16:01 Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)

As I have highlighted over the years and as the Thames Crossing Action Group has highlighted, this is a destructive project, it is costly and it is environmentally damaging. It is destructive because it will put on the Essex side a vast amount of new concrete road leading from the Thames all the way up to the junction with the A127. It is very costly, as we have heard, at £8.2 billion. My hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham described his 8,200 towers of 1 million coins very aptly. If I had time, I could work out the volume of that, but it is a vast amount of money. Of course, the project is environmentally damaging not only in the amount of construction work that will go on, but, I think, in inviting more vehicles into the area. I know that the lower Thames crossing team are keen to decarbonise, but it cannot be built without having a huge impact on our local environment.

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16:17 The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. The Government’s priority is to enable more of those journeys to be walked and cycled and for public transport to be used. Reference was made to the future of transport. We will introduce legislation on self-driving vehicles and so on, so we will see significant improvements in this area. As the Minister responsible for decarbonisation and the future of transport, I would be delighted to work with her to identify where the opportunities for better public transport and active travel may be.

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