HS2’s new chief executive has said he “can’t apologise” for the construction of a £100m bat tunnel on the embattled project.
Mark Wild said building the structure in Buckinghamshire was the “most appropriate” way to “comply with the law.”
Construction of the 1km-long mesh tunnel was intended to protect a colonoy of Bechstein bats, one of the rarest species of bat in the world.
But it has become a symbol of the UK’s cumbersome planning laws and the severe cost overruns at HS2, with the entire project now expected to exceed £60bn.
“I understand why that would raise public concern; it seems an extraordinary amount of money,” Wild told the Commons Public Accounts Committee.
“But I would say this: I have actually visited this structure myself in my first weeks to see it, it is of great concern to me to understand.”
Sir Jon Thompson, the former HS2 Chair who stepped down earlier this week, first raised the so-called “bat shed” at a rail conference in London in November.
The veteran civil servant described it as a “blot on the landscape” built with “no evidence” that bats would be put at risk from the project’s high-speed trains. He also revealed more than 8,000 different permits had been needed along the route.
Asked whether he regretted the decision, Wild said: “I can’t apologise for complying with the law. This structure is the most appropriate. It is an extraordinary amount of money but it is in the context of a scheme that is costing tens of billions and it’s built for 120 years.”
According to the Department for Transport (DfT)’s permanent secretary, Dame Bernadette Kelly, the Treasury had “challenged” the construction of the bat tunnel, but eventually decided it would be the “most efficient remedy” for protecting the Bechstein colony.
Wild said: “This is a considerable engineering structure. It is on a railway that will travel at over 200 miles an hour, so the engineering of this whole structure is quite considerable.
“At the end of the day, HS2 Ltd must obviously comply with the law, and the law says that we must mitigate damage, harm, to protected species.”