Welcome to the APM Podcast. AM is the chartered body for the
project profession. My name is Emma De Vita and I'm
the editor of Project APM's Quarterly journal and your Host
and this podcast. I'm speaking with Beth W, CEO of
East West Rail and Transport Project that will open up a
corridor from Oxford through Milton Keynes and Bedford to
Cambridge and connect the UK's two leading life sciences and
tech hotspots. Welcome back, Thanks for joining
us today on the PM podcast. Perhaps a good place to start
would be for you to give us a bit of background about the
history of the project, what the overall plan is, and where
things are right now in July. Of course so since the 90s and
local authorities across the region from Oxford to Cambridge
and even even wider than that, have been really advocating for
the rights of the restoration of an East West Link between Oxford
and Cambridge in particular, but going West of Oxford and and
east of Cambridge. And so in the early 20 teens a
business case was made to start the construction of of East West
Rail. So the first phase from Oxford
to Vista is up and operating. The The next phase, from from
Vista to Bletchley, is under construction now, which is run
by a Network Rail alliance. Is actually not part of East
West Railway Company, but it's a Network Rail alliance with Lang
O'Rourke and Atkins and local vessels.
And then East Austral was set, Eastrail Company was set up in
2018 really to be something different from from Network Rail
to be blunt about it and to really look at what could be
done differently in the rail sector very much in in a
vertical integration kind of way.
So can reconnecting train and track and to look at really how
do you more cost effectively and more quickly deliver new railway
infrastructure? So so the railway line already
had the business case made from Oxford to Bletchley.
There is an existing railway line called the Marston Vale
line between Bletchley and Bedford that was stopped from
closing back in the post beeching days and it's been run
as a community railway and but it it only run runs one train an
hour each way. Normally that railway stopped
passenger services at the moment because the rolling stock
provider went into administration.
So unfortunately at the moment the, the customers have to take
a real replacement bus. And so part of our scheme is to
upgrade that line so that it could take more than one train
per hour each way. And then we're building a new
line between Bedford and Cambridge.
So we've done a couple of statutory, non statutory
consultations on the on the line of route to see what the
communities want. You know we looked at a bunch of
different alignments to see what was going to be the best
alignment and how we might upgrade the Marston Vale line
And there was a bit of a hiccup back in 2021 and we we were
really asked to really look at the strategic case again off the
back of that we completed the work and looked at alternatives
to drive the cost down. And before we were able to get
the conclusion of that, we had a couple of changes of government
and really happily though, we've had a huge amount of support
from the current government. And we were mentioned by the
Chancellor in last year's Autumn Statement and this year's budget
and in May we announced our preferred route announcement so
that we can move towards submitting our planning
application. So what comes next is that we
are designing a way we've been holding public drop in events
and will continue to have public engagement throughout the autumn
and into the New year. But we are targeting starting
our statutory consultation process in the first half of
next year so that we're able to submit our development consent
order, which is our planning application after the general
election and you joined in April 2022.
So what point was everything at then?
It was deeply uncertain when I joined, I have to say.
So we weren't sure if we were going to have a project and my
first hundred days sort of coincided with the Prime
Minister resigning. So, you know, what I was doing
is trying to drive us towards making a decision and getting,
you know, trying to to really look at the organisation and and
make sure we were heading in the right direction.
And all that was going along and we were making a recommendation
and it was all, you know, going, you know, progressing.
And then we had this big political change.
So we had to take a step back, figure out how do we?
How do we engage with potential incoming governments and
convince them that that it's the right scheme and that we should
continue to go ahead? So we did a lot of work from
July until. Really until November, December
talking to the to the candidates teams, the new and then the new,
the new governments about scheme and and that it was, it was
really a good idea to do it. Especially looking at the
potential for growth across the region which is a, you know it
has huge amounts of of high potential based on very 21st
century businesses and areas of development.
So life sciences in in Cambridge for example, our business case
is really driven from the opportunities that the railway
provides rather than just some railway infrastructure.
How do you measure the success of the project?
What are the deliverables you're looking to achieve?
So it's bigger than just delivering a railway, It's
actually thinking about how it will grow the economy, linking
those two kind of tech hotspots together.
Exactly. And and you know Milton Keynes
and Bedford and and really helping create water benefits
for the communities in between as well and you know more people
on trains mean fewer people on roads.
