Jon Thompson steps down as chairman of HS2 as the price of rail projects in the UK rises

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The chairman of Britain’s high-speed rail project 2 will step down in the spring, the government said on Tuesday, hours after the Financial Times reported that the price tag had increased by 9 billion pounds.

Sir Jon Thompson will leave your post just two years after taking the helm in February 2023, he previously sat on the board of HS2 Ltd for two years.

One rail executive said Thompson’s departure was not surprising as ministers had appointed a new chief executive of HS2 and ordered a review of its powers and costs.

Thompson recently took up a board position at Mike Ashley’s Frasers Group, owner of UK retailer Sports Direct. Sky news reported last month that he was lined up to become chairman of Frasers in 2025.

But the government announcement came hours after the FT reported that an official report to be published later on Tuesday would show an internal estimate that HS2 would cost between £54 billion and £66 billion at 2019 prices.

That cost estimate, disputed by the government, would mark a huge jump from the previous figure of between £49bn and £57bn a year ago. The above figure is equivalent to about 80 billion pounds at today’s prices.

Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary, thanked Thompson for “working for almost four years to develop Britain’s biggest rail project”, adding: “He has shown strong leadership strong during the project’s challenging times.”

Last year, the then Conservative government cut the project in half, leaving just a stretch from London to Birmingham.

Thompson led HS2 as executive chairman for 12 months when the project lacked a permanent chief executive, before incumbent Mark Wild arrived.

He has been asked by ministers to conduct a review of the project, including drawing up a new, detailed cost estimate.

Alexander said Tuesday that she expected Wild to “keep a firm grip on the budget and schedule, and deliver this service as cost-effectively as possible for passengers and taxpayers.”

Wild will seek to renegotiate a number of contracts which officials say have made it difficult for HS2 to deal with suppliers and contractors.

Thompson recently expressed his frustration at the planning issues and bureaucracy that have contributed to the skyrocketing costs of HS2.

He said the most typical example is construction demand £100m bat barn on the railway to protect a rare species from being hit by a train passing through woods in Buckinghamshire.

“I can give you countless examples of that. That’s my favorite because it involves this bat. . . and people then have this simple way of saying, ‘Oh, you went over budget.’ Well, yes, but do people think about bats?,” Thompson said at an industry conference in November.

HS2 has been plagued by delays and cost overruns since it was given the go-ahead by ministers more than a decade ago, with management blaming problems including cost-plus contracts , the increase in tunneling and the complexity with ground conditions.

The price tag for the route between London and northern England was put at £33 billion when it was approved in 2012.