfields, including Mr Galloway's, is to raise a series of issues: consultation, involvement of the local community, issues of impact from construction, impact on the local area and from the use of the lorries, and certain other issues, Whitechapel Station and the like. As I say, I have already described them and, following the Committee's guidance that we should not repeat ourselves, I simply refer the Committee back to the transcripts for the last few days.

10467. CHAIRMAN: If you are referring to transcripts if you could quote them and get them on the record, I think that is fair.

10468. MR ELVIN: In which case, sir, I refer you to my opening in the transcript yesterday, paragraphs 9629-9642, and remind the Committee that it was agreed yesterday that I would provide a comprehensive closing tomorrow afternoon. Thank you, sir.

10469. CHAIRMAN: George Galloway. George, do you want to stand up, sit down, or whatever?

10470. MR GALLOWAY: I will sit down if that is all right.

10471. CHAIRMAN: Can I just say at the outset that you are looking even more distinguished than usual this evening with this new look! We are all very appreciative that you are trying so hard for us.

10472. MR GALLOWAY: I am not as elegantly dressed as my adversaries. I do hope, notwithstanding your strictures in your opening remarks, that you will give some latitude on account of the fact that I am the elected Member of Parliament for the constituency and that I was elected on an explicitly anti-Crossrail platform, if you will forgive that pun.

10473. CHAIRMAN: I think it is fair to say that was one of the issues that you were facing at the election; there were a number of others also. Believe me, Mr Galloway, we will give you necessary leeway in this Committee to present your case, but where you may breach any of that you will be treated exactly the same as everybody else. You are more than competent to deal with these matters.

10474. MR GALLOWAY: I will do my very best not to breach your strictures. As we have been friends for 30 years ----

10475. CHAIRMAN: And still are in spite of everything!

10476. MR GALLOWAY: ---- it would be hardly in my interests to irritate you or the Members of the Committee. I do want to say that I do have a mandate on the Crossrail issue, which was a major plank of my election campaign. As Dr Johnson said, the knowledge that one is to be hanged in the morning concentrates the mind wonderfully. There is no doubt that new Labour in Tower Hamlets felt that it was to be hanged last month at the local elections if it did not execute a very considerable u-turn and put a bit more locomotive power into its notional opposition to the impact of Crossrail on the community that I represent. Not being a churlish man, I obviously acknowledge the fact that there are significant changes that have been won as a result of the widespread community campaign, led by Khoodelar, from whom I am sure you have heard, or will be hearing, whose leaders are behind me, encompassing a very wide section of political and civic opinion in the Borough of Tower Hamlets.

10477. I believe, and you know this from my speech in the House on 19 July last year, that Crossrail will prove to be the most expensive white elephant in British history, knocking the Scottish Parliament and the Millennium Dome into a cocked hat. It will cost more than £20 billion, I believe mostly from the taxpayer, for a short commuter line working five days a week to service rich people who live and work in Canary Wharf and want to travel to Heathrow Airport. You and I both know there are many other things that could be done with £20,000 million, not the least of which would be doing something about the shocking state of public housing in the Borough of Tower Hamlets, no doubt in Mansfield too. I know that is not this Committee's business but it does inform everything that I have to say.

10478. The changes that have been made have not mitigated my and the Respect Coalition's position that we do not want Crossrail at all. We think that it is a grotesque waste of public money.

10479. CHAIRMAN: Mr Galloway, can I stop you for a moment to give you some guidance really. We have given you the leeway to state the case on that but you have to pay due regard to what our position and responsibilities are as Members of this Committee. We are restricted. The House has found that Crossrail is a good idea, it is a good Bill, and we should see it through and come back with a report to the House to decide what the ins and outs and ends of it should be. We do not really have the power to stop it.

10480. MR GALLOWAY: No, I understand that. I was just about to move on to the next station of my argument. I am grateful for your not stopping me before I got to this station. The context I am trying to set is that some of the very poorest people in England live in Tower Hamlets and live in the epicentre of this development so far as it affects our borough. I am glad that you went on the site visit that you did because you will have in your mind's eye collectively the area that we are talking about. It is a part of London but quite unique. There are very few capital cities in the world where so many poor people live in such poor housing so close to the centre of the capital city, so close to the power and wealth in this society. This is not the place to argue about how that might be remedied, but it has led to a situation for very, very poor people, a large number of them immigrants and the children and grandchildren of immigrants, a significant number of them for whom English is not their first language and for whom parliamentary proceedings and consultations on major public works are not the Lingua Franca of their everyday lives in the way that they would be in, say, Kensington & Chelsea. I think that has informed the way this procedure has been followed up to now.

10481. One of the things I will be arguing here, if you will permit me, is that the consultation on all sorts of matters, environmental and other matters, has been woefully insufficient, and insofar as the Race Relations Act inform some of what I have got to say, it is unlawful. There have not been the efforts made that should have been made, that are required to be made, in compliance with the Race Relations Act to properly inform and consult, and seek agreement if possible, with the ethnic minority communities who live in very large numbers right at the centre of this development so far as it affects our borough.

10482. CHAIRMAN: George, are you going to elaborate on that?

10483. MR GALLOWAY: Yes. I wanted to say that in your site visit you will have seen just how narrow and clogged are the arteries around Brick Lane, Hanbury Street, Woodseer Street and Durward Street. These are very dense concentrations of people, overwhelmingly poor people, amongst the densest concentrations anywhere in the country. There are very narrow streets, narrow and well-used pavements. In the heart of this warren of narrow streets the Promoters intend to visit what I described in the House as a Ground Zero for seven years utterly devastating the lives and the livelihoods of very large numbers of people in my constituency. I am glad that under popular pressure (although we were told it was impossible when we first advanced it) the tunnel is now to be dug from both ends. We were told it was impossible but it turned out to be possible because of popular pressure. That has mitigated some of the impact.

10484. It is my argument that the Tower Hamlets Borough Council in their evidence to you has fantastically oversold the mitigation, that the building of the shafts that are still proposed in Hanbury Street will still cause massive disruption and danger to the lives and to the health of my constituents, and should not be permitted. This response that I have from the learned gentlemen on my left, and that you have, is full of the usual soft soap about assurances and the rest. I have sat on committees like yours; I sat on the longest running railway Bill since Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the King's Cross Railway Bill. There were many such assurances given but assurances, as you know with your long parliamentary experience, are worth little unless they are copper-fastened and I have not seen in the documents presented to me and to you anything like copper-bottomed guarantees on the disruption, the noise, the pollution and dangers that will be caused by the digging of these shafts in Hanbury Street or Woodseer Street. For the record, let me say I see no difference materially between these two options. The number of people whose houses will have to be knocked down, the number of lorry journeys, the amount of pollution, the amount of noise, will not be significantly different if the shaft is built in one or the other.

10485. I simply do not accept that the assurances on the table to date in any sense solve this problem which I have and which my constituents have. I have to tell you that locally it is regarded as inconceivable that streets as narrow and as congested as Hanbury Street, Durward Street, Vallance Road, could conceivably handle the amount of traffic that is being talked about here. That is just the amount of traffic. The character of the traffic, multi-wheeled vehicles, massive juggernauts every five minutes, every ten minutes, who knows, thundering through these very narrow arteries, past schools, past libraries in heavily densely populated areas is regarded as inconceivable. People laugh at the idea. How could you possibly run these trucks in addition to the traffic which is already causing so many problems of congestion in that area? I tell you, Chairman, it will blight the lives of some of the poorest people in England, and for what? For the purposes of a five day commuter line for wealthy people and very little of the claimed benefits of this scheme will ever trickle down to the residents of the streets that will be blighted. I will come on to that point in more detail later in my presentation to you.

