Appeal court dismisses Chris Packham’s HS2 legal challenge as ‘fanciful’

CHRIS PACKHAM, the naturalist and television presenter, has lost a court bid to block the HS2 rail scheme after his case was dismissed as “fanciful”.

Mr Packham had argued there were failings in the way the Government reached its decision to give the project the go-ahead. He took his fight to the Court of Appeal after being refused a judicial review in April.

But yesterday, three senior judges upheld the High Court’s decision and dismissed Mr Packham’s claim.

Timothy Mould QC, barrister for the Government, argued: “It is simply fanciful for the appellant to assume the first respondent (the Secretary of State for Transport) knew nothing about the public legislative and procedural history, including the comprehensive assessment of environmental impacts … beyond that which was drawn to his attention by the report itself.”

Lord Justice Lindblom said that the court had “rejected both of Mr Packham’s

substantive grounds of appeal as unarguable”.

Mr Packham said following the judgment he was “deeply disappointed” by the decision over his challenge to the development of the high-speed rail network.

In a statement, an HS2 spokesman said: “From the outset HS2 Ltd has taken our commitment to the environment extremely seriously.

“The Act of Parliament gives us the legitimacy to carry out work to build the railway, and licences from Natural England and approvals from the Environment Agency ensure that we have the right safeguarding in place to protect wildlife and other natural assets.”