Chris was born and brought up in Edinburgh, attending George Watson's College. He read Law at the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Criminology at Girton College, Cambridge, being called to the Bar at Lincoln's Inn in 2008. He is currently Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Political Officers Network (CPON) and works in Local Government. He has stood for the Conservatives in Haringey (2010) and Linlithgow (2011) and has been active in the Conservative Party since 1992. Read more from this author

Tweet

The debate about High Speed Rail has so far confined the main controversy to south east England, but it is something with which Scots should involve themselves as well, because ultimately it will be Scotland which stands to benefit the most from high speed rail.

It is pretty obvious to anyone who takes a train from London to Edinburgh that there is a capacity issue on the rails, certainly at the southern end. I’m sure we all familiar with the Darwinian stampede at King’s Cross when the train to Edinburgh is announced (made a bit more exciting now with added barriers for hurdles) and things don’t get that much better onboard, with uncomfortable high backed seats crammed into the carriages to maximise the number of passengers who can be fitted in the space. It’s pretty much the same story at Euston.

The train empties slightly north of Newcastle or Preston, freeing up seats, but that does not take into account the capacity issue on the rails. The West Coast Main Line is Europe’s busiest rail transit corridor, although it is only double track for most of the way between Crewe and Edinburgh/Motherwell. The recent £10b modernisation of the line, which permitted 125mph running with tilting trains, together with the launch of a higher frequency timetable out of Euston, led to a 30% increase in capacity, a cut in travel times and 15% growth so far. However Network Rail has warned that that growth will see the extra capacity exhausted within a decade. The anti-HS2 campaign mentions £1.1b infrastructure investments to lengthen trains and increase the number of trains out of Euston, but remember that the extra capacity must be sustainable to cater for increased growth if we are to cut the number of domestic inter-city flights. The increase in service which they propose would be an extra two trains an hour, which is not sustainable in the long term. It is rather like adding an extra lane to the M25, it is full within a few months, as more capacity attracts more traffic. They also propose the conversion of first class carriages to standard class. To do so would deprive the train operating companies (TOCs) of a significant amount of peak revenue and would make a renegotiation of the franchise contracts inevitable, as the premiums paid to government would certainly need to be lower to reflect the lower revenue yield. This in turn means less investment in the railways from TOC profits.

It has been said that the railways are the only industry where growth is a problem, however we want to attract more rail traffic, from the roads and the air, not only for environmental reasons, but logistical ones as well. End to end, railways are often faster and more efficient, and allow work to be done en route. The great irony about the councils opposing the HS2 project is that they also opposed the third runway at Heathrow on the basis that High Speed Rail could free up domestic slots, and they were right – London to Paris & Brussels air travel has almost disappeared). If we do proceed with encouraging rail use, we need to deliver a reliable and attractive product, which will sustain and grow itself. Therefore this needs to be a long term plan, not a “patch and mend” on an old railway. We are also going to have to look at the design of the trains, as travelling environment has been overlooked in recent years in favour of cramming passengers on; if the TOCs are going to charge higher fares (and I would imagine that HS2 would have a premium) then they need to justify that.

Further than just solving capacity issues, a new line expands choice. Passengers can choose whether to take an express train or a semi fast. Stations on what were previously the “fast lines” can have their services increased as there is no longer the overriding need to accommodate fast (profit making) intercity trains on the tracks. Freight paths can also be freed up, taking lorries off the road and slow freight trains out of the way of passenger trains. It would be a massive boost to British industry in terms of construction, and also offers the potential to throw a lifeline to our fading train building industry.

But why would someone in Scotland be bothered about an argument raging in the Chilterns? The reason is because I find it unlikely that a new high speed line will be built over the southern uplands; the engineering, topography and cost would be astronomical. I would imagine that trains will run at 125mph to a dedicated line which will terminate either in Lancaster or Newcastle. The real benefit to people in Scotland will be the speeds which the train can reach when it gets to there. High Speed Rail doesn’t make much difference to the journey time between London and Birmingham, the real savings start to come when you run long distances, that is why MPs in the south oppose it and those in the north support it. It is a simple cost/benefit split.

The main problem at the moment is the routeing, passing as it does through the Chiltern Hills. Now when it comes to NIMBYism, Buckinghamshire has form, with a well educated, well informed populace who know how the system works. I am surprised that it came to be routed there, as opposed to along the M1 corridor with branches to Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester, but let’s be honest: wherever you propose a 200mph railway, the local residents and councils will object unless they have a direct benefit, there are too many votes in local districts for a politician to put national concerns ahead of local ones. The question is whether the residents of one particular area of the country can hold the rest to ransom, or whether as a national infrastructure project it overrides such concerns. Personally I believe the latter. The route I think could be moved, but we should press ahead with such a vital, forward thinking infrastructure project as soon as possible because growth attracts growth.