10486. You saw the schools and you saw the schoolchildren, and I am glad that you did. You saw how many there are. You saw how precarious the journey to and from school is already. I ask this Committee to give due weight to the plea I am making not to endanger the physical safety of these children, of this population, from this level of traffic. Seven years is a long time, Chairman. If a week is a long time in politics, seven years of constant workings on this scale is a very, very long time. And it is in the context, I hope you will permit me to say, of other massive developments taking place cheek by jowl and simultaneously. The Royal London Hospital, a vast project, will be proceeding more or less at the same time. The East London Line, now I see to be a wholly privatised piece of work, will be proceeding more or less at the same time. It will be hell on earth. It will be no bliss to be alive for those seven years in these narrow streets where some of the poorest people in England live in some of the most overcrowded houses and some of the worst houses in England. I hope that this Committee will not visit upon my constituents that which I think they would be reluctant to visit on other communities that perhaps historically have a longer track record of defending their interests. I argued in July last year that one of the reasons why this scheme was going to affect my constituency so very severely was that the community there was regarded as a pushover, unable to stand up for itself, unable to articulate its case, and ruled by a political class which has sold itself to this project for a mess of potage called the Whitechapel Station, about which more later.

10487. I am doing my best now to try and salvage something for them in this process. Please do not imagine, whatever you have been told by Tower Hamlets Council, that the beating hearts in this area have been stilled by the concessions that have been made; they have not. Once the work starts, if it starts on this basis, it will have a very severe impact indeed.

10488. I said that my constituents thus affected are amongst the poorest people in England, in some of the worst houses in England, some of the most overcrowded houses in England. They also already suffer amongst the poorest health in England. We have a situation where the people in that area, literally in the shadow of the City of London, the wealthiest square mile in Europe, and metaphorically in the shadow of the gleaming spires of capitalism in Canary Wharf, live six years less than the people in Kensington & Chelsea, six years less. The incidence of asthma, diabetes, heart problems, in my constituency are way above the national average now. It is already amongst the most polluted boroughs in England and that is before these seven years begin. Once the dust is flying, the mud is splattering, the trucks are rolling, the juggernaut is in full flight, the impact on the health of my constituents will be, I predict - I am no physician but I do not have to be Einstein to work this out - hazardously affected. Not just the physical safety of walking in the streets going to school, going to the shops, going to the library, but the longer term impacts of the pollution that will be visited upon them by this project if it goes ahead in this form will be very grave and very serious indeed.

10489. In the responses there is reference to the three monitoring points which will monitor the pollution levels thus created. This is completely insufficient. One of these three is on the tip of the Isle of Dogs measuring the air pollution in the middle of the Thames! I am asking you for this: we need a special zone for the observation of pollution generated by this project in the heart of this project. That is the very least you can do for me and, more importantly, do for them to ensure that this pollution is monitored where it is happening in a serious, scientific and systematic way, and if, as I predict, pollution levels exponentially rise that proper mechanisms are in force to ensure the work is halted until that problem can be resolved.

10490. I want to turn if I can to the issue of hours of work, Chairman. I saw a quote - let me paraphrase it, from Mr Keith Berryman. He referred to the site during your proceedings as "not a 24 hour site, generally speaking". What does that mean? A 23 hour day, generally speaking? A 15 hour day? What does that mean, "not a 24 hour site, generally speaking"? How much of it is going to be a 24 hour site? How is it conceivable that in such a built-up area you could even contemplate anything remotely approach a 24 hour site, generally speaking? I am asking you to ensure that this work stops at six o'clock at night so that some kind of life can be lived for seven years by the people living in this area. A 24 hour site or a site that stretches beyond six o'clock is unacceptable to the people in the area and I hope that you will take that on board.

10491. I note in passing that no agreement has been reached on the amount of local labour. This adds insult to injury. Not only, as I am coming on to argue, will this railway line take jobs from Tower Hamlets but the actual building of it, the digging of it, will not even involve local labour, so it will be imposed upon the local people. There will be no benefits for the local people, there will be disbenefits for the local people, and they will not even get seven years of work out of it. I am asking you to turn your attention to that question of local labour which is not resolved and all we have is an assurance that it will be discussed. You are a trade union man, Chairman, I hope you will hear the import of what I am saying on that matter.

10492. The mess of potage that I referred to earlier called the Whitechapel Station has been one of the great red herrings that has been dragged across this whole affair. We do not need a Whitechapel Station. If it had not been for the previous Tower Hamlets Council's fixation with a Whitechapel Station, not for transport reasons but for "regeneration" reasons, a concept I will also come back to, there would not necessarily have been this Whitechapel alignment in the first place. We do not need the Whitechapel Station, we have got a perfectly good station. In any case, London Underground were going to renovate that station in 2009 so, in fact, the chimera of the Whitechapel Station will delay by many years the renovation of the Whitechapel Station. On the Whitechapel Station, which the Tower Hamlets Council say is needed for regeneration purposes, I now see a reference in their newspaper - they call it East End Life, we call it East End Lies, the sort of weekly Pravda paid for by the taxpayer and published by Tower Hamlets Council - that they want it to be a piazza-style, plaza-style, entrance to the station. I do not know about you, Chairman, but I start counting my spoons when I hear words like "piazza, plaza developments" for regeneration purposes. I think Blade Runner, I think Canary Wharf, if you like. I certainly think the death of the community as exists in that part of Whitechapel at the moment.

10493. One of the reasons why so many people want to come and live in the warehouses, want to come and live in the lofts, want to come and live in the trendy bijous flats in and around Brick Lane is precisely because of the character of the area, precisely because of the multiracial, multicultural nature of the area, one of the most important jewels in the crown of which is the Whitechapel Market. If you ask me to choose between the Whitechapel Market and a piazza-style regeneration development, I know what I and the vast majority of people would choose. Whitechapel without its market would be no Whitechapel at all.

10494. When the Promoters, in league with the Council, talk of regeneration, I think Spitalfields. Spitalfields was another jewel in the crown of the East End. It was regenerated with a piazza-style development. They call it regeneration, I call it death. Anyone who has been to the redeveloped, regenerated Spitalfields knows that we have exchanged a real community with real life's blood coursing through it for a windswept, concreted square with a few homogenous, globalised multinational stores and restaurants for very rich people like you and me, Chairman. None of the local people could buy the hors d'oeuvres in the restaurants in the regeneration Spitalfields, and I refuse to do so on principle.

10495. CHAIRMAN: Can I say that I am not very rich.

10496. MR GALLOWAY: It depends whether it has been a good day at the bookmaker or not, unless your habits have changed.

10497. CHAIRMAN: It is very nice of you to comment on that but I think you are wrong.

10498. MR GALLOWAY: I meant it not in any pejorative sense, Chairman, you were a very good pundit on matters of turf in years gone by.

10499. CHAIRMAN: I think it is called the economics of the racing industry.

10500. MR GALLOWAY: I know, of course, you did not gamble, it was merely a sporting interest. My point is, we will get a new station in Whitechapel without Crossrail faster than we will get one under Crossrail and we do not need the kind of new station at Whitechapel that they are proposing to give in exchange for the devastation that is going to be caused to the local people, and by the way most of whom do not use Whitechapel Station anyway.

10501. This brings me on to my next point. It is the case already in Tower Hamlets that the vast majority of jobs are held by people who do not live in Tower Hamlets. I said in my speech last July - I repeat it, it is worth it - there are 30,000 people who work in Canary Wharf and not ten per cent of them come from Tower Hamlets. Incidentally, almost 12 months on I still do not have the demographic breakdown of that ten per cent, and I wonder why. In the City of London, where upwards of 100,000 people, the best figure I have got is that 88 Bangladeshis work in white collar jobs in the whole of the City of London. Bangladeshis, perhaps, are not very good at business, it is just by chance that they created a £4 billion a year industry out of vindaloo. They are good enough to do that but they are not good enough to get jobs in the City of London. People commute into Tower Hamlets and take these jobs and then they commute home again. This Crossrail will only make that whole conundrum worse. More people will come into the borough and take more of the jobs. The local people will have paid with seven years of their lives, which by the way given our life expectancy in that part of the borough is well over ten per cent of their lives, but they will get no benefit from it, they might even lose jobs from it, lose the market as a result of it. It is simply unconscionable and I hope that you hear what I say in that regard.

