Buses: Funding
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(1 year, 6 months ago)
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Mr Holden
I thank my hon. Friend for mentioning Cornwall. I had a fantastic visit there with her recently to see “Love the bus” and services locally. Cornwall Council has done exceptionally well with its initial £13.5 million bus service improvement plan and it will be getting just under another £2 million as part of this extra allocation. Cornwall is a great example of enhanced partnerships working really well to deliver for people, with more bus users and the £2 bus fare saving millions of pounds for local residents and tourists who visit Cornwall every year. I urge Opposition Members to look at Cornwall as a good example of where enhanced partnerships can really work to deliver for people and local businesses. This is not an ideological approach but one based on delivering for local people.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
In our north-west region, bus services have been cut by nearly 16%. It is not just about the funding amounts that the Minister is reading out; it is about the structures, as my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) said. Nowhere else in the developed world do bus operators have so much power over routes and services. In my constituency, that has meant cuts to the point where some constituents cannot even use a bus to get to Salford Royal Hospital or to use other vital services. In Greater Manchester, we are fixing that, but does the Minister agree that only Labour’s plans would give all our communities the control that they need to hold bus operators to account?
Mr Holden
My understanding is that there is no plan for more money from Labour, and there was no plan for more money for buses today from Labour. That is just like what we see in Labour-run Wales, with no plan for the future. In fact, it is particularly interesting that the Leader of the Opposition recently stated that Labour-run Wales is a model for the Labour Government. What we see here is a Conservative Government actually delivering for people across the country.
The hon. Lady talks about powers. I am happy to work with the increasing devolution across the country, as I have done with the Mayor of Greater Manchester, which has had more than £1.07 billion in city region sustainable transport settlement funding, £94.8 million from the BSIP and more than £200 million for Transport for Greater Manchester and the commercial bus operators. I have said that I do not mind the model; she is obsessed with it.
Avanti West Coast
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(2 years, 2 months ago)
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Trudy Harrison
The reality is that we, the state, are currently paying for the train service, because it is unsustainable for train operators to pay for it themselves. I will take deep interest in comparing and contrasting ScotRail with other train operating companies; if there are lessons to be learned, I welcome them. All options are on the table, and the decision will be made on 16 October about which option will best serve our passengers, who are the most important people in this discussion.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
I want to highlight to the Minister the impact of Avanti’s cuts in service to one per hour from Manchester to London, and of passengers being unable to book at weekends. A young constituent of mine who is a wheelchair user was due to travel to London next Sunday. She is nominated for a Shaw Trust Disability Power 100 list award. She has had weeks of uncertainty and now she has to travel by coach and car. There will be many more people in that situation who need accessible transport. The Minister mentioned certainty, but there is no certainty in Avanti West Coast services or with this timetable. Will she and her Secretary of State now act, and recognise that Avanti has failed in the provision of rail services and that its contract should not be renewed?
Trudy Harrison
I spoke with a member of Andy Burnham’s office yesterday at the Women in Transport event, along with Avanti and the West Coast Partnership members that were there. I have every sympathy; I am disappointed with the service and frustrated that the hon. Lady’s constituent has had to endure such a difficult journey. The solution is to have train drivers working.
Whether we call this an unofficial strike action or not, a system whereby drivers were willing to work their rest days for extra pay has worked for nigh on 20 years, and with almost immediate effect one train company, Avanti, has not been able to persuade its drivers to work their rest days, resulting in about 40 out of 50 drivers who usually work their rest days not being willing to work more than 35 hours. I think I am setting out the challenge very clearly. Whether the franchise is state owned or privately owned, the challenge remains: these trains need to be driven, safely, by people who are trained. It takes two years to train a train driver. That is the challenge.
