London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (Amendment) Bill

Absolutely. I cannot remember whether you, Mr Deputy Speaker, were in the Chair last time, but in the course of the discussion the right hon. Gentleman was guilty of making some rather poor-quality jokes about whether or not hamburgers were going to be sponsored in the Olympics and so forth. This hamburger junction construction is a really significant issue. I am delighted to see that the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning) is now in the Chamber. He will, I hope, come down and visit this part of the network. If he does so, he will realise the implications of the prospect of total closure of all the side roads off that junction, day after day during five weeks when all four sections will be closed off. That will mean that in the peak hours, 3,000 vehicles an hour that use that junction now will not be able to use it. The consequences in terms of disruption to local businesses and local residents are absolutely beyond comprehension. Last week, there was an incident on the road between West Parley and Longham—one of the side roads that leads ultimately into the Canford Bottom roundabout—as a result of which that road was closed. The traffic chaos, which extended well into the Bournemouth conurbation and had repercussions as far away as Poole, was enormous. There was a great deal of local anger, yet that was a closure that lasted only a few hours. What we are talking about now is a closure for 12 continuous weeks. If this were happening in your constituency, Mr Deputy Speaker, you would have done exactly the same as me—raise the matter with the local highways authority. I put the point that if we can keep the main parts of the roundabout for the A31 running during working hours, why cannot we allow the side roads to operate—at least during peak periods or during the working day. The highways authority, Dorset county council, told me that it had been presented by the Highways Agency with some 10 different options for the construction of this hamburger junction. Those options ranged from closing off all the roads completely for 24 or 48 hours and doing the construction quickly, thereby minimising the expense and duration of the works but maximising the disruption to all traffic to, at the other extreme, closing none of the roads at peak times, with the works taking longer and perhaps costing a bit more. As a result of the pressure of the ODA and the imperative to get this junction improved before the Olympic games—as I say, it is unnecessary, but it has now apparently been imposed on the roads Minister by his counterpart, the Minister for Sport and the Olympics—local businesses and local residents will suffer an enormous amount of disruption. In my submission, that is not consistent with the avowed intent of the Government, as expressed in paragraph 84 of the Bill's explanatory notes, according to which:"““The Government's aims in providing for, and enforcing, traffic restrictions required for the 2012 Games””" are"““to minimise the impact of the 2012 Games on local businesses and residents going about their everyday business.””" I have to tell my hon. Friend the Minister, and my hon. Friend the Minister responsible for roads, that those words ring extremely hollow in the Christchurch constituency, and in the neighbouring constituency of Mid Dorset and North Poole. I am sure that, in due course, when the residents of the Poole constituency, as well as the constituencies of Bournemouth East, Bournemouth West and North Dorset, realise the disruption that will be caused, the clamour for something to be done will become even greater. In my view, prevention is better than cure, and it is not too late for the Government to intervene. They could say either that the construction works should not be carried out until after the London Olympics, or that they should be carried out using a different method that would enable the local traffic to flow, especially during peak periods. The consequences of the total closures to which I have referred will be completely disproportionate. I have no doubt that if local people had known in advance about the data, which were supplied by the Highways Agency at the insistence of my hon. Friend the Minister only in the middle of August, there would have been uproar. They would have said that the plans were intolerable. Indeed, local businesses were not told about the proposed closures until the middle of August. They have now been told by EnterpriseMouchel, which works for the Highways Agency, that there will be road closures for 12 weeks from the middle of February 2012 until the beginning of May. That obviously includes the Easter period. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) is looking at me with incredulity at the prospect of major roads being closed for that length of time. It is impossible to over-emphasise the gravity of the situation. I do not think that the Highways Agency or the Olympic Delivery Authority have any notion of the anger that is going to be generated when people see what is happening on the ground and realise that there was, and still is, an alternative. This is not like when a motorway has to be closed following a fatal accident, which is an act of God—or perhaps not. We know that this is going to happen, and we ought to be able to plan for it and bring in the necessary traffic management measures to ensure minimum disruption to the local traffic. However, because of the imperative of getting the work done before the Olympics, local businesses and residents are going to be put through an enormous amount of inconvenience. I cannot even get an answer on whether it will be possible for pedestrians to cross from one side of the junction to the other during the course of the works. A detour of perhaps four or five miles will be required for motorists, through congested urban conditions. That will add hours to people's journeys and do immense economic damage to the locality. When we discussed this on Second Reading, my hon. Friend the Minister said that that was the first he had heard of the problem. I hope that he will now look into the matter again. His Bill enables him to say that the works should be half-completed or curtailed before the Olympics. They do not have to be finished until after the games, and if that is the price of enabling local people to go about their normal lives without disruption, so be it. Another point relates to the substance of whether the junction improvements are valid. Only when we obtained the data did the position become clear. Although the Highways Agency and others had asserted that everyone would be better off when the improvements had been completed, it was clear from the small print that, even during peak hours, vehicles coming off the eastern part of Wimborne Road West would experience greater delays than they do at present, and that the same would apply to Wimborne Road West in the evening and Ham lane in the morning. As for off-peak periods—and, of course, much of the day is off-peak, given that the peaks are defined as two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening—it is clear that, contrary to all the assertions, delays on the local roads will increase. That too was not made clear during the consultation, and the Highways Agency—perhaps in the knowledge that the consequences of declaring openly what was going to happen would be adverse to it—did not communicate the effects to local people. This is a serious example of the need for consultation with the local highways authority, but either there was no such consultation or, if it did take place, the highways authority has not been listened to. When I raised the matter with the traffic manager at Dorset county council's environmental directorate, he told me that the proposals considered with the Highways Agency included 10 different options for dealing with the traffic. The issues that they took into account were disruption to the network, buildability, and value for money. I asked what the county council thought, and at that stage it became rather difficult to engage with it. I asked a specific question: did the council believe that the proposals to block access and egress from all four local roads for such a long period was reasonable, or did it place a disproportionate burden on local residents and businesses? I also asked it to look at the 10 possible scenarios, but I am sorry to say that I did not receive a very clear answer from the highways authority. I am not sure whether its members had really got their heads around the gravity of what is proposed. The area contains many major businesses, including aerospace manufacturing, and those businesses—not to mention people going about their own ordinary daily business—will be greatly inconvenienced. If my amendments had been printed and selected, it would have been possible for the Bill to include the commitment made by the Minister earlier and repeated by the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead—who is responsible for road traffic—that the disruption to local businesses and residents would be minimised. It is clear from what has happened so far in relation to the A31 and the Canford Bottom improvements that that commitment is not being fulfilled. I hope that the Minister will relent between now and the beginning of the disruption that is due to start in February. As was established on the last occasion when we discussed the matter, any competitors or officials wanting to go to the Weymouth site will need to be there in good time. They will not want to risk a delay to their journey at the Canford Bottom roundabout, which, in any case, is probably a good hour and a half's drive from the Olympics venue. Officials and media people may want to bear that in mind. I notice that my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole is now in her place, and I hope she will join in the debate, in order to emphasise that this is not a party political matter, but rather a constituency matter of the highest order. We do not have the luxury of having any motorways in Dorset, and we do not have many trunk roads either, but we expect those that we do have to be managed and dealt with in a way that is much more friendly towards the needs of the local people than seems to be the case at present. I said I would not speak at length and I have resisted quoting from much of the extensive correspondence I have had with the Minister and officials. I hope this debate—and, perhaps, the protests that will follow if the Government do not relent on the proposed 12-week closures—will bring home to them the fact that local people take this issue very seriously.