10502. I turn to the race issues. I hope that it is accepted by the learned gentlemen on my left that Crossrail singularly failed to properly consult with the ethnic minority communities in the borough. It is certainly the view even of the pliant Tower Hamlets Borough Council, who have worked hand in glove with the Promoters throughout this long period, that not enough effort was made to properly inform and educate this huge swathe of the population affected of what the impact on them would be. I do not believe on the environmental issues, on the race relations issues, on the case for the need to drive these ventilation shafts, these access shafts, in either Hanbury Street or Woodseer Street, the case has been made in my reviewing of your proceedings to date. I still have not heard a reason why there has to be a ventilation shaft there. There are no ventilation shafts in the Channel Tunnel, we would be in trouble if there were, why do we need a ventilation shaft in Hanbury Street? I still have not heard a convincing argument for that. I said I am not a physician, I am not an engineer, but I was able to understand engineering principles well enough to argue when they were saying it was impossible that this tunnel could be dug from both ends. They said it could not. Me, a factory worker, said "It must be possible" and, hey presto, it turned out to be possible. I am saying again now, with such engineering genius as I have, it must be possible to build this part of the line without a ventilation shaft in Hanbury Street at all, and I have seen no convincing argument otherwise. Unless we are talking money, Chairman. Unless it is about saving money for the multinational conglomerates that will one day build this great white elephant at public expense. That was the real reason, as you very well know, why they did not want to dig the tunnel from both ends, to save money, to make more profit, profit at the expense of the poorest people in England. I do not think you, with your great history, are likely to be easily persuaded to prioritise profit over people. I hope that you hear what I say on that.

10503. I may be trying your patience, Chairman, so I will wind my initial comments up. If I am allowed to make more after the response, I would be grateful to you.

 

Examined by THE COMMITTEE

10504. CHAIRMAN: I think what we might do is if there are any questions from Members at this point we will take those. I have one or two. You said about the Race Relations Act and being in breach of it through lack of consultation. Although you implied it was insufficient, and this was agreed by Tower Hamlets, you were not specific about how it was in breach.

10505. MR GALLOWAY: All they did was produce some leaflets in some minority languages, but they do not know whether the leaflets ever reached the minorities. They did not meet the minority community's organisations, they did not meet the people who are in my surgery every Friday, either as individuals or as members of organisations, they were never contacted. It is not enough. You cannot say it is consultation if you place leaflets in a library.

10506. CHAIRMAN: George, I am not saying that they did sufficient or insufficient, what I am saying is the reference you gave was they were in breach of the Race Relations Act and I want to know specifically.

10507. MR GALLOWAY: I believe they discriminated against the ethnic minorities in the borough in the way that they went about their consultation.

10508. CHAIRMAN: So it is just lack of consultation rather than specific breaches of the Act itself.

10509. SIR PETER SOULSBY: Might I just come in for a second because I might give you some comfort, Mr Galloway, and I am sure you would welcome that.

10510. MR GALLOWAY: Indeed.

10511. SIR PETER SOULSBY: We did raise this issue quite thoroughly this afternoon and we have asked for market testing results, because I was assured that market testing had been undertaken but I am still to be convinced that is the case and, therefore, we are awaiting the results of what is called market testing. I think that will help you and I hope you feel on that basis that we might proceed further on another occasion.

10512. MR GALLOWAY: I am grateful for that intervention.

10513. CHAIRMAN: Can I just say you said something in the course of your statement about breaches of legality. It might be that we will accept a note in respect of that at a later date. I accept that it is not readily to hand this evening.

10514. MR GALLOWAY: I will write to you, Chairman.

10515. CHAIRMAN: The second thing is in relation to your comments on the developments which are there now. You mentioned there is a massive redevelopment about to occur at the Royal London Hospital and the station which is there now is clearly inadequate. I say that because we visited it. Bearing in mind quite a lot of people who go to hospital are old and infirm, it would take quite a major engineering regeneration to make it possible for the upsurge in numbers to readily have access to that hospital. You have implied the redevelopment was planned for 2009 anyway but, bearing in mind the scale of reconstruction and redevelopment that would have to occur at that station, do you think that could be carried out without something as large as the total redevelopment of this station which is included in Crossrail? It would be a phenomenal amount of investment required at that station.

10516. MR GALLOWAY: The melancholy truth, Chairman, is there are going to be fewer people in the Royal London Hospital after the redevelopment than there are now. There are going to be fewer beds thanks to the PFI at far greater cost. There are going to be far fewer beds in the Royal London Hospital. The huge development at the Royal London Hospital is not going to mean more patients, it is going to mean fewer patients as a matter of fact.

10517. CHAIRMAN: I think that is the way hospitals and medicine is going but it does not mean fewer patients, it means fewer patients who stay in hospital.

10518. MR GALLOWAY: Fewer patients in beds.

10519. CHAIRMAN: There will be many more who are visiting the hospital.

10520. MR GALLOWAY: This is perhaps not a debate to be had here. I accept your point that the 2009 renovation which is already on the worksheet is needed, but that is all that is needed. We do not need what is now being talked about, this piazza-style development for regeneration purposes, not transport purposes - that is explicitly stated - of the Whitechapel Station. 2009 would fit nicely with any increase in traffic at the Royal London Hospital.

10521. CHAIRMAN: The perception is there. What I was trying to get to was do you think the 2009 development which has been proposed is sufficient to meet the needs of the Whitechapel area with the new development of the hospital?

10522. MR GALLOWAY: I honestly do, yes.

10523. SIR PETER SOULSBY: You said the number of people whose houses would have to be knocked down was going to be the same whichever site was chosen for the ventilation shaft. That is news to me. I wondered how many such houses you understood would have to be cleared in order to make way for the sites.

10524. MR GALLOWAY: I understand only that the numbers involved would be similar whichever street was chosen.

10525. SIR PETER SOULSBY: I understood the number would be zero in both cases.

10526. MR GALLOWAY: There will be re-housing of a significant number of people in both cases.

10527. SIR PETER SOULSBY: Perhaps counsel for the Promoters will be able to clarify that later. I understood that was to be the case, it would be the same either way and the number is zero.

10528. MR GALLOWAY: I do not think that is right.

10529. CHAIRMAN: Just two other points on that. In relation to the timescale: the timescale which you referred to of seven years in relation to Hanbury Street we questioned last week and it is just over two years. The perception of seven years is work that will commence somewhere in the borough but in the evidence which was given on Hanbury Street it is a maximum of just over two years. Was that a reference to the earlier calculations or predictions?

10530. MR GALLOWAY: My advice is that the seven years might be cut to six years and that, of course, there will be a period of the most intense, disruption, traffic, noise and pollution and that might be a figure of two to three years. Either way, that is still a hell of a lot of noise and disruption and danger.

10531. CHAIRMAN: I accept that. What we are saying is some other evidence which we have received in relation to Hanbury Street in particular. We did go there and accept an invitation by a load of residents to traverse the route which the lorries would leave from on whichever site given the options being proposed.

10532. MR GALLOWAY: And they are very glad you took them up on that.

10533. CHAIRMAN: We came back and went into the question of timescale because of the difference between seven years and one year, we did not know which the true fact there was. All I can say is we have been told that area in particular will be just over two years.

10534. The final thing is I was very interested in your request for a special observation zone for measuring pollution. Do you have anything written up on that?

