Member News
By Susan Elan Jones MP - 13th July 2011
Welsh secretary Cheryl Gillan must not be allowed to block High Speed Rail 2, writes Susan Elan Jones MP.
By rail from London, I can get to Paris faster than Wrexham. I can get to Brussels faster than Liverpool. I can get to Rotterdam a full hour faster than Glasgow.
For a country that invented railways, that is truly ridiculous. While other European countries are reaping the benefits of their high speed rail, in the UK we are still just talking about it.
And unfortunately, our proposed scheme has powerful enemies. The secretary of state for Wales hails from Buckinghamshire and has declared that she will oppose this innovation because it "runs right through my back yard".
She has failed to answer parliamentary questions on what assessment she has made of the economic benefits of the scheme for Wales and is allowing her constituency chairman to lobby against the scheme. Incredibly, she has also hired a lawyer to form part of her parliamentary team exclusively to oppose high speed rail.
But Wales needs high speed rail. Even without the line having to enter Wales, the massively reduced journey times to key hubs like Manchester and Liverpool will make it much easier and quicker to reach places like my constituency. An hour and ten minutes is less than some tube journeys – so suddenly, for London-based teams, North Wales begins to look like an easy place to do business.
In the future, after electrification of the North Wales Main Line, one or two trains a day could even "turn off" at Crewe – allowing a European passenger to go direct from, say, Brussels to Bangor. If this sounds far-fetched, that is a sign of how acceptable it has become to think of parts of North Wales as backwaters.
That can and should change - but not if we refuse to make the investment.
This is why I have called the debate – to make the Welsh case for high speed rail in place of the ministerial team, who are refusing to do so.
Wealthy areas in Buckinghamshire can afford to sit back and enjoy proximity to London and the rest of Europe, but my constituency doesn’t have that luxury.
If ministers are serious about putting Wales and the rest of the UK on the map HS2 must go ahead, and I look forward to making that case in today's debate.
Susan Elan Jones has been Labour MP for Clwyd South, Wales since 2010
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