So even if you're not necessarily somebody who's going
to take take a train journey, what you should be getting the
benefit of is fewer people driving through your village on
the way to get somewhere else. But our our business case is
really driven off of the opportunity to.
To to develop growth and there's a potential National
Infrastructure Commission forecasted there were potential
additional 80,000 jobs in Cambridge alone.
So the question is where do you get, you know, where do you get
those people from Cambridge is really expensive.
Cost of living there is really, really high.
They don't have that opportunity for lots of development.
There's a green belt and so you have to look at, well, where are
people going to be able to live that is affordable in the
region? There's already a railway line
that runs NS like everywhere in the country and people who live
South of Cambridge, the housing is really expensive there.
So they tend to gravitate towards London jobs.
People already do come down from north of Cambridge but where
property prices are actually a lot lower is to the to the east
and to the West. And so the the opportunity is to
to work with the local authorities which is you know
this is their responsibility to to look at local plans and local
planning to build railway stations and places where
there's potential for new places and and that's where you know
huge amount of the benefits are going to come from which will be
about creating the links and for.
The opportunities for people and businesses to establish
themselves near Cambridge, to get into those jobs in Cambridge
and then also to get you know businesses more widely
throughout the region. Because what we've seen in
places is that a lot of times you want businesses want to have
their sort of their science hub. For example, you know people
want to be at the the Cambridge Biomedical campus, but if
they're going to do some manufacturing they might want to
take that slightly outside of Cambridge but near be nearby.
So by having East West Rail allows for companies to be able
to go to Bedford, for example, and and establish something
there because they're able to get there really quickly by
public transport. Yeah, OK, that makes sense.
And what drew you to the role? I mean the reason I've been
infrastructure in the 1st place is because I care about what
infrastructure does for people. Infrastructure is there to
enable people to live their lives and the better we provide
our infrastructure, the the better, you know, that should be
helping people's lives get better.
And the railway, I think by being its size as well, you
know, it's not a huge project. It's allows us to to do some
stuff. I think that's really different
from other big infrastructure projects.
What do you mean? So one of the things is the
biggest thing for me is how do we connect with our communities
and how do we? Actually collaborate with our
communities and Co create where it's appropriate, what the right
outcomes are going to be because every place is you know every
place in England is different, every place in the UK is
different and every every place across this region is different.
And so not every solution that we might come up with is going
to be right for each place. So the interest, the interesting
thing for me is how do we talk to our communities and say OK at
Camborne station, how do we get really good door to door connect
connectivity is that we work with the local authority to
develop cycle paths and they have really good pre bookable
cycle storage is that we have some.
Really. Interesting local bus networks
that that just sort of you know could come up with something
that's really helpful to get people from from their houses to
to the station. But then we need to design the
station really well to have that pre bookable cycle storage or
that but good bus connectivity and that's going to be different
from place to place. And so it it's that engagement
and then talking to people and really understanding what their,
what they want will create a better outcome because it's been
designed for the people who are going to use it.
I've obviously done a bit of reading around and I was come
across the idea that you're quite up for innovating project
delivery or trying different things.
Or tell me a bit about that. So I I've also done lots of
reading and research and and and I feel like we all know that the
construction industry and the rail industry hasn't really
evolved much and doesn't have brilliant productivity.
And when I observe why that is, I think a lot of times we try
stuff and then it doesn't work 100% and then we go back to the
way we've always done things because you know I told you was
it wasn't going to work properly but rather than going oh I got
50%, that's amazing, if you try again we'll get to 75%.
If you try a third time then we'll get to 100%.
And we never seem to do that as an industry.
And again I think that with East West Rail we have some really
great opportunities to try some stuff out on the railway,
especially because we're not you know the the Bedford to
Cambridge bit, we're we're not massively going to impact the
rest of the network. So we might be able to try some
things out which might be a little bit riskier, not from a
safety perspective, but just from a.
The delivery perspective, that might be a little bit riskier
than what we might normally do, but it shouldn't be something
that's gonna have a major risk impact on the network.
So it's an opportunity to trial some stuff out in a relatively
controlled environment to see if we can actually do things more
cost effectively. So you're up for a bit of
experimentation. Can you be a bit more specific
in other ideas that you're really excited about trying out?