10535. MR GALLOWAY: Again, I can write to you with a specific proposal.

10536. CHAIRMAN: I personally, and I know Members of the Committee, would be very grateful for your idea on that, if we could get that an early opportunity.

10537. MR GALLOWAY: Yes. The asthma problem in the borough is particularly acute, but there are other pollutants that will be flying around and well able to travel indoors and well able to travel long distances which will undoubtedly exacerbate pre-existing health problems. A special observation zone specifically for that part of the area would be a very valuable thing that you could insist upon.

10538. CHAIRMAN: I am grateful for that. I am advised that this afternoon evidence was given in respect of that particular element. I was not aware of that because I was not here this afternoon. I was not in the bookmaker's either, I was on the way back from Amsterdam.

10539. MR GALLOWAY: I am sorry if I hurt your feelings on that. I know you are not a gambling man.

10540. CHAIRMAN: I was at the Annual General Meeting of the War Graves Commission. Mr Elvin, would you like to enter the frame?

10541. MR GALLOWAY: If my learned friend - I should not say that, I do not have his qualification - would just let me read this inspiration which has reached me on the issue of the race relations question. "The Spitalfields Society was in constant touch with the CRE, Trevor Phillips", a good friend of the Government, "and the legal requirement on a project like this is for a racial impact assessment to be carried out" and that is a legal requirement, "Crossrail only carried out the racial impact assessment after the CRE pointed this out and after round two of the consultation. Further, there were no leaflets in Bengali in round one, only in Chinese and some other languages". That is the reference that I made to "unlawful".

10542. CHAIRMAN: Mr Elvin, would you like to get up a bit more quietly this time!

10543. MR ELVIN: I will try not to throw everything on the floor! I was not trying to upstage Mr Galloway and I do not think I would be effective to do that, even if I did.

10544. Can I deal with the racial equality issues. We presented, in fact, to the Committee as P92 this afternoon a complete run of the correspondence there has been between Crossrail and the Commission. As we made clear this afternoon, racial equality impact assessment has been carried out and it is now being kept under review, as there is a requirement to do so. The reason it was late was there was initially some question about whether it applied to Crossrail. It was accepted later that it did and it was carried out. We have not received any adverse comment from the Commission as to that. As Mr Simon Dean gave in evidence this afternoon, the Commission has not served any notice in respect of a failure to comply with the duties under the Act and, indeed, the position now is that additional matters have been put forward.

10545. If I might just draw the Committee's attention to document P91, which is the document on consultation in Spitalfields. Following consultations with Tower Hamlets, and I appreciate that may not satisfy the Petitioner, Tower Hamlets asked for, and there has been appointed, a community cohesion adviser to improve community relations. The consultation does not end with the lodging of the Bill, it continues, and even past Royal Assent it continues because there is then detailed design and all the other matters that have to be resolved where discretion is left and where there is consultation required with the local authority and the like, for example under Schedule 7 of the Bill.

10546. CHAIRMAN: Would that include full coverage in all languages?

10547. MR ELVIN: I will come back to that in a moment. It has also been agreed that there will be future collaboration directly with the borough for community relations purposes, and that has been agreed and has satisfied the borough.

10548. In terms of language versions, in fact Bengali information was provided in 2004. Indeed, I showed the Committee this afternoon the English leaflet and the Bengali leaflet. I also showed the Committee some of the display panels for the information rounds, both the equivalent English and Bengali versions. They were made available and, indeed, Bengali speaking interpreters were made available at the information locations. That has all been given in evidence this afternoon. I am summarising the position but the Committee will have it in the transcript from earlier this afternoon.

10549. I am reminded by Mr Mould to say that of course there is a broader equality impact assessment which is ongoing. That involves, as a consultee, the CRE as well. As far as the allegations of breach of the Race Relations Act are concerned, there is no evidence that has been breached and we would say in the material we put before the Commission, and before the Committee this afternoon, that we have complied, so far as we have been requested to do so, with the requirements of the Act. Therefore, I do reject Mr Galloway's suggestions that there is a breach of the law. No doubt if he puts in a note which raises further matters we will respond to that in due course.

10550. Can I deal with certain other matters. Much of Mr Galloway's objection is to the principle of the Bill, and, sir, you have already reminded Mr Galloway of the remit of the Committee. Mr Galloway made his passionate views very clear to the House at the second reading debate on 19 July, columns 1154-1158 of the Commons' Hansard for that day. They were rejected by the House. The House took a different view. The democratic views of the locality are not represented solely through Mr Galloway. The Borough of Tower Hamlets, and I appreciate he has strong views about their position and I cannot say anything about that, he is obviously entitled to the views he holds, the democratic representation through the Council takes a different view of the importance of Crossrail, of its benefits to the area, and of the position now reached on consultation. Indeed, Mr Whalley on behalf of Tower Hamlets on Thursday last week, Day 38, and I will give you the reference to this when I close the case on Spitalfields tomorrow, said that whatever problems there might have been in the past there had been a major change of late and Tower Hamlets were satisfied so far as community consultation was concerned.

10551. Be that as it may, the democratic process has both approved and supported the principle of Crossrail through the House, reinforced, and one only needs to read Hansard for 12 January at the instruction debate to see the support reiterated, through the local authority. Whilst Mr Galloway is entitled to express the views that he does, within the context of the Hybrid Bill procedure that issue is no longer open to debate, the House having reached the view it reached on the second reading.

10552. Can I say this: I do wish to point out that there is exaggeration in the claims that have been made of the impacts of Crossrail. Again, Mr Galloway may have strong views but it is not helpful to his constituents, nor to the debate generally, if matters are exaggerated. Can I give you a few instances of those exaggerations. Firstly, as Sir Peter pointed out earlier, no houses are to be demolished in the Spitalfields area. The question of re-housing arises simply as a temporary measure because of the impacts of noise in a limited number of properties in the vicinity of Hanbury Street. Mr Galloway quite rightly points out that the environmental impacts of a shaft, whether it be at Hanbury Street or at Woodseer Street, we think, and we agree with him on this, are likely to be broadly the same. The temporary re-housing is simply to deal with the noise for those who are most likely to be affected by the worst impacts during construction. No houses are to be acquired and demolished.

10553. The second exaggeration is we are not dealing with lorries every few minutes. There will be of the order of 15 lorries a day at the height of the construction of the shaft, about one lorry every half an hour. That is a drop in the ocean compared with the number of lorries which already go up and down the street, which you will have observed on your site visit and which I observed on my visit to Hanbury Street. There are already lorries going up to the Woodseer Street site and the Committee has seen photographs of the large lorries which currently use the area. Be that as it may, at the height of the construction of the shaft it will be 15 per day, about one every half an hour. As Mr Berryman explained yesterday, and indeed last Thursday on Day 38, that will reduce after no more than two years to a single vehicle a day, if that. The construction period under the revised scheme is not seven years, it is at most two. It may be less than that depending on which of the options for the Hanbury Street shaft is taken up. The Committee may recall there are a variety of options. They are not yet decided, they can be decided in consultation with the local authority and the local community. They range from putting as much as possible under ground and a range which includes more over ground. The more you put under ground the longer the construction period, the more you put over ground the shorter the construction period, putting it crudely. The two years is for the maximum construction which is for most of the shaft and equipment being put under ground, so not seven years and certainly not a lorry every minute.

 

10554. If we come to working hours, the working hours are being currently agreed with the representatives of the local authorities, principally Westminster, and Mr Berryman explained that yesterday. If Mr Galloway had read the rest of the transcript he would have seen that 24 hours relates to underground tunnelling work but the likely general working hours will meet his requirement of finishing at 6 o'clock. It looks as if the generally agreed working hours will be - and I cannot promise this, Mr Galloway, because we are reaching the final stages of agreement and it is the City of Westminster who are the legal authority in the negotiations - but the likely general working hours will be eight in the morning until six in the evening. The transcript reference is Day 39, paragraphs 9816 and 9817.

