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Crossrail Bill

I shall continue to reply to the constituency issues that hon. Members have raised. My hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) raised several issues about the role of Network Rail, which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made clear earlier. My hon. Friend also referred to the effects on services and freight. That again was made clear earlier: we do not expect major effects on freight. There will be issues to consider during the construction phase, but we shall be talking to all partners and all bodies to move the process forward and come to agreement through negotiation. The compensation levels that he mentioned will be set as per the standard compensation arrangements. The right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May) mentioned the Reading issue, so let me make it clear why we have not included Reading. Obviously, we shall consult on that process, but we believe that the case is not made because of the passenger numbers and because we do not believe that passengers from Reading would use that service when they can use a non-stopping service to Paddington. My hon. Friend the Member for Dagenham (Jon Cruddas) made a powerful point about economic development and regeneration and one of the many benefits of Crossrail is that it will contribute to the regeneration of large parts of London, particularly the east of London. He made the point about capacity and population movements and the importance of transport in that respect.