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Crossrail Bill

I said a few moments ago that I envisaged that the railway would be regulated by the Office of Rail Regulation. Our difficulty is that we are trying to build a new railway that will be partly completely new—the tunnels—and partly integrated with the existing network. Powers must thus be taken through the Bill to make that happen and to allow the Crossrail services to run. It is intended that the railway will be part of the national network and that it will be regulated by the ORR. Although it is perfectly true that one cannot run two trains on one piece of railway at the same time—I will come on to deal with questions about the west country service, which I know affects the right hon. Lady—the intention is that Crossrail will be run as part of the national network. Yes, it will provide London commuter services, but it will also provide links for different parts of the United Kingdom. The right hon. Lady should have no fear that this will somehow be a bit of railway that will be run entirely independently from the rest of the network. That would not be possible due to its very nature. If that were the intention, we would do precisely what the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles) envisages in the instruction that he has tabled and stop it at the tunnel ends, but that is not the case.