10555. In terms therefore of the impacts, we do suggest that it is unfortunate that they are being exaggerated because it creates a false sense of anxiety amongst local residents. There has been misinformation, and misinformation from the side of the petitioners as well as, it is claimed, from Crossrail. I do not suggest we have been giving misinformation out but clearly there are misunderstandings which Mr Galloway's presentation demonstrates graphically are being pursued despite the information that we have given to the Committee and elsewhere.

10556. I understand Mr Galloway's position on the "grand plaza" scheme that Tower Hamlets has in mind for Whitechapel Station. Mr Galloway will, I am no doubt, be pleased to hear that we oppose it as well. And the Committee will recall the debate over the demolition of McDonald's. We all may have our views about getting rid of McDonald's and the like. Tower Hamlets may wish to do that but Crossrail certainly does not.

10557. The reason for a Whitechapel Station, which is regarded as fundamental by the Borough, is to provide a new station which is accessible to all, whereas the current station is not. It is to provide a new station accessible to all and this area of all areas within London deserves better public transport which Crossrail will bring. We propose an appropriate ticket hall and appropriate entrance; we do not propose a grand piazza entrance onto Whitechapel Road.

10558. So far as the need for the Hanbury Street shaft is concerned, it is not merely ventilation; it is emergency intervention. Recent events have shown graphically the need for the Fire Brigade to enter the Tube and other underground railways in case of an emergency at a minimum of risk to themselves and maximum ability for them to get in and out to deal with those who may be injured by unfortunate events. The reason the Channel Tunnel has no shafts, apart from the obvious point - it would be a little difficult - the Channel Tunnel has a third tunnel, so the emergency intervention on the Channel Tunnel is via a third independent tunnel not via shafts. We have already shown to the Committee the Health and Safety Executive's requirement for one kilometre-spaced tunnels for intervention purposes.

10559. Finally on the question of environmental guarantees, I remind the Committee that I gave an undertaking, not merely an assurance, but an undertaking on behalf of the Secretary of State on day one to ensure compliance with the environmental minimum requirements which are tied into the various mitigation measures and the Construction Code which will apply to this project. I think, Mr Galloway, the King's Cross Bill was a private bill. I do not know about the undertakings given by private promoters but the undertakings that I give are on behalf of the Secretary of State and they are deserving, in my submission, of proper weight and respect, as has always been the case with hybrid bills.

10560. I do not propose to say any more on the matter other than to note that the final exaggeration that has been presented this evening is the project is not costed at £20 billion but at a little over £10 billion.

10561. CHAIRMAN: Before you sit down there are a couple of questions in relation to Mr Galloway's evidence. I wonder if you could give a view on the need for child protection from construction work around the school area, if you could elaborate on that, and also a little bit more on recruitment of labour, two of Mr Galloway's claims. The reason I am asking that now is because I suspect as the debate is on European affairs that we may in the next couple of moments be having to pause for a moment or two to have a vote. No, you can proceed straight into it.

10562. MR ELVIN: As an example - and I have not got the precise list at my fingertips - you will recall that Swanlea School is the school which is most closely affected. Both in the case of Swanlea School and generally an agreement has been reached with Tower Hamlets that special measures should limit, for example, the running of construction traffic at certain key times of the day which will have to be applied in the case of specific schools dependent on what time those schools have children leaving and entering. So there will be special measures to ensure that children will not be placed at risk from construction traffic at the times when they are arriving and leaving school. There are other measures which are close to being agreed or agreed with Swanlea. I do not have them all at my fingertips, but I am sure I can produce more information if it is necessary.

10563. If the Committee will just give me a moment, I may be able to find the letter to Tower Hamlets. Yes, if Mr Fry could put it up, it is exhibit 21804C-OO5. It is our letter to Tower Hamlets of 6 June and it is the section really dealing with Swanlea School. There are a number of issues which are raised in the case of Swanlea School. You will see reference is made to the response to the head teacher; noise mitigation measures to assist the school; the Promoter arranging, in co-operation with the school, to carry out surveys of the structure; the case for meeting reasonable technical support costs; meeting costs in terms of ventilation and like; meeting direct support costs for having to move examinations off-site; the issue of passengers discharging into the school playground during an emergency, as that is an emergency access point, but that is not expected to be a regular usage; and then an agreed co-operative approach with the school and the Council.

10564. There is a further section, if I can find it. It is page 2 please. You will see under section 7, where it is proposed lorries pass a school not currently subject to heavy goods traffic the Promoter will restrict the hours. That is setting out the point that I have just made, that there will be special restrictions put in place and a strategy for lorry routes will be developed with Tower Hamlets to take into account such sensitive usage. Under the requirements of Schedule 7 of the Bill - and the Committee will remember this and the letter refers to it - lorry routing arrangement have to be dealt with in consultation with the local planning authority and approved by them in any event.

10565. On the question of local labour and use of local employment, the Committee will recall that this was an issue raised by the lead authority, Newham, and agreement was reached with Newham which is repeated in the case of Tower Hamlets, slightly elaborated. You will forgive me if I just find the reference, yes, it is page 4. In our letter to Tower Hamlets we refer to the undertaking to Newham, which we can have supplied to Mr Galloway if he would like a copy of that undertaking. We have agreed to take forward discussions with regard to possible enlargement of that undertaking to use local labour along the lines of Newham's agreement with the DLR.

10566. Our only concern is that we make sure that any agreements to use and to assist local workforces to compete are compliant with the law. Subject to that, undertakings have been given for the use of local labour.

10567. KELVIN HOPKINS: Mr Galloway's objections where layered in a number of ways, the first of which was an objection in principle to Crossrail, which is beyond our purview so we cannot discuss that. The next layer down I think was whether or not there is really a need for a new Whitechapel Station, given that there is a Whitechapel Station already which is linked to the Hammersmith and City Line and the District line and linked to the East London Line. Mr Galloway also said that London Underground was in any case going to modernise the station presumably with disabled access and better communication between the platforms and that kind thing in time so it may just be that the inadequacies of Whitechapel Station at the moment were going to be addressed by London Underground and that it would not necessarily be an argument for having a Whitechapel Station for Crossrail. I can understand also local authorities being keen on a station for status and whatever. Mr Galloway made what seemed to be a reasonably strong point that there would not be much passenger demand from Tower Hamlets or from Whitechapel for the use of Crossrail and, in any case, there is a fairly quick link to Liverpool Street Station which would mean people coming on the East London Line, transferring to Hammersmith and City and going straight to Crossrail at Liverpool Street, and they could get through that way in any case. Have we had detailed passenger forecasts for Whitechapel and Crossrail and are they compelling in terms of cost-benefits?

10568. MR ELVIN: Can I take instructions, Mr Berryman is whispering in my ear. I am not sure I can put my finger on them offhand. I was going to call Mr Anderson yesterday to deal with the benefits but because of the shortage of time I did not. Would it be a matter which would assist the Committee if I call evidence on it tomorrow? What I can say to the Committee at the moment is that a station would not be being proposed at Whitechapel if there were not likely to be substantial passengers using the trains there. I recall that when we were dealing with the petition of the London Borough of Greenwich, some comparisons were made, when looking at the analysis of the Woolwich contentions, that Whitechapel was one of the comparators that was used to show in terms of benefits of numbers of passengers and regeneration. Mr Hopkins, I will do my best, but unfortunately I have not got the Greenwich material with me to hand. Would it help if we reproduce that tomorrow?

10569. KELVIN HOPKINS: Yes, indeed. Just a little more on that if I may. If there were no Whitechapel Station would this affect the overall viability of Crossrail or could indeed Crossrail be regarded as a viable project without Whitechapel Station?

