Labour should hop on board High Speed Two

In, out, in, out, shake it all about: and no, this is not the hokey-cokey I’m talking about, but politicians’ mixed responses to HS2, the high speed rail project which has caused such controversy over the past few weeks. Alastair Darling thinks we should scrap it; Andrew Adonis says it’s vital; and Shadow Transport Secretary Maria Eagle says Labour would derail the project if costs rose above £50 billion. Several Tory backbenchers have withdrawn their support for the scheme, grumbling that the money could be better spent.

But this week High Speed Two is making a comeback. Today Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has backed the rail project in the Financial Times, saying: “our capital’s long-term status as an economic global powerhouse is threatened if we do not constantly upgrade the transport infrastructure.” His comments echo the Armitt Review published yesterday, which stressed the importance of big infrastructure projects .

Whose idea was HS2 anyway? Lord Adonis commissioned research on the new rail project when he was Transport Secretary in 2009, and former Chancellor Alastair Darling gave it his backing in 2010. The high speed rail link would triple capacity and shave nearly an hour off journey times between London and Manchester, Sheffield and Leeds. It seems like a no-brainer. But with HS2’s projected costs spiralling well above the £30 billion that was predicted in 2009, and Treasury figures forecasting spends of up to £73 billion, the project could well be derailed by significant Labour opposition.

Lord Adonis recently wrote in the New Statesman that cancelling HS2 would be a ‘national act of self-mutilation’. We don’t need the speed, he says, but the capacity:

“There will be an acute shortage of transport capacity from the 2020s to convey freight, commuters and other passengers into and between the major conurbations of London, the West Midlands, the East Midlands and South and West Yorkshire […] Detailed costings that I commissioned in 2009 suggested that to secure just two-thirds of HS2’s extra capacity by upgrading existing lines would cost more in cash terms than building HS2.”

I’m inclined to agree with him on this one: Labour threatening to pull out of HS2 could be disastrous for UK growth in the future. As Andrew points out, in 1979, the Labour government made a huge mistake when it cancelled the Channel Tunnel and a new London airport at Maplin Sands. It is up to the current shadow cabinet to learn from Labour’s past mistakes. The HS2 project has cross-party support. It will bring jobs; it will bring growth; it is an example of state investment in infrastructure. High Speed Two is the one plan the Tories and Lib Dems have committed to, publicly, which doesn’t involve cuts or shrinking the state. What’s more, it is state expenditure, well spent, that the government will find it difficult to row back on.

As Adonis points out, in the run up to the 2015 election, it would be all too easy for Labour to accuse the Tories of mis-spending public money on a new high speed rail link, covering a train line which already exists. But attacking the government over HS2 would be the wrong thing to do. Labour should back High Speed Two, because it will upgrade the UK’s infrastructure, benefitting British commuters and businesses for decades to come.

Besides, there are plenty of other Tory transport plans that Labour could, and should, derail: Conservative mayor Boris Johnson’s plan to close ticket offices across London, for a start.