Q111 Chair: And it cut your contingency by nearly £300 million, Mr Higgins. Is that right?
David Higgins: During the planning process, yes. That is the correct figure.
Q112 Chair: So your contingency as a proportion of your budget for this second phase is what?
David Higgins: I don't know the exact amount of the contingency. What I do know about the project, however, is that we have tendered it and we have brought on delivery partners-Costain, Invensys and Balfour Beatty-some 18 months ago. So they have been fully engaged. We only started construction in May-only a month ago-so for 18 months they have been looking at all the construction planning and sequencing. We are tying them into a gain-sharing agreement between the three different parties to carry out that work. I am confident that we have got the right partners on board and that we have the right planning.
Q113 Chair: You are confident that you will live within the contingency?
David Higgins: Yes, I expect us to deliver on that and we have certainly delivered on stage 1-
Q114 Chair: Despite the fact that there are a load of provisional costings still around the place?
David Higgins: In terms of provisional costings, we tendered 18 months ago, we had cost plans and we accepted Costain when it put in cost plans. So I am confident that we have good coverage of that.
The key issue now is really the integration of everything. The physical work at London Bridge is complicated enough-getting access-but it is now about the integration, because we all think of the physical redevelopment but we are now moving all the signalling system for this whole area down to Three Bridges. So we are building a new state-of-the-art control centre. We are relocking, interlocking and changing the interlocking on the whole of the railway system progressively. Then we are introducing automatic train operation-on what will be one of the most advanced systems in Europe-progressively through to the end of 2019.
Q115 Meg Hillier: I just wanted to ask some quick questions and the answers can be quick too, so don't take it amiss that we are just doing things quickfire. I will ask a bit more on the rolling stock, and then on some of the issues around the interim rolling stock. First, on the rolling stock-I think this question is to you, Mr Hurn-why has the rolling stock been commissioned on fixed-car models, that is eight-carriage trains and 12-carriage trains?
Michael Hurn: A lot of analysis was undertaken when we were looking at the specification for this project, to look at whether we would have fixed-car formations; that is taking a 12-carriage train, all joined together, so you can't split the train up. That is what it means, obviously.
The main reason is that we want to have, as I mentioned earlier, a metro frequency through London. There are operational risks of having multiple-formation trains joining up elsewhere in the country. There is a delay issue with that potentially, which can delay performance through the centre of the railway in London. The other really important factor is that, with the type of train we want to have, its characteristics are very quick dwell time. The train comes into the platform, spends a short amount of time at the station and moves on again to get that frequency and that reliability of performance. To do that, we have had to have wider doors and more stand-back areas. We have therefore had to take out some seats. To compensate for that, by having a fixed-formation train you do not have so many driver cabs, and therefore you can provide more seats. In answer to your question, there is a lot of analysis into that, but those are the two main reasons driving it.
Q116 Meg Hillier: I get your point about flow. Are there any cost advantages to this?
Michael Hurn: There are some cost advantages. You have less maintenance because you have fewer cabs to maintain. Clearly, there are some disadvantages to having the trains run in fixed formation. You need longer trains than necessary, even during some of the off-peak periods. That is understood.
Q117 Meg Hillier: You've analysed that?
Michael Hurn: Yes, we analysed that. We looked at the balance of all that, and concluded that it is in the best interests of the project to have fixed-formation trains. It was put into the invitation to tender, and it has been there all the way through in terms of the specification. The other important thing to say is we will have a new, much larger, train franchise from September 2014. Clearly, we will be encouraging innovation from that train franchise to use the fleet in the best possible way.
Meg Hillier: I'll stop you there because we are going to be moving on to the franchise, and I know that Steve wanted to come in.
Q118 Stephen Barclay: It is just a quick question that flowed from an earlier hearing. Will all the new rolling stock have the capacity to scan passengers on and off?
Michael Hurn: Do you mean from a ticketing perspective?
Q119 Stephen Barclay: No, from a passenger forecasting and usage perspective.
Michael Hurn: I will need to check, but I think there are some arrangements for looking at the weight of the train when it is loaded with passengers, which gives an indication of loading. But I will need to check what is in the technical specification for it.
Q120 Stephen Barclay: It distinguishes between passengers with lots of bags and passengers travelling light, does it?
Michael Hurn: I'm not sure it is as sophisticated as that. Certainly, the train will know the extent of loading on each carriage, and will give an idea of that.
Philip Rutnam: We get good data on passenger flows from ticketing systems and ticketing information.