10570. MR ELVIN: I will provide a proper answer to that when I produce the passenger numbers tomorrow. Can I remind the Committee that what Mr Whalley said from Tower Hamlets last week was that the provision of a station at Whitechapel, because of the need for interchange and because of the regeneration benefits, was fundamental to Tower Hamlets` support for the scheme. Can I also remind the Committee that the GLA and the Mayor's plan targets Whitechapel as an area of opportunity for further growth in homes and jobs linked to improvements in public transport, and the areas of opportunity in the London Plan are tied to regeneration initiatives in closely allied areas. Again, if the Committee would find it helpful, I can have reproduced for tomorrow the relevant two or three pages from the London Plan.

10571. CHAIRMAN: That would be helpful, Mr Elvin, but I am not sure if that is satisfactory and I will tell you why. The point we are discussing now, although Mr Hopkins raised it, is Mr Galloway's point as to whether or not due work had been done to show that we need a station at Whitechapel. Because it is his point the fact that Mr Anderson is not here today and may have to come tomorrow to do it, what I have got to bear in mind is Mr Galloway is unlikely to be available tomorrow and I think he should have the opportunity to cross-examine. What may be the case is that we might be able to arrive at an agreement with Mr Galloway in that if he was available he could question the witness and if he was not available he could read the transcript and respond to the Committee in writing about that particular point. Mr Galloway, would that be a satisfactory solution for you to have the capacity to cross-example that evidence if it is given and either to do it verbally or to do it in writing after the transcript has been made available.

10572. MR GALLOWAY: Yes, Chairman, I am grateful for that.

10573. MR ELVIN: I am quite happy to call Mr Berryman now. I am not sure he can give you the precise figures.

10574. CHAIRMAN: That is the point. I understand Mr Berryman is very talented and very capable but the person that has been suggested is Mr Anderson who is the expert. I have asked Mr Galloway about his position. He has agreed if that evidence is given at this hearing and you examine that evidence, then he can get the transcript from that and he can then respond in writing to this Committee. I think that is a good halfway house really.

10575. MR ELVIN: Sir, to be absolutely fair, it is not just a question for Mr Anderson. All I said was that I had proposed to call some evidence on Whitechapel yesterday but lack of time required me to abort that.

10576. CHAIRMAN: You are going to call Mr Anderson tomorrow?

10577. MR ELVIN: No, it may be Mr Berryman. Mr Berryman can explain now the railway case for a station at Whitechapel, and I am more than happy he should do so if it would assist the Committee.

10578. CHAIRMAN: Mr Galloway, are you happy for Mr Berryman to come in now?

10579. MR GALLOWAY: If he is the man with the answers.

10580. MR ELVIN: I am not promising he is going to have the figures at his fingertips but ---

 

MR KEITH BERRYMAN, recalled

Further examined by MR ELVIN

10581. MR ELVIN: The Committee knows Mr Berryman; I do not introduce him further. Mr Berryman, can I just ask you to explain briefly to the Committee the railway reasons for having a Crossrail station at Whitechapel?

Mr Berryman: The primary reason for a station at Whitechapel from our perspective is the inter-connectivity it gives between the Crossrail route and other significant routes in East London. The East London Line is a bit of a, what could one call it, lost soul in terms of Underground lines in London but after the modernisation which is currently taking place it will be a long line running from Croydon in the south up to Dalston in the north and will become quite a major important traffic artery for London. The District Line, as you will all know of course, is already very busy. As I say, the East London Line will become a very important artery in the Underground network. The District Line and Hammersmith and City Line already are. There will be very significant passenger numbers interchanging between those lines. I do not have the figures at my fingertips because, as you know, we were not expecting to give evidence on this point this evening. There will also be significant numbers of people entering and leaving the station. The Royal London Hospital is nearby and it is quite a busy generator of traffic. There are a lot of local residents in the area which are good traffic generators. It will be quite a busy station, both for interchange purposes and also for people entering and leaving to the street. It is also a good bus interchange particularly with all the traffic going to the north towards Bethnal Green and that way.

10582. CHAIRMAN: One of the central planks of Mr Galloway's argument is what Mr Hopkins indicated to you as to whether or not there was a need for this enormous new station. It seems extraordinary to me and other Committee members, that everywhere else in London is saying they want a Crossrail station and Whitechapel is the only one saying "we do not want a station at all."

Mr Berryman: The local authority of course is absolutely of the contrary view; they do want a station and they have welcomed enthusiastically the proposal for a station from the beginning.

10583. Your argument is that it is Mr Galloway and some of the people he represents that do not want a Whitechapel Station in the form that is being presented rather than the area and the Council?

Mr Berryman: We can only go on the feedback we get from various sources and we do know Mr Galloway and people who feel the same way as he does do not want a station. There are other places in London where people do not want things to happen but this is the area where they are most vociferous.

10584. To be specific, can you tell us what the sources were, the noises you are hearing in favour of a Crossrail station?

Mr Berryman: We get it from the Mayor of London and the GLA, we get it from the local authority in the area, we get it from a significant proportion of the people that we consult. We do not get it from everybody in this area, there is strong opposition, it would be fair to say, but it is by no means universal.

10585. CHAIRMAN: Mr Elvin?

10586. MR ELVIN: I have got nothing else at the moment. I will try and produce the more specific figures for the Committee tomorrow.

10587. CHAIRMAN: Mr Galloway?

 

Cross-examined by MR GALLOWAY

10588. MR GALLOWAY: Please, I am champing at the bit! If you will allow me to say so, I think it is surprising the paucity of facts and statistics and information that you have just been given on this point. It is no surprise, I should have thought, to Crossrail that this very point, to use your words Chairman, is a central part of my argument. I should have thought they would have come armed with the witnesses and evidence to back up their case. I hope the witness will not take it as anything personal when I say for a professional to come in front of a parliamentary committee and use phrases like "a large number of people", "a lot of people" is not very satisfactory.

Mr Berryman: I could not agree more.

10589. Why is there not a cost-benefit analysis, Mr Berryman, of having a station or not having a station? There is on Woolwich Station a cost-benefit analysis? Why is there none on the Whitechapel Station?

Mr Berryman: I could not agree with you more that it is unsatisfactory to come to this Committee and say things like "a lot of people" and "many people", but I do not have the figures at my fingertips. We will provide them in written form tomorrow but I just do not have them with me.

10590. But, Mr Berryman, you knew I was the witness at 6 o'clock this evening. You presumably read my statement and my speech of 19 July?

Mr Berryman: I not only read it I sat there and listened to it.

10591. I am sorry for that.

Mr Berryman: It was very entertaining.

10592. Is it not extraordinary that no-one came armed with the arguments to the contrary? You agreed it was unsatisfactory. Is it not more than unsatisfactory; is it not extraordinary?

Mr Berryman: I said it was unsatisfactory to give that kind of response to a select committee. I would never try to defend that.

10593. Can I put to you then what I think is the truth, that the Whitechapel Station is the quid pro quo for Tower Hamlet's support for the Whitechapel alignment. This is my point, you see, Chairman, we would not be having this discussion, I would not be here, you would not have to listen to me if there was no Whitechapel alignment. The Whitechapel alignment is the alignment the price for which was the Whitechapel Station. There is no other case for a Whitechapel Station except as a quid pro quo to get Tower Hamlet's support for the Whitechapel alignment.

Mr Berryman: I am afraid you are not quite correct in saying that because any route which goes east-west across London and goes through Liverpool Street at one of its points must go through your constituency, and irrespective of whether there was to be a station at Whitechapel or not, there would still have to be ventilation and intervention shafts at various points through your constituency. It is really academic as far as that goes whether there is a Whitechapel Station or not.

10594. It could have gone along the River. It could have been the southern alignment rather than the Whitechapel alignment?

Mr Berryman: I personally do not think the southern alignment is at all practical.

