Examination of Witnesses (Questions 6680
- 6699)
6680. Mr Binley: Exhibit 10, yes.
6681. Mr Pugh-Smith: There is a one sheet
summary.
(Mr Schabas) This was all they gave us. This
was their evaluation that they had done. The key point with the
Central London alignment is EE Central Area, GB Rail Alignment,
and if you look over to the right you see 3,623,000, which is
the same price, it is not three times as much or twice as much,
the central area is the same price. The other parts they were
arguing were much, much more expensive, the line to Stansted and
the line to Heathrow, and we have argued that those numbers are
wrong too. As I have said, we do not have an army of engineers
behind us, but we have built the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, the
Jubilee Line extension and things like that, so we are not completely
guessing in the dark. We also thought the 18 billion number was
wrong, and I could explain the other lines, but I do not think
they are relevant the central London route.
6682. Mr Binley: Can I secondly ask,
on the letter dated 30 September, which is your Exhibit 7, from
Mr Berryman where in paragraph 1 under "Cost", sub-paragraph
2, he says, "Although we accept that it is possible that
the benefits and in particular fare box income may be higher than
the reference scheme", how does that relate or does it relate
in any way to the statement that was made on 16 February 2001
to the effect that the evidence relating to the catchment area
would mean that the river route would not attract the catchment
and, therefore, I assume the fares that the decided route will?[18]
(Mr Schabas) They seem to be
contradictory, do they not?
6683. It does seem to be contradictory to me.
(Mr Schabas) I do not think I should be explaining
Mr Berryman's letters, but I do not think they are contradictory
actually and I can maybe explain on his behalf what he was trying
to say.
6684. Perhaps we could at some stage have Mr
Berryman and he could tell us what he means by it because these
questions are important.
(Mr Schabas) The Superlink differs from Crossrail
in two major ways. One way that it differs is that we are not
sure that the route from Paddington to Canary Wharf which they
have picked is the right one. We are not saying that the river
is better or the northern route is better; we are not sure and
we do not think they can be sure either. The second difference
with Superlink is that we do not go to Shenfield and Maidenhead,
but we go to Reading, we go to Milton Keynes, we go to Basingstoke,
we go to places where frankly traffic growth is happening. These
require some additional bits of railway to be built, not a lot,
but a bit, seven or eight miles of tunnels, but tunnels are actually
pretty cheap if you do not have stations in them. Those generate
the extra revenue. I think what Mr Morris was saying back in 2000
was that under the river you would get less traffic in central
London, and I think he may be right, he may be wrong, but the
difference is going to be minor. There is going to be different
traffic generation. If the route goes under Oxford Street or it
goes under the river, it will generate traffic in different ways.
What Mr Berryman is admitting here and agreeing with is that if
you build the line up to Basingstoke and over to Stansted and
Reading, of course you will generate more people and more revenue.
He is saying that it will cost £18 billion to do it and that
would bring us to Exhibit 10 where he has done some estimates
to suggest that they did not, until they got Mr Morris involved
and Mr Morris is not here, but until Richard Morris came in, they
had nobody in their team who had real rail operational experience,
they were engineers, and they added in a lot of costs which do
not need to be there.
6685. Can I stay with the same letter and go
to section 3 of that letter where Mr Berryman says, "In particular
it does not relieve the most grossly overcrowded sections of the
rail network which are on the LUL lines". Do you think he
is specifically referring to Liverpool Street there in any sense?
(Mr Schabas) I think he is talking through
his hat, with all due respect. I do not think he is qualified
to say or know and, frankly, without some modelling, he could
not really know. Superlink would relieve Liverpool Street very
substantially because we are proposing that from Canary Wharf
you would then swing up to Shenfield and take trains off the line
into Liverpool Street. Half of the people who go to Liverpool
Street now walk to work which is why Crossrail linking in Liverpool
Street makes life worse for them because people in Romford will
find themselves deep underground when they would rather be on
the surface and walk to their offices. The other half are going
all over the place and they do not want to go to Liverpool Street
and Superlink relieves Liverpool Street in a different way.
6686. On the Liverpool Street one, I need to
understand whether you had heard the initial arguments about Liverpool
Street where it was felt that the additional capacity, whilst
it needed some change, could in the main be taken by the present
ticket halls and so forth. Crudely, that was the argument, as
I saw it, and yet if this is about Liverpool Street, Mr Berryman
is now arguing, or the argument in 2.2 is, that your scheme does
not relieve the most grossly overcrowded sections, and that is
why I am specifically concerned about Liverpool Street.
