Press Watch: Adonis: Scotland won’t miss out on high-speed revolution

Transport Secretary Lord Adonis has promised “enormous” journey-time savings for Scottish rail passengers when the first major new railway in more than a century is built between London and Birmingham in around 15 years.

However, he conceded that discussions with the Scottish Government on funding a track extending north to Glasgow and Edinburgh had not begun and that a decision would be made “much further down the line”.

His comments have been met with disappointment by Scottish business leaders who have been lobbying for Holyrood and Westminster to agree an early funding package that would guarantee construction of a new route all the way to Scotland.

Network Rail has put the cost of such a route at £34 billion but believes the benefits to business and the environment would justify such expenditure.

Detailed plans for a track that will see 200mph trains operate between London and Birmingham by around 2025 are due to be announced on Thursday following a report submitted to the Government by a specially created company, High Speed Two, last December.

Lord Adonis told The Herald that a “core principle” of the scheme would be that high-speed trains would be able to continue north from the Midlands on existing infrastructure. He dismissed fears that journey times would suffer because the trains will not have tilting technology to allow them to accelerate round the turns of the West Coast Main Line.

“My concern is to see that Scotland is served by high-speed services from the outset of a high-speed network being developed, because of course it’s not possible to build a network all in one go,” he said.

“I expect high-speed trains serving Scotland directly and offering massive journey time savings to London from an early stage in development.”

The Transport Secretary said a special funding arrangement would have to be reached between the Scottish and UK governments as the scale of the project transcended any existing agreements.

“I would stress that both governments, in London and Edinburgh, have a very strong interest in developing a high-speed network that goes all the way to Scotland,” he added.

“We’re not into a detailed allocation of funding between different tiers of government. That is a decision much further down the line; it’s not an issue on which we reach a judgment in the forthcoming policy statement.”

The Scottish Chambers of Commerce (SCC), which has been leading a campaign to see Scotland included in any new high-speed rail network, has pushed for construction to begin at both ends.

Garry Clark, head of policy at the SCC, said: “From an economic point of view, I think they’re missing a trick on high-speed rail.

“In terms of the Scottish Government’s response, there’s been nothing in terms of a serious look at cost. At the end of the day, the Scottish Government is going to have to play a central role in developing high-speed rail plans, whether building from both ends or in phases, south to north.”

Mr Clark said that both Jim Murphy, the Secretary of State for Scotland, and Lord Adonis had made clear that the Scottish Government would be expected to pay for any new railway lines that were built in Scotland.

The Scottish Government has so far refused to discuss funding of a high-speed rail line but stressed its commitment to Scotland being included in a UK network.