10595. You did not think it was at all practical to dig the tunnel from both ends but it suddenly became practical.

Mr Berryman: That is not the case at all. You may have been advised or not by your supporters that we had been looking all the time at the possibility of eliminating the tunnelling sites at Hanbury Street. The reasons for the change in the policy were actually through change of circumstances which occurred in connection with planning and funding issues. It was not because we did not wish to change. We were forced into that strategy by what we understood at the time to be the planning issues. We have now revised the strategy based on development of some ideas which have been floating around for some time. You may be interested to know that the revised strategy will be cheaper than the original strategy and that is what we were always aiming to do.

10596. That is not what we were told at the time of course. We were told we could not tunnel from both ends because it would be a vastly more expensive scheme.

Mr Berryman: The reasons are quite complex. I am very happy to explain them to you, if you wish, but the previous assumption was that there would be a period of advanced works before powers had been granted by this Bill that is being considered which would include diversion of utilities and sewers and things of that sort. And that would be followed by a six-year construction period, in other words a total of an eight-year construction period from the day the first shovel went into the ground to the day when the railway opened. It subsequently became clear that it would not be possible for us to start those enabling works prior to having the consent which would be granted by this Bill because of changes in environmental impact legislation, and we therefore realised that we had eight years to build the tunnel instead of six years as we previously thought. Once you put that into the equation you can start looking at alternative tunnelling strategies and that is what we did, and we came up with a solution which involves starting at a site where there are no utilities to divert, giving us the full eight years to go at it, and that is why the strategy changed. It was because of that change in understanding of the legislation that it became practicable to tunnel from both ends rather than from three sides.

10597. Mr Berryman, why is there a cost-benefit analysis on Woolwich Station but not on Whitechapel Station?

Mr Berryman: Each station was considered as an adjunct to the scheme, and it is customary to do cost-benefit analyses on those kind of elements.

10598. Is it not customary to do cost-benefit analyses on most developments as significant as this?

Mr Berryman: A cost-benefit analysis on the whole scheme has of course been done.

10599. I am talking about the building of a station at Whitechapel. Is that not as significant as the Woolwich proposal? Do we not deserve even a cost-benefit analysis in Tower Hamlets?

Mr Berryman: We have done a cost-benefit analysis of the station, but I have to say, irrespective of the results of any such analysis, Whitechapel is a fundamental part of the scheme because it provides that connectivity between the Crossrail alignment and other routes in London which would not exist if there was no Whitechapel Station.

10600. Only because you have chosen the Whitechapel alignment which I am here to plead against.

Mr Berryman: No.

10601. My point, Mr Berryman, is if you had properly evaluated the cost-benefits of this, you might well have chosen the southern alignment.

Mr Berryman: Which southern alignment?

10602. Along the River.

Mr Berryman: There was no question of us proposing a southern alignment.

10603. MR GALLOWAY: I know there is not, that is my point.

10604. MR ELVIN: It would be helpful if Mr Galloway would allow Mr Berryman to finish his answers.

10605. MR GALLOWAY: I am sorry.

Mr Berryman: I do not think there is any point in pursuing discussion about the southern alignment. We do not believe it to be feasible from an engineering point of view. I have already given evidence on this matter some time ago.

10606. MR GALLOWAY: Yes, but Chairman, I am arguing that you should not choose this alignment and I am entitled to adduce in that argument ---

10607. CHAIRMAN: You are certainly allowed to cross-examine Mr Berryman but it is fair, as Mr Elvin did raise the fact, that he should be allowed to answer.

10608. MR GALLOWAY: Yes and I apologise for that. I am more used to the parliamentary cut and thrust rather than the quasi legal system that you are operating and I apologise for that. Let me ask him a direct question. Mr Berryman, you said the Council leadership was fully in favour of this. Do you know what happened to the Council leadership at the elections a few weeks ago?

Mr Berryman: I understand that their majority was reduced.

10609. No, the Council leadership.

Mr Berryman: You mean Councillor Keith?

10610. The people who have been doing the negotiating with you?

Mr Berryman: Are you referring to Councillor Keith.

10611. I am referring, Chairman, to the Mayor, the Deputy Mayor, the Leader of the Council, the Deputy Leader of the Council, they were all defeated in the elections last month, were they not?

Mr Berryman: I believe they were, yes, but I have to say that they are not the only people we have been negotiating with in the Council. We were negotiating with the previous leadership before that as well and their approach has been consistent throughout.

10612. MR GALLOWAY: I would have hoped, given that Mr Berryman has accepted that this little vignette is unsatisfactory, Chairman, that at least in writing he will provide the kind of answers that he has not been able to give this evening because it is a trifle amateur for a Committee to be discussing matters of this weight on phrases like a "a lot of people", "a significant number of people", and no cost-benefit analysis.

10613. CHAIRMAN: That, Mr Galloway, is the point I raised earlier on upon which Mr Hopkins has elaborated. Can I draw this to a conclusion because I am very interested in what Mr Berryman said in the course of the answer he gave to you in which he implied that a sort of cost-benefit analysis had been carried out in relation to this. I would like to see provision of that for members of this Committee, if we could have a note on that.

10614. MR GALLOWAY: May I respond to that in writing, Chairman?

10615. CHAIRMAN: When they supply it to the members of the Committee we will also supply it to you, Mr Galloway, and if you evidence given tomorrow, from another person or Mr Berryman indeed may be recalled again, we will send to you copies of the minutes of that and you may then respond again in writing to the Committee.

10616. MR GALLOWAY: Thank you very much.

Mr Berryman: We can provide the passenger numbers certainly tomorrow morning. It may be later in the day or even the next day before we can get the benefit cost ratio to you.

10617. CHAIRMAN: I am less concerned about whether that is all available tomorrow in a note or anything else than whether it is correct. I am trying to make is having received it, it will go to Mr Galloway and Mr Galloway will be allowed to put in writing his views back to the Committee for our consideration. Is there anything else, Mr Galloway?

10618. MR GALLOWAY: Thank you, Chairman. I realise I am all that stands between everyone and a World Cup match so I would like to just respond on a few things that Mr Elvin said, if I may.

10619. MR ELVIN: Mr Berryman can therefore move out of the hot seat.

The Witness withdrew

 

10620. CHAIRMAN: I am very interested, Mr Galloway, in your new interest in the English football team, being Scottish!

10621. MR GALLOWAY: Unlike the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I now fully support the England football team.

10622. MR ELVIN: I am pleased to hear it.

10623. MR GALLOWAY: I said earlier, Chairman, that I count my spoons when I hear talk of piazza and plaza type developments. Another phrase that makes me count my spoons is the phrase "area of opportunity". It is precisely that kind of opportunity that they have in mind when they use it in relation to Whitechapel that concerns the people there. You see, we believe that what is underway is the building of a corridor above and below ground connecting the City to Canary Wharf, a corridor which will eventually, socially and ethnically cleanse that part of East London. There are already permissions for tower block office developments in Aldgate, Canary Wharf is bursting at the seams, the City of London is bursting at the seams. Crossrail is their blue riband idea and the big losers will be local people - black and white, Asian, indigenously English - who live in and call themselves Eastenders. It is precisely the extent to which - it is quite a revealing phrase - this is seen as an area of opportunity that we are worried by because we like living there. The people who live there, notwithstanding their poverty and the cramped housing, they do not want to leave there. They do not want to be driven east. They do not want this juggernaught that is underway to cleanse them and to drive them out of their area.

10624. Mr Elvin was right to reproach me - and he did it in an elegant way but he reproached me nonetheless for selectively quoting from transcripts. Neither should he, with respect, selectively quote from the correspondence with the Swanlea School. The Swanlea School community is utterly opposed to these proposals and remain utterly opposed to them. The Swanlea School is going to lose part of its garden, part of its playing area. We saw - although it was hurried over and not quoted - from the letter that was put up on the screen not only the things that the Promoters have agreed with the Swanlea School but also the things that they would not agree to.