Rail Strikes
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend is right. Where we have leaders in charge who are showing responsibility and stepping in and negotiating with the unions and employers, we have resolved disputes. This Transport Secretary has no time to resolve the biggest dispute in modern history. What has he found time to do instead? Looking back at his Tik Tok over the past couple of months, I can see that he had plenty of time for videos, for sit-on lawnmowers, for Spaghetti Junction, and for impersonating Jeremy Clarkson. He spent a collective total of three-and-a-half hours on the media covering the back of his weakened, discredited, law-breaking Prime Minister. He has also found time to grandstand over this pathetic motion in front of the House today, but he has spent not one single second in talks to resolve these disputes. Frankly, it is unbelievable.
But whether it is the chaos at the airports, with security queues snaking out the door, and thousands of families missing out on their hard-earned holidays, or the looming rail strike, set to be the biggest since 1989—when, coincidentally, the Tories were also in Government—the response from the Transport Secretary is the same: to cast around for someone else, anyone else, to blame. It is nothing short of a dereliction of duty and an insults to the hundreds of thousands of passengers who depend on this being resolved.
The truth may actually be even worse than our usual missing-in-action Transport Secretary. It is impossible to escape the conclusion that Ministers would prefer to provoke this dispute and play political games rather than resolve it.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is right to highlight the missing-in-action Transport Secretary. A couple of Conservative Members raised the issue of schoolchildren taking their GCSEs and A-levels, and that is a concern to everybody. Ministers will not be forgiven for failing to prepare for this strike. [Interruption.] I tried to ask the Secretary of State this question. What contingency plans has he made and has he called Cobra? What we want to see now is not more Tik Tok from the Secretary of State, but more common sense, more planning and more contingency.
Louise Haigh
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Was it not telling that there was not a single mention of one constructive step that the Transport Secretary has attempted to take to bring this strike to a resolution? When is he planning on meeting with the industry and the unions before the first day of planned strike action? What safety assessment has he made of the cuts to Network Rail jobs in order to reassure workers and passengers that their safety will not be compromised? Has Cobra met to plan contingencies for the impact on the movement of freight, on schoolchildren missing their exams and on the wider economy? Finally, and most importantly, will he immediately call in ACAS to bring an urgent end to the dispute? That is why we have tabled our amendment to the Government’s motion in front of us today. It is to urge them to convene talks with the industry and the unions and take concrete steps to resolve these strikes.
Labour has been clear, and I will be clear again: we do not want these strikes to take place. If we were in government, we would be around the table in talks to resolve this. Members do not have to take my word for it: in Labour-run Wales, a strike by train staff has been avoided. Employers, unions and the Government have come together to manage change and avoid the disruptive action that this Government are about to oversee.
Britain’s Railways
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
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Grant Shapps
We are honoured to be surrounded by successful former train Ministers in the House today, and I pay tribute to my hon. Friend not only for having been a great train Minister but for knowing exactly how many passengers—1.8 billion—travelled in the last, most successful ever year for our railways, which was 2019, before covid. He will be pleased to hear that the entirety of the White Paper is written on the premise of putting the passenger first and working out what they need, which is not very complicated: trains that run on time, are comfortable—warm in winter, cooled in the summer—and have wi-fi available. And no more of those uncomfortable cardboard ironing board seats either! People want to find it easy and comfortable to get on, with tickets that are easily available and contactless, as other hon. Friends have mentioned. That is the way that we will take the numbers back to 1.8 billion and beyond.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]
Some 50% of rail stations in Greater Manchester are inaccessible to people with a disability, and I hope that the Transport Secretary agrees that that is unacceptable. On the face of it, these plans are going to do little to improve accessibility, so can he confirm that he will be giving our regional mayor, Andy Burnham, the funding and powers he needs to control and improve stations, as they do in London?
Oral Answers to Questions
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(4 years, 2 months ago)
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Grant Shapps
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. These powers have existed in London forever. They prevent, for example, box junctions from being blocked up, along with a number of other things. As he rightly says, we intend to extend the powers throughout the country and I will report back to the House on that shortly.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]
Grant Shapps
The hon. Lady is absolutely right about the impact on aviation, which has been enormous, but so has the support, and that is often not recognised. If I may detail it, there has been £1.8 billion of support through the Bank of England’s covid corporate financing facility, which easyJet and others have used; £283 million has come from the coronavirus job retention scheme; and 56,400 staff have been furloughed, with the salaries that have been paid worth well north of £1 billion. When those figures are added up, there has been an enormous amount of support for the sector. We are working with it every day and the best thing we can do is to open up the routes, which is dependent on the progress of the virus and the progress of technology to help us beat the virus.
