THE second compensation consultation for people living on or close to the proposed HS2 line has started.

The government was forced to consult all over again after the High Court ruled in March that the 2011 consultation on compensation for stage one of the route, from London to Birmingham, was flawed. Lord Justice Ouseley deemed it ‘so unfair as to be unlawful’.

But a new element of the consultation which HS2 has introduced leaves campaigners once again feeling that people living in the borough have lost out.

The new measure is a proposed discretionary Rural Support Zone (RSZ), running 120 metres either side of the line.

If adopted, it would operate from now until a year after HS2 would be operational – if it ever is – and would seek to compensate property owners in rural areas over and above statutory levels, in line with the government’s efforts to appear to be especially generous when it comes to HS2 compensation.

The RSZ could include compensation or a property bond; the former would secure sale of a property outside the safeguarding zones established months ago if it is up to 120m from the line, while the latter would be fixed on a distance to be agreed and work as a guarantee for homeowners, based on the price of the property.

In Hillingdon borough the RSZ clips a small area with no homes where the railway line would cross Moorhall Road, in Harefield,
then continues out into Buckinghamshire.

Critics feel this latest ‘carrot’ offers something to rural areas and nothing to Greater London.

Lottie Jones, of Ruislip Against HS2, said: “It looks like, once again, no one in the borough is any better off from the new proposals.

“The new zones that have been introduced apply only to rural areas as, I imagine, it would be too expensive to put them in urban areas.”

HS2 Ltd will hold an open day at The Barn Hotel, in West End Road, Ruislip, on October 14 from noon to 8pm.

Hillingdon and Ruislip Against HS2 will be holding its own open day, provisionally arranged for the same day, for people to get more information from local campaigners about what they need to do now.

? RSZ: MAIN POINTS – People living in the RSZ could be able to ask the government to purchase their property at 100 per cent of its unblighted open market value providing they meet strict criteria.

The boundary stretches 60m further from the line than the existing safeguarding zone.

The property bond, only for people in the RSZ, would allow property owners to agree a price with the government to purchase their home in the future.

The bond could also be used to make up the difference between the market value of a home with HS2 and the value if it did not exist.