10625. On the subject, Mr Elvin, of undertakings, I respect the fact that you are here as Mr Solomon Binding when you are talking for the Secretary of State and when you give an undertaking, of course that undertaking will be met, but there are so many things, you see, which are not undertakings, there are so many things that are assurances, so many things which are warm words about the seeking of agreement. For example, he said, and I am quoting him because I wrote it down, "I cannot promise you, Mr Galloway, that it will be between 8 and 6 pm." We will try and make it between 8 and 6 pm is really what he is saying. That is no undertaking at all.

10626. CHAIRMAN: He said, Mr Galloway, that he expected it would be, it is probable that it would be, but I think the Members are getting your implication about that.

10627. MR GALLOWAY: In that case I will not labour that point. We all know - we are all politicians here, at least we are - the difference between an undertaking and "probably" or "possibly".

10628. He was remarkably sanguine about the idea of a lorry every half an hour. I am not sure how he would feel about a lorry every half an hour, for two years, if I accept his two years - although it would be the only contract ever performed in England that was performed to the time that we were told it was going to be performed at the beginning, but let us take him at his word even though it was not an undertaking - that it will be "only" two years - a lorry every half an hour for two years is a lot of lorries. I think if it was up the leafy lane up which he no doubt lives he would not be quite so sanguine about it.

10629. I tell you candidly I do not believe that it will be a lorry every half an hour, as I do not believe it will be only two years. I believe it will be more than two years and more than every half on hour, but every half an hour is bloody bad enough.

10630. Now, I take the point about the third tunnel in the Channel and I take the point about the Health and Safety Executive's requirement for ventilation and intervention access. All I am saying is that the cost-benefit analysis approach should be made here. The devastation to a poor, cramped community should be weighed against the need to have the intervention shaft at precisely that point.? Is it beyond the geniuses - highly paid and qualified geniuses - working on this project to find another place they can make the ventilation shaft that would obviate all of this devastation, all of this misery, all of this inconvenience, health risks dangers? Is it beyond them to come up with another place where they can put the ventilation shaft? After all, they came up with the tunneling from both ends when it looked for a long time like there was no such possibility.

10631. Mr Elvin reproached me, too, about my prediction that the project would cost £20 billion. That was very brave of him! In fact, he said it is going to cost £10 billion. He did not tell us that that prediction is four years old and not a ball has been kicked, not a brick has been laid and will not be so for many years to come, even if God speeds your proceedings. Is it really going to be £10 billion, Mr Elvin, or is it more likely to be £20 billion? As you will tell from my accent, I am Scottish. Do I have to drag you through the cost of the Scottish Parliament? Do I have to drag you through the original estimation of what it would cost? Or the Millennium Dome might be more closer to home. Who in this Parliament, who in this public believes a prediction of £10 billion for this - £10 billion which of course has not been raised or identified but let us leave that aside. I tell you this is going to be the most expensive white elephant in British history and you as a Committee should weigh that responsibility very carefully. I would not want to be in your shoes. The Whips would never have chosen me anyway to have the responsibility

10632. CHAIRMAN: I think they would!

10633. MR GALLOWAY: Maybe they would.

10634. MR BINLEY: Given half a chance they would! The same way they chose us.

10635. CHAIRMAN: I can remember when you were put on the Gas and the Water Bill at one point.

10636. MR GALLOWAY: They send me on such Bills over and over again; I do not know why! I had a special relationship with the Labour Whips. Now, Mr Elvin says that I was exaggerating. It is my job to as powerfully as possible make the case for the worst case possible because in my experience the worst case usually turns out to be the case. He said I was exaggerating about the 24-hour working or to use Mr Berryman's phrase - I think it was Mr Berryman - not a 24-hour operation "generally speaking". But I have got the works schedule here. It looks like plenty of 24-hour working scheduled on it to me. Again they are remarkably sanguine about 24-hour working being underground. Only underground then? Are we going to feel no vibration? Are we going to hear no noise? Are we going to have no disruption caused by 24-hour working underground? I very much doubt that but again Mr Elvin is being very brave and bold in predicting that. The proof of the pudding is in the eating; unfortunately it is my constituents who have got to do the eating if he turns out to be wrong.

10637. Now, on the issue of race, I was" exaggerating" again, but let me quote, if I may, from Trevor Phillips not a Respect supporter, nor one of what Mr Berryman called "the people who support me", but in his letter of 8 July to my distinguished constituent John Aktar (?) he says: "These proposals will indeed have a devastating impact on a thriving area in East London and particularly so in light of the fact that it is densely populated by residents and local businesses alike." These are the views of the Head of the Commission for Racial Equality.

10638. MR BINLEY: Chairman, can I ask Mr Galloway what the date of that letter was?

10639. MR GALLOWAY: 8 July 2004.

10640. MR BINLEY: Which I think I am right in saying is quite early in the process of the correspondence, is it not?

10641. MR GALLOWAY: I am not sure he would resile from what he said in that correspondence.

10642. MR BINLEY: I draw attention to the fact that is not necessarily the whole of the correspondence being quoted to us.

10643. MR GALLOWAY: It is a fair point that is made, Chairman, but it is equally a fair point that I make. These are the extant views of Trevor Phillips, as far as I am aware.

10644. MR BINLEY: If I just might add, is it not case, if I recall it correctly that was something Mr Phillips wrote after having received two letters from two people in the area and that he has perhaps modified his views since?

10645. MR GALLOWAY: You may be more familiar with Mr Trevor Phillips than me.

10646. MR BINLEY: I am.

10647. MR GALLOWAY: But my constituent John Aktar knows this scheme inside out and knows the impact it will have inside out. Trevor Phillips did write the words I have just quoted. I am aware of no other words from Trevor Phillips in which he withdraws his observations.

10648. CHAIRMAN: Neither am I, Mr Galloway. Can I just say that we have all the correspondence from the Commission and we will appraise all that information.

10649. MR GALLOWAY: Okay. I am coming to my last point, Chairman.

10650. CHAIRMAN: And we will give a judgment.

10651. MR GALLOWAY: I am coming to my last point. Mr Elvin, again rather bravely, stated that there was material in Bengali. There are three things wrong with that. First of all, these must have been phantom materials because none of the Bengalis appear to have ever seen it. Secondly, most of my constituents do not speak Bengali, they speak Sylheti. Thirdly, many of my constituents do not read at all. Many of the older Bangladeshi origin people in my constituency do not read at all. They were not communicated with. If you like, I will bring them all here to tell you that they do not feel that Crossrail properly communicated with them during this long period in which they had a right to have their views properly taken into account. I can fill this room and every room in this corridor with Bengalis who will tell you that, Chairman. So I do not withdraw the case I made that Crossrail only very belatedly undertook that which they are required to by law, the race impact studies. Only when they were taxed about their failure to do so by the Commission for Racial Equality and only in the second round were materials in Sylheti produced. If there were any in the first round they were not seen by very many Sylheti speakers in my constituency.

10652. So I am very grateful to you, Chairman, for the very kind way that you have conducted your management of what I have had to say. I apologise if I have broken any rules. I am grateful for the opportunity to come back on the things that we have agreed that I can come back on. I have nothing more to say.

10653. CHAIRMAN: You only broke a few, George, but that is par for the course: one or two pieces of unparliamentary language like the use of the word "bloody", and the outrageous suggestion that Mr Elvin lived down a leafy lane!

10654. MR ELVIN: If only!

10655. CHAIRMAN: All in all, are you concluded?

10656. MR GALLOWAY: Yes.

10657. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much for your attendance. We will take account of all the evidence that has been given. We will adhere to the promises that have been given from this chair about correspondence to you and your right to respond to that. We will be in touch in that respect. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's hearing. The meeting of this Committee will be tomorrow at 10 am. Order, order.