Oral Answers to Questions
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(4 years, 4 months ago)
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Rachel Maclean
I will take this opportunity to thank my hon. Friend for his valuable contribution in driving forward this vital agenda. We are a world leader in technology, innovation and R&D and, as he will know, we have invested £121 million in UK hydrogen technology to make sure that it plays a key part in our green recovery and achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050. He is also right that this has the potential to drive a fantastic flourishing and see levelling up across our whole country. We are working to include hydrogen and ensure that it plays a key part in the green recovery and our levelling-up ambitions.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
James Murray (Ealing North) (Lab/Co-op)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Kelly Tolhurst)
The Government remain committed to an open dialogue with the sector as we work towards our shared ambition of getting aviation up and running again. We encourage the industry and unions to engage constructively with each other.
Barbara Keeley [V]
British Airways is proposing to lay off 12,000 staff and is using this pandemic as cover to put its remaining 30,000 staff on inferior contracts. Using a global health crisis to force through such changes is a national disgrace, yet British Airways still enjoys preferential treatment as our flag carrier, with a dominant position on slots at Heathrow. If it fails to treat its staff properly, surely it is time to review whether it is fit to be our national carrier and time to reallocate those slots.
Kelly Tolhurst
All redundancies or any threat to jobs in this unprecedented pandemic is incredibly worrying for all workers, and my sympathies are with all those affected at this time. I have spoken to Willie Walsh and encouraged BA and the unions to engage constructively with each other. Employees should be treated fairly and in the spirit of partnership and we are working with the aviation sector on a restart and recovery plan. Of course, we will be looking at all regulations at our disposal.
Disability Equality Training (Taxi and Private Hire Vehicle Drivers) Bill
Baroness Keeley ExcerptsFriday 18th November 2016
(8 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Disability Equality Training (Taxi and Private Hire Vehicle Drivers) Bill 2016-17 View all Disability Equality Training (Taxi and Private Hire Vehicle Drivers) Bill 2016-17 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention. I am very conscious of what she says, but it is important that when we have votes in this House we have had proper scrutiny of the measures put before us, and I wish to draw out some important points before sitting down.
I note what has been said about consultation, and it is important that that is done correctly. I would be interested to know what consultation there has been, not only with local authorities but with taxi operators and the professional bodies that represent them. I would also be keen to understand a little more about who would be expected to deliver this training. Does sufficient capacity already exist?
Tom Pursglove
I am conscious of wanting to get through this, but I will give way.
Barbara Keeley
The hon. Gentleman talks about consulting, but has he consulted disabled people in his constituency? That is what all the Labour Members here are concerned about. Time is short, but we have a chance to get this Bill through. There is time for all the scrutiny measures that he is talking about later, so will he bear in mind the time and let the Minister speak?
Tom Pursglove
I am very grateful for the intervention and I am going to wrap up my remarks, but I have a final few points that I want to ask about.
I appreciate what the Minister said about best practice, so I am content with that. I am interested to know how the Bill’s provisions would apply to other providers, such as Uber. That is an important point. Black taxis would fall within the scope of the Bill, as drafted, but how does the Bill apply to Uber?
When the Minister responds, I would be keen for him to say a little about the Department’s thinking on taking the Bill’s provisions forward in any particular guise. It raises incredibly important issues. I am very impressed by the tenacity of the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish in introducing it, and I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say, because wherever discrimination occurs it must be stamped out—it is completely unacceptable. The law is very clear about this discrimination, and anything we can do to help spread best practice to try to improve awareness and enforcement can only be a good thing.
Transport and Local Infrastructure
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(8 years, 6 months ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
I am slightly worried about the amount of time I am going to take and the number of Members who are seeking to intervene on me, but I cannot resist the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley).
