More money for North's Motorway network promised as Prime Minister scraps northern leg of HS2
In his speech to the Tory party conference today (4th October) Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak has formally announced he has cancelled the planned HS2 rail link from Birmingham to Manchester.
In a speech otherwise largely devoid of new policy, Sunak nonetheless tried to present himself – the fifth Tory prime minister in 13 unbroken years of the party’s rule – as the only option for change.
On HS2, Sunak said the government would invest £36bn saved from HS2 in other transport projects across the whole country – including a number of road schemes.
HS2 had overrun in costs and the plans as they stood no longer made economic sense, Sunak said, adding: “The facts have changed, and the right thing to do when the facts change is to have the courage to change direction.”
The Birmingham to London leg will run all the way into London at Euston as planned rather than stop at Old Oak Common.
But the current HS2 management team will no longer run the Euston site.
Sunak said: “There must be some accountability for the mistakes made, for the mismanagement of this project.
“We will instead create a new Euston development zone.”
But the knock-on effects will be massive impacting commercial development around HS2’s planned Manchester Piccadilly and Crewe stations.
The government has already spent £2.3bn buying up land and property on stage two of the railway from Birmingham to Manchester.
The prime minister listed a number of other schemes that would get funding instead to be spent in the same 2029-40 period as planned for HS2.
However, the government has released scant about the timescales of the cash for these projects, so they may be some way away.
The government has reallocated some of the cash away from rail and towards road schemes.
Road upgrades mentioned by the prime minister during his speech include work to improve the A1, A2, A5, A75, and M6.
There will also be funding for the Shipley bypass, the Blyth relief road and "70 other road schemes".
Accompanying material released by the government repeatedly mentioned the fixing of potholes. But no further details on what the upgrades will look like or when they might start were given.
Whilst many of the schemes will not directly benefit our sector it is hoped that the offset of job losses due to HS2's cancellation may at least, in part, be offset with other projects.
The government has already spent £2.3bn buying up land and property on stage two of the railway from Birmingham to Manchester.
It is still unclear what level of compensation Balfour Beatty and Kier will receive for the termination of early enabling works contracts on the Birmingham to Crewe phase 2a stretch.
Comments