Spiralling HS2 bill may pass £100bn, says PM

THE PRIME Minister may have let slip the spiralling bill for HS2 during a radio interview, prompting fears he was preparing to scrap the project after the election if he were to win a majority.

Speaking to Nick Ferrari on radio station LBC yesterday, Boris Johnson was asked whether money should keep going into the rail scheme which is planned to connect Leeds to London, Birmingham, the East Midlands, and Manchester.

Mr Johnson said: “We’ve got a review going on to look at whether the money could be better spent, and that’s not to say that I am temperamentally hostile to big infrastructure projects.

“I think that the issue for anybody looking at HS2 – a new administration – if you come in with a project that is north of £100bn probably, you’ve got to ask yourself if it’s responsible to the taxpayer, to ask if it’s being sensibly spent and is that funding being prioritised right. You know, could you spend it more sensibly in the North?”

Up until now the bill for HS2 had been set at £88bn, and when challenged Mr Johnson admitted this was the current estimate, but he said he expected it to be pushed higher still.

He said: “Looking at the way these things go, it probably will come in north of £100bn but at the moment you are right, at the moment it’s £88bn.

“That is a lot of money. And there will be serious questions about whether that is the right… the question is are we spending it in the right order?”

The Oakervee review into HS2 was due to be released before the election, however it was shelved when it became clear the country would go to the polls.

Mr Johnson later suggested he was “looking at” abolishing the BBC licence fee. The Prime Minister said that while the Tories were currently “not planning to get rid of all TV licence fees”, the current system “bears reflection”.