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
I hope that the Secretary of State will comment on the woeful transport situation in Salford in my constituency. There are no plans to improve our key road network and the three motorways in my constituency, or for any substantial upgrades to our rail services through Eccles, Walkden and Patricroft. Our bus services are completely woeful. Traffic in Salford has increased by 3.6%—three times the Greater Manchester average. On Monday I will meet the Royal Horticultural Society to discuss the building of its fifth garden, which will bring 1 million visitors to Salford every year. How are they going to be brought in?
Mr McLoughlin
I will come on to say more about the work we are doing on road infrastructure and devolution to local authorities. Salford should be in a strong position to take advantage of some of those measures.
Lilian Greenwood
The Bill must address the decline in rural bus services, which have suffered some of the worst cuts and highest fare rises in the country, but, as my hon. Friend says, we also need to ensure that those powers are available to any area that wants them. I welcome the concession the Transport Secretary has made. According to the Queen’s Speech briefing, which was published yesterday, the Bill will allow communities without directly elected mayors to apply for contracting powers. It is, however, unclear why those powers should remain in the gift of the Department. Both the Transport Secretary and I represent areas that have, so far, not agreed a devolution deal. Perhaps the right hon. Member for Derbyshire Dales (Mr McLoughlin) can explain why those powers are good enough for Manchester, but might not be good enough for Matlock.
The Queen’s Speech also contained the announcement of what the Government call their modern transport Bill, although, given that the Minister of State—who, sadly, is not present today—drives a 126-year-old car and is a noted steam engine enthusiast, perhaps we should check their definition of “modern transport”.
As ever, the Government’s announcement is long on statements of intent, but short on details. The Queen’s Speech briefing said that the law on drones would be reformed, but, in answers to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Richard Burden), the Government have consistently said that the EU is leading in the area. It is unacceptable that Ministers seem to be waiting for a serious drone strike to occur before taking action: it is vital that we do not wait for an accident to happen.
Electric cars will play a crucial role in driving down emissions, but we are playing catch-up, because the Government failed to deliver their promise in the coalition agreement to establish a national charging network. We welcome the development of personal autonomous vehicles. They could prove to be a boon for our car manufacturing industry, and I know that they are eagerly anticipated by many disabled people. However, given that insurance premiums have risen by 20% over the last year, the Government’s proposal to insure driverless cars on the same basis as existing policies may not offer much reassurance to prospective buyers. That said, the focus on driverless cars is, perhaps, understandable, given the Government’s tendency to run on autopilot.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
As my hon. Friend is talking about developments in technology, may I ask whether she agrees that the bus services Bill provides an opportunity for all new buses to be made accessible to people with sight loss? Two million people would greatly appreciate talking buses, with “next stop” and “final destination” announcements.
Lilian Greenwood
My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the lack of accessibility on buses. A number of London buses provide audio-visual announcements, but there are very few examples outside London, and that should be addressed.
The Minister of State has said that the United Kingdom should adopt a “light touch” approach to driverless car development, but we need to ensure that the risks have been fully analysed. It is important that Ministers do not move—to coin a phrase—too far and too fast. It should also be said, however, that that is just about the only area in which the Government could be accused of acting too quickly.
Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)
There is a great deal to welcome in this Queen’s Speech in relation to transport, and it is reassuring to see how many issues addressed in it reflect the requests that have come from the Select Committee on Transport. The real test will be whether the promised measures are implemented and do not simply remain aspirations, and of course we will have to see the important details of what is being proposed. I am pleased that the National Infrastructure Commission is to be made a statutory body charged with producing strategic vision for 2050. I just hope that we are not still discussing the issue of increasing hub capacity in the south-east when we get to that date. It is very important that a decision on aviation capacity in the south-east is made soon. Heathrow is the right location and it is important that a decision is made, in the interests of this country as a whole, and on behalf of the regions and nations of this country.
The northern powerhouse also features in the Queen’s Speech, and that is extremely important. Again, we do not need to hear more words; we need to see implementation of proposals and ideas that have been put forward. That