10. Crossrail Limited told us that there was an "extreme commitment" both within, and outside, the programme to meet the December 2018 milestone, set in 2010, for the start of train services running through the central section of the railway, between Paddington and Abbey Wood.11 The Department acknowledged that this date had become politically important to TfL, the Mayor of London and the Department, and that this was not conducive to the effective management of this complex programme. However, it asserted that the creation of Crossrail Limited as a separate delivery body was a way of enabling a responsible view to be taken of what could be delivered, and that it was Crossrail Limited's responsibility to tell the Department if the delivery date could not be achieved.12
11. We heard that the commitment and pressure to meet the December 2018 milestone, plus the challenges the programme had already overcome, led to optimism bias in Crossrail Limited on what could be achieved in the time available and a failure to properly assess the risks to the schedule from delays. The Chairman of Crossrail Limited's Board, who has experience of large programmes but was not in post at the time that the failures emerged, told us that the courage required to challenge the schedule and stop such a large programme would have been "immense".13 The Department recognised that there were broader lessons for government and the scope of the work it had commissioned following the problems with this programme included considering how government and the public sector can be more realistic about schedule pressure in complex programmes.14
12. Crossrail Limited believed that there was no systematic failure in how the programme was organised or designed, but a failure to understand the scale and complexity of the programme. We heard that London Underground would typically build three stations at once and commission or put into service, one or two a year. The Crossrail programme was of a different magnitude and involved building and commissioning 10 new stations.15
13. Crossrail Limited explained that the work on the stations started to slip in 2016 and that this had a ratcheting effect of building up risk within the programme. It told us that it had now re-sequenced the programme to complete the stations after the railway systems (such as signalling systems and operational systems to control parts of the railway including platform doors), a situation it did not want to be in. It accepted that this re-sequencing should have happened earlier when the stations first became delayed.16
14. In November 2017, there was an explosion at an electrical substation at Pudding Mill Lane, which had "far-reaching consequences" and the "explosion set of a chain reaction of glitches-delaying power to the central tunnels and thus all the extensive testing that needed to be done".17 The Department told us that this set of significant alarm bells and had an enormous impact on the programme because three months of the schedule was lost, with only 13 months to go before the December 2018 opening. It told us that this had prompted it to question Crossrail Limited on whether the December 2018 milestone could still be met and that Crossrail had assured it that by revising its plan for testing and commissioning, it could still deliver the railway in December. It told us that it was disappointed that it had not received better information and that over-optimism had led to inaccurate assumptions being made about what was possible. Crossrail Limited told us that while the explosion was a significant event, it was not the main cause of the delays as at the date of the explosion there was already a lack of installed signalling systems and the stations were a long way behind schedule. It asserted that the risk profile of the programme at that stage was such that, even if the explosion had not happened, the programme would still have failed to deliver on time. It recognised that individuals and teams were working in silos and were not able to identify the impact that individual delays had on the overall programme, so this information was not communicated upwards.18
15. Since December 2018, TfL has published some Crossrail programme documents on its website, including project status reports by the Project Representative.19 The Project Representative is a team appointed by the programme's sponsors, embedded in Crossrail Limited, to undertake reviews and provide commentary to the sponsors on progress.20 The Project Representative's May 2018 project status report, even though redacted, includes statements such as "significant completion and integration challenges remain" with the stations, tunnel portals and shafts, and "technical difficulties and poor progress" in the completion of other rail systems. The operational readiness assessment within the report notes that 16 readiness tasks are rated as 'red' and a further 5 are rated as 'amber'. None are rated at 'green'. The report summarised that the schedule "remains highly ambitious" and there "remains a high risk that [the December 2018 opening date] will not be achieved".21 Around the same time, in June 2018, a member of the Committee visited a Crossrail site and was told by programme representatives that the programme was on track and would be delivered on time. Crossrail Limited told us that it did not believe there was any intention to deceive or mislead, but that programme staff probably failed to understand the work still to complete or the amalgamation of risk.22
16. The Department was unable to explain how it reconciled the Project Representative's bleak assessment with other information it was getting from Crossrail Limited that the programme would be delivered on time. The Department argued, unconvincingly, that the Project Representative was a small team undertaking deep dives into small aspects of the programme, compared to thousands of members of staff in Crossrail Limited. It told us that while it was aware of delivery risks to the December 2018 delivery date, it expected these to be a matter of weeks not months and the scale of the problems emerged far faster than it expected. It recognised that there had been warning bells in March and April 2018 because of projected cost increases, but given the scale of the programme, it had believed these were not as major as the problems that crystallised over summer 2018.23 The Department told us that in 2018 there was a "real stepping up" of its challenging, and the questions that it was asking, of Crossrail Limited's executive team in order to get clarity and assurance on progress, and that Crossrail had remained confident consistently that the delivery date of December 2018 could be achieved.24 The Department was not able to explain sufficiently what changed as a result of this reported increased scrutiny.25
17. The new Chief Executive of Crossrail Limited, who took on this role in November 2018, asserted that individual reporting of risks was managed well and that there was a good audited risk process.26 However, they accepted that the management team did not have a good enough grip or understanding of the work that was still to be completed and that there was a systematic failure to properly assess the amalgamation of individual risks from delays to the interrelated work on the stations and signalling systems. The Department similarly asserted that staff involved were not incompetent and were acting professionally and in good faith. However, it told us that "risks were not adequately identified, assessed, mitigated and reported on by and within Crossrail Ltd".27 The evidence we heard focused on explaining the failure to properly identify and get a grip on systematic risks across the programme. However, we did not hear a convincing explanation of the root causes of the delays that led to the schedule becoming compressed.28 We look forward to the results of a NAO review into the root causes of the delays.
18. We questioned the Department on its confidence in the risk assessments for other departmental projects and programmes. We heard that the arrangements for delivering projects and programmes varied. It asserted, however, that it did have detailed risk registers for all the projects it directly managed and that it looked at cumulative risk across its portfolio of projects. Where it did not directly manage projects, the Department expected all risks to be reported to it by those delivering the projects and that it would challenge and assure reported risks. It was, however, keen to learn lessons and would be implementing the recommendations from a review it had commissioned jointly with the Infrastructure and Projects Authority on the wider lessons from the Department's delivery of major projects.29
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11 Qq 3, 6, 67
12 Qq 86-87, 94
13 Qq 6, 38, 68, 69; Tony Meggs was previously the Chief Executive of the Infrastructure and Projects Authority. He became the Chairman of Crossrail Limited's Board on 14 January 2019.
14 Q 94
15 Qq 41, 43; C&AG's Report, page 7
16 Qq 50-52
17 Financial Times, Crossrail: how Europe's largest transport project stalled, 20 December 2018
18 Qq 62-65
19 Transport for London, Crossrail project updates
20 C&AG's Report, page 16
21 Jacobs, Project status report 111, Period 1 FY 2018-19, 1 April 2018 - 28 April 2018, 24 May 2018
22 Qq 65, 74-77
23 Qq 82-85, 143
24 Qq 63, 78-81, 85
25 Qq 80-87, 90-93
26 Qq 12-14; Mark Wild was previously a non-executive director on Crossrail Limited's Board.
27 Qq 2, 13, 17, 37, 65
28 Qq 32, 33
29 Qq 53, 54