Crossrail Bill

moved Amendment No. 39: 39: Clause 66, page 40, line 28, at end insert— ““(2) CLRL shall publish an annual statement setting out— (a) all relevant details as to the monies received and used to fund the construction and maintenance of Crossrail; (b) incurred costs to date; (c) projected total outturn costs to date; and (d) which bodies shall bear responsibility and liability for any costs associated with the building of Crossrail. (3) The Secretary of State and Mayor of London shall publish an annual response to CLRL’s annual statement setting out all relevant details relating to— (a) expenditure in last 12 months for the purposes of constructing Crossrail; (b) total expenditure incurred to date for the purposes of constructing Crossrail; (c) projected total expenditure for the purposes of constructing Crossrail; (d) the proceeds of any land and property disposed of to date by CLRL; and (e) the use to which the disposal proceeds of any land and property have been applied to date.”” The noble Lord said: I am sorry to stop the smooth flow of the finishing of the Committee stage of the Bill this afternoon. As discussed in my previous amendment to Clause 22, transparency and reporting will be a key determining factor of the delivery of this project on time and on budget. I suspect that the Committee will be aware that the amendment builds on one tabled by my honourable friend Stephen Hammond in another place. He suggested an amendment to put a requirement on a mixture of the Mayor of London and the Secretary of State to produce reports relating to the objectives, expenditure and revenue generated during the construction of Crossrail. The Government gave assurances that this would already happen within the current regulatory framework and heads of terms, and said that it did not have to be specifically highlighted in the Bill. Following a Division, the amendment was rejected. I share the concerns of the honourable Member for Wimbledon and should like to push the point about transparency and accountability again in this Committee. The purpose of the amendment is to require transparent annual reports to be published detailing how the project is progressing against budgeted costs and the agreed funding agreement. Given the huge scale of the project—some £l6 billion over seven years, as we have said several times today—we consider it vital that annual accounts of activity are published by Cross London Rail Links so that Parliament, the Secretary of State, the Mayor of London and all private sector funders can see how their money has been spent and what the projected outturn costs are. This level of transparency is particularly important and necessary given that two other huge projects have endured great difficulties in recent years. The Channel Tunnel Rail Link, which impressively was delivered on time and on budget, nevertheless required two financial restructurings and £6 billion of government-backed debt to see it through to completion, while the modernisation of the west coast main line, which was originally forecast to cost £2.5 billion back in 1998, helped to force Railtrack into administration, and it is now forecast that it will have cost more than £8 billion when it is completed in late 2008—more than three years later than the planned completion date. We cannot afford to let history repeat itself. The amendment would ensure clear project management and financial reporting, giving confidence to all stakeholders and funding contributors that the construction of Crossrail is being delivered within or to budget. It would also ensure that any potential funding problems could be identified as soon as possible, thereby allowing plans to be made and action to be taken to steer the project back on course. I hope that the Committee agrees with my argument and can see the benefits that this level of transparency would bring. Moving away from the amendment but keeping on the topic of finance, it is important that we touch on a few other concerns that I have in relation to the funding and budgeting of this project. I should like to ask the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, whether the budget of almost £16 billion has taken into account the inflationary costs that we are likely to see in the future. Obviously, there is the topic of fuel prices, which will add to the costs, but have the Government budgeted enough for the cost of labour and so on in 2010 and beyond? Over the next decade, a number of major engineering and construction projects will fully involve the construction industry. Some examples are the Building Schools for the Future programme, the tremendous number of waste facilities in the south-east, the Olympic Games, and various other projects, including two enormous port projects in my own county, to name but a few. Those projects will reduce the supply of skilled labour that is available to deliver the Crossrail project and will be coupled with high demand for specialist labour, in particular. Can the Minister confirm whether the inflationary elements have been taken into account in the £16 billion budget? One point that has not come up at all today, but which was raised several times at Second Reading, is that the funding of Crossrail is very dependent on the legislation that will take into account the small part of the business rate that will provide funding. That is how the whole project was agreed. I think that the Prime Minister said in his pre-Queen’s Speech announcement in the summer that this legislation was to be protected in the coming year. If it does not happen and that legislation does not go through Parliament, the current funding mechanism for Crossrail will not be available. Perhaps the Minister will comment on that for everyone’s benefit, so that we will know that Crossrail will definitely be funded. I beg to move.