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Crossrail Bill

I do not think that we have yet reached the stage where Conservative policy is exactly the same as ours—[Interruption.] We shall see. The point is that the Select Committee will concentrate on matters relating to the petitions, which I would expect to be mainly concerned with matters of private interest—property take, land acquisition and so forth. In respect of the acquisition of sites presently used for freight, for example, some broader policy issues will be raised. The second part of the Opposition’s instruction refers to rail freight, the national rail network and the Olympics and I intend to say something about all of them shortly. Typically, those issues would be dealt with by a Standing Committee because they deal with general public policy rather than private interest.