VAR ANS Group has questioned Network Rail’s proposal for a new West Coast high-speed train line, suggesting the money would be better spend on improving business communication.

Network Rail’s proposals will see journey times from Manchester to London fall from over two hours to just over one hour. But despite a £34bn investment for the first phase, work will not be completed until 2020.

Paul Sweeney, managing director of ANS Group, said: “A travel time from London to Manchester reducing to one hour and six minutes is obviously a huge benefit to businesses whose productivity is suffering from time wasted on long train journeys.

“However, if Network Rail has factored this business passenger traffic into their predicted £55bn revenue from the scheme then I think they will fall short.”

Sweeney said with business efficiency and the green agenda increasingly on people’s minds and with HD video conferencing technology improving at such a pace, the days of train journeys for meetings are short lived no matter how quick they are.

“Indeed, to put it in perspective, for the same £34bn investment we could equip every single business in the UK with a High Definition Video Conferencing unit,” he said.