One of the big questions I've got for the team is how do we,
how do we just move less earth because the big costs on a lot
of these railway jobs are or highways jobs, It's moving dirt
and that's a huge part of everybody's cost.
But from a sustainability point of view, from a cost point of
view, for a time point of view, actually the less we intervene
in what we're trying to do to get to the outcomes that we
want, we will be more sustainable because we're doing
less. That's a good thing.
We'll be cheaper because we're we're doing less and that's a
good thing and we'll be quicker because the less we do, the more
we can get to the to the benefits.
So, you know, the challenge that I give to the designers is how
do we, how do we actually, you know, move, move.
How do we build less staff? We tend as an industry to go,
what's the biggest thing we can build or what's the best thing
we can do? And there's a bit of a, for me,
there's a bit of a mindset to say we've got a climate
emergency, how do we get those benefits with the least amount
of impact? Because that's that's a winner
all round. What about in terms of the way
the project is managed? Is there anything you're
experimenting with in terms of the kind of methodology, the
approach you take, the tech you're using?
So organizationally we're trying to do we're we're going full on
matrix which I know is not remotely radical, but we're
trying to to really have multidisciplinary teams working
together to come up with what their scope looks like together
and drive forward the outcomes. It's still a work in progress
because people want to you know it's not how people are normally
normally work in the industry. So trying to say no you don't,
don't don't wait your turn to approve something.
You need to get in there the outset and design it and make
sure that the scope is right from everybody from all the all
the different disciplines perspectives because if you
don't get the scope right then we're not going to get the
outcome right. So you need to be in there from
the beginning. Not sort of sitting at the side
so we're we're working really hard on that because I really
believe in that because it's it goes to a diversity point
actually which is to get to the right outcome and you need to be
able to listen to a whole array of different voices but we all
need to recognise that diversity is actually really hard and
inclusion is really hard because it's easy and I I joke around
like group think is really easy because we just all trundle
along and we think it's all fine but actually when you when
you're you know we we make friends we tend to make friends
with people who are similar to us because it's easy but when
we're in work we we have to to get to those good outcomes we
really have to listen to different voices and they might
be things you don't want to hear.
And that's hard. It is like we, you know it's
it's challenging and I think we we really need to lean into that
difference because that is how we get to to to the better
outcomes, faster outcomes. But it takes us longer to get
there at the beginning. And again you know it's an
industry like we need to start building stuff straight away.
It's like actually if you think about the design first they put
a little bit more time in the at the front end where all the
costs, you know basically all your cost decisions at the front
end, but a little bit more time in the front end you should get
to much better outcomes. The back end.
It should be cheaper, but you have to sit with a level of
discomfort for a while that people really don't like.
Two things sponsor One, have you read Bent Flubber's book, How
Big Things Get Done? Yes, because there's a lot of
chiming there in that. And 2nd, how do you set up a
culture of an organisation or project that is up for dealing
with the difficulties that come with diversity of opinion and
not taking the easy Rd of just having everyone say yes and
agree with you? So we just actually had our our
sort of half yearly away day last week and we've been, we've
been talking about this a lot because.
Most people join these pressurised to be different but
we we realise that a lot of people's different, we're
different from each other. So we we we had a whole
discussion and then I think this is how do you get people to do
this. We had a big discussion about
how what what are the different, what do we really want to be
like? What are the five things we want
to be different at? Not, not everything.
We can't be different, we can't do everything.
So what are the big things that we want to be different about
And so you know the first couple of things to me are you know,
put the communities first. This is about providing a
railway to people. It's not about some shiny
infrastructure. It's about communities and
people and back to this building less stuff.
I think that's really important because again, we're having a
climate emergency. And the you know if we can think
about this as more bang for your buck by doing less how how do we
go into that space. But you know the the team needs
to buy into these things and that's why we we kind of put it
out for engagement to everybody is like what what where is it
that we want to be operating at. Because I think it is really
important that if we're going to take this position the the the
company needs to be brought into that people need to participate
and say you know what what matters to them.
So they are really, really bought into what the, what those
things we're going to be doing to be different are you've
worked for the big kind of rail projects, HS2 and you've also
worked for Transport for London. What lessons, experiences,
expertise have you brought from those projects to this project?
I like to think that I take everything and I put it in my
backpack and bring it with me somebody somebody used that
example elsewhere and and I think it's a really good one
because every experience is a useful experience even if you're
not going to use it now or even it's not directly applicable,
it's it's good experience to have.