(Mr Schabas) I have not read all of the testimony
on Liverpool Street, but what we did find under freedom of information
was the generation of traffic that Crossrail will bring and what
is amazing is that it was much less than they like to claim. Under
the Department for Transport's own numbers, Crossrail will increase
commuting into central London by 2.5per cent because, frankly,
it is not going to make the journey from Romford or Shenfield
much nicer than it is now, so I think it is probably true that
at Liverpool Street they will not have a more severe crowding
problem because, having spent £10 billion, they will not
have many more passengers. It is, therefore, probably right, but
in a kind of way which to me damns the whole project and, if that
is the case, what is the point?
6687. Early on in 2001 you were told that delay
was not required and government pressure was suggesting there
should be no delay and that was the inference of the statement
you made to us.
(Mr Schabas) Absolutely.
6688. Then in October 2004 Mr Prideaux said,
"I really have no locus to consider alternatives".
(Mr Schabas) Mr Montague.
6689. Sorry, yes.
(Mr Schabas) Mr Prideaux is with us.
6690. Yes, Prideaux is your man, my apologies.
It is quite confusing stuff, is it not? He says, "I really
have no locus to consider alternatives". I will ask later
on, but do you think that is the same pressure, that those statements
arose from the same pressure to drive this along and your view
seems to be that that drive was so important as to suggest that
they would not properly look at any alternatives? Is that what
your evidence suggests?
(Mr Schabas) Yes, minister!
6691. Not quite! In fact, quite a long way off!
(Mr Schabas) But I think that is exactly what
they said.
6692. Chairman: Mr Pugh-Smith, before
your witness goes, it might be unsatisfactory, the route which
has been chosen, but actually it is the instructions you have
been given and, in that respect, counsel is correct. We really
cannot approve this in any way, we are not authorised to do that
and it is not within our powers.
6693. Mr Pugh-Smith: We are not inviting
you to do that.
6694. Chairman: But the discussion we
have had here has been useful because it has informed members
of the Committee perhaps why the route which has been chosen is
so central to the instructions you have been given, so, in that
respect, I am grateful.
6695. Mr Pugh-Smith: I am glad it is
helpful in that regard, but, as I mentioned in opening on 30 March,
there is a more fundamental legal point as well to which I will
return in closing and that is the requirement in the Environmental
Statement to consider alternatives adequately and we have called
Mr Schabas to demonstrate that, in our submission
6696. Chairman: It is well within your
remit to challenge that.
6697. Mr Pugh-Smith: That is right.
6698. Mrs James: From what you are saying,
the plan you have been telling us about with all of your rail
experience appears to be one that takes in a wider perspective
and a longer-term future for rail, because you are talking about
the Reading end of things and with us knowing what we poor, long-suffering
travellers to south Wales experience on a regular basis, that
is a particular pinch-point, so would you see that on the back
of this the problems could be addressed with the plan that you
are taking?
(Mr Schabas) Yes, it has no difference which
route you use through central London, but I think that Reading
is another example that it is symptomatic because they were going
to terminate at Maidenhead. I asked Cross London Rail because
I have some friends in the organisation, "Why are you terminating
at Maidenhead? Why don't you go to Reading?" They said, "We
have to pay to resignal Reading which will cost £150 million".
I said, "If you look on their website, Network Rail are actually
planning to do that in 2011 anyway, so you don't have to pay for
that". It was too late for them to realise this. Instead,
if they do terminate at Maidenhead, it will cause real operational
difficulties because they will have to run shuttle services as
well on the diesel line. They will actually be adding more trains.
There is no one solution to trains coming through to Reading and
there is no simple solution, but it is symptomatic of them, as
I said at the very beginning, being in too much of a hurry, haste
makes waste, and they rushed ahead without thinking through all
the issues.
6699. Sir Peter Soulsby: Mr Schabas,
what you have told us, as Ms Lieven has pointed out, does strike
at the principle of the Bill and it is clearly beyond the remit
of this Committee as given to us by the Commons, and I think in
the circumstances it is quite right that Ms Lieven chose not to
respond to it. Can I just, without putting words in your mouth,
try and summarise what it is you have said to us. I think I am
right in saying that you are saying to us that we are wasting
our time, looking at a particular route, when in a broader sense
it is probably not the best value for money, being based on an
inadequate consideration of alternatives. I think perhaps you
are also saying to us that it is most unlikely that it will ever
be funded or built.
(Mr Schabas) Yes, absolutely. It is a great
tragedy really.
18 Committee Ref: A80, Corrspondence from Crossrail
to GB Railways Group plc, 30 September 2002 (WESTCC-32605-047). Back
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