HS2 passes a colony of rare, protected barbastrelle bats in the Chilterns. To prevent bats from colliding with trains, the agreed mitigation is to spend £100m on a new 1km cut-and-cover tunnel.
To many, this is a demonstration that the UK has a problem with building the right infrastructure, in a timely manner, at a price that compares well with our international peers. This matters; a) because of our historic record of underinvesting in projects that have well-evidenced economic benefits, and b) our high relative costs for delivery of schemes.
High costs mean we under-provide. As a result we have the largest city in Europe without a rapid transit system. We have cities that lose productivity because it takes so long to get to the city centre at peak times. We have regions without a water supply to support the new homes needed. Uncertainty and high costs are an ongoing drag on many of the biggest and most exciting projects we work on, where we want them to realise their full potential as sustainable, attractive new places.
The Elizabeth line has beaten its projected ridership by staggering amounts. But what if we could have built three Crossrails for the cost of one? Paris, Stockholm, Leipzig and Madrid and many others could have.
The bat tunnel is a symptom of an underlying problem. The proffered remedies – cutting back on statutory consultees, easing up on environmental regulations – may seem tempting and might help, but are not necessarily a long-term solution.
Instead, we should look at how our peers do it. In public transport, the lowest benchmark costs for the new trams, trains, metros and stations that link places together sustainably are seen in the Nordic countries, southern Europe, France and Switzerland, as well as further afield in Asia. There, projects are designed and led by the public sector, with the in-house expertise to make decisions, do design work themselves, effectively work with consultants for specialist expertise, and manage construction contracts. Grand Paris Express – a transformational 200km of tunnels and 68 new Metro stations within the Parisian suburbs – is being run in-house by the regional government, with their own engineers and design teams.
The UK does not do this (although we used to). Design and specification of public projects is regularly outsourced. Risks and decisions that the public sector could navigate (e.g. gaining consents and deciding on appropriate mitigation) are instead currently handed off to the private sector, having to facilitate one arm of government talking to another.
This approach leads to inefficiencies, a lack of accountability, and an urge by politicians to intervene on details.
It is easy to say ‘take politics out of this process.’ Hive it off to an arms-length body of experts. But the spending of public money and change to our built and natural environment will always be political. Politicians should be supported by a public sector that brings the right decisions to them at the right time, and has the confidence and capacity to avoid sending everything up the chain, or handing everything off to a third party for another study. More capability and expertise at all levels in the public sector should be the long-term aim of this and future governments.
An odd conclusion from a consultant? I say not. We would all, citizens and consultants, benefit from a public sector with more capacity to deliver, and able to act as a more informed, leading and capable client, drawing on us as consultants for our expertise in specific areas. Together, we would get far more done, and deliver great, sustainable new places. And it might not drive us batty.