And I think from my banking days, what I took with me from
that is that and I was on the debt side and there's no upside
in debt. So it's all you know how do you
manage your downside risk. So I tend to approach everything
which is. OK, what do I want to achieve?
And what are my risks of not achieving that?
And then I try to, I try to create a solution that is
suitable for the situation. So the more experiences I have,
the more I can see how different things work in different
contexts. And then it's how do you apply
them to the, to the risks that you have, to the, to the
opportunities that you have. Because everything is different.
And I think that the what the industry often tends to do is
sort of apply the rule that they use the last time.
But it's a different set of circumstances and any project
that we're working on and there are, you know, there are
different opportunities, there are different risks, there's,
you know, different ground conditions, you know there
there's different stuff. And so we should be taking all
that good experience and the good experience of our
colleagues and figuring out what are the things we need.
How do we, how do we do that, this one this time, because it's
different from the last one. What do you enjoy most about
your role? I I love talking to all of our
stakeholders actually. I find it you know and it's hard
sometimes when when you when you don't you bring bad news or they
don't like what you're saying. But I think, but I think that
it's it's also great to work with people to come up with a
really good outcome, a shared a really good shared outcome.
And so I love going to talk to our local authority partners to
say OK well if we are going to deliver our our bright diversity
net gain commitments which is 10% more than any impact that we
had. How can we work with you to get
to come up with a solution that's actually what you want as
well. So you know there's no money out
you know in the in the water world.
So how do we deliver with our obligations and the budget that
we have, we're going to have? For this fire diversity net
gain, how do we deliver a nature reserve for the local authority
that they want it anyway. So it's sort of those kinds of
conversations and that whole, you know, let's figure out how
we can meet our shared objectives together as I find
that really exciting. And the flipside, what the
hardest bits about your role? Poor or or or maybe I, I can
recognise that. What are the biggest challenges
you face? Because obviously politics for a
project like this has massive impacts, as you've already
talked about. It it does.
I mean I think that that for us though we've got great cross
party support which is really, really important that obviously
I think. Any infrastructure project needs
to have cross party support and it's cross party support across
the region because most infrastructure projects last
more than one election cycle. So it is really important that
and and you know a big a big thing that came out of bent
lyrics Buck is about you know how do you actually deal with
the election cycles and try to shorten the time to delivery
because it it's you know those are the things that that stall
and and make you know have the cost increases.
So sort of I'm really keen to make sure we deliver as quickly
as we possibly can so we can minimise the number of election
cycles. I I think one of the biggest
challenges we're going to have though is about money.
The economy as we all know hasn't been in great shape.
This is a growth project. This is here to support growth,
but there's still a lot of other things and a lot of other
challenging government commitments across the board.
The government is going to have to face.
So it's trying to get into that prioritisation because it's a
long term project. This is, this is not a short
term solution. So to get to that growth in 10
years time, we need to put in the investment now to do that.
And when you've got all these conflicting priorities that are
really important, it's really important to, you know, get the
NHS working. It's really important to have
great schools. You know that there are all
these other competing, competing issues and so.
You know we we're going to have to continue to make our case
even if we do have great cross party support to make sure that
we get the investment for the project.
One area I wanted to ask you about was you as the leader,
have you consciously developed a leadership style?
Have you reflected on what kind of D you want to be?
Or have you been influenced by other people you you've admired
in the past? I think again I've I've been
influenced by by lots of people for good or bad.
You know you see you see people's styles and you see what
you do want to do and you don't want to do.
There's the someone I worked with who's the chief executive 2
blondes John Lamont. I loved watching him listen to
everybody's point of view and then make a make a decision.
And then if anybody was sort of drifting away from that decision
he'd call people back into line which is a really good you know
I think that's a really great model to follow because you do
have to make to make progress. You have to make decisions.
But he would always listen to everybody's point of views 1st
and and you know ideally I think it all circumstances you want
people to come you come to an agreement.
You don't want to have to impose a decision upon upon them.
Good. So you know that was that was an
objective but he would take the decision rather than letting it
drift and then but the it's the holding people to account but as
well rather than than sort of again drifting off into Oh well
I didn't really like that decision but I think for me it's
about being who I am as well. What do you mean by that?
Well, I think that that there is there has been for a very long
time a perception of what a leader is supposed to be.
Like which is well I think alpha dog type and being often very
sort of or aggressive and being super outgoing as well.
And and I've talked to people who've worked for me and who've
been you know I've had economists work for me and be
introverts and going oh I don't know if I can if I can be a
leader and I said you know you can be you know you don't have
to be like that. You know that that sort of alpha
dog type person that you might you might see as the the
stereotypical leader view you can be.
You can be yourself and be a leader you don't have.
You know you have to shout at people you don't have to be that
kind of person. You you find your own leadership
style and the thing what I've tried to do is to just make sure
that I'm being myself and and the government normal human
being and I try to treat everybody else like normal human
beings and not be grand. And so I think people are really
that, you know they do find me approachable and they will tell
me stuff and that's how we get things done.
And you know it it it is one of those things that I want
everyone to be respectful of each other that I work with
because everybody is a person and deserving of respect
irrespective of what level they're sitting at and people do
have experience and views and they should be listened to.
You know, again, irrespective of hierarchies, because everyone
has something to bring to to what we're doing.
You're probably one of very few women at the top of an
infrastructure project. Just looking back over your
career, how has being a woman impacted on your career, whether
it's positive, negative or hasn't made a blind bit of
difference as far as you're concerned?
I think it's made a huge amount of difference quite frankly
because I've always worked in in male dominated industries and I
think one of the things from the outset is that I knew that I was
going to be memorable irrespective of what I did.
So when I was in New York it was just being a young woman.
When I moved to to London it was being being a woman with this
accent. And so I didn't want to be
memorable for the wrong reasons. So I wanted to be, you know, I
wanted to be the most clever person in the room with the most
knowledgeable or the most. You know I've read all my
documents and I did my things and I, you know, because I, I
whatever I did people were going to Remember Me and and it's it's
a space that and I'm just very conscious of that.
I wouldn't call it role modelling now but it was sort it
sort of it is a you know people are watching what you're doing
and so I I've always been just conscious of and I haven't
always succeeded. I will be very honest about that
and be you know and and but it's it's about almost having not
even having to represent but but my you know almost being judged
by not by not at another level and being conscious of of being
judged at a different level because of because of where you
are. I think also because I'm so
noticeable I've been probably bolder than I might have
otherwise been because my head was already above the parapet.
So I might as well say what I think.
That's a great idea. Yeah.
That's a great point. Yeah, why not?
I mean it's like I'm there so,
so you're halfway there, so you might as well be all the way
there. So I think that there's almost
is almost emboldened me to a certain extent to to to be more
outspoken than it might have been otherwise.
If you could look back at 20 year old Beth and give her some
advice, what would you say to her?
Well, I would say it's all about the people.
You know you that I think I was a very academic ambitious person
and I thought especially my banking days, it was really easy
to think that it's just about the work and it's just about the
work and it's it's not not just about the work, it's really
about how do you have good relationships, how do you use
those relationships to deliver good things.
And it it, you know, how we work together as human beings is is a
really important thing. And so I think I would tell
myself that don't look at just the work, look at who you're
working with, how you're impacting them, how they're
impacting you, what you're doing together, because that's the
important stuff. Did did the experience of the
pandemic, The more people interview, the more I realise
that it did have like a lasting effect on values or what you
want to do in your career, and you can see there's been
permanent change. Did the pandemic change anything
for you? Did you reassess anything I
think, I think I'm always reassessing it sort of I I
probably spend over I over assess sometimes but I I think
it's brought home to me more that that that the importance of
being with people. I think I'm I'm desperate to to
be with people and you know live and in person because I think
that the the the pandemic period we we all figured out how to
work in a different way which did a job it was transactional
and technical and it was it had a purpose but I think that face
to face interaction you know working together you know is
still really really important and probably I probably think
that more now that I that we don't have it as much.
And I think I've realised the importance of the coffee and the
and and again, it's I I've always been about let's get the
work done and I can go hang out with my mates.
So I think that it's that I've realised the importance of of
when when I was when I was doing my property development, we were
doing commercial offices and commercial office design was all
about how do you have serendipitous moments where you
bump into people and have great ideas that still really matters.
OK, brilliant. Thank you so much for your time.
I wish you the best of luck. Thanks very much.
Thanks again to Beth for joining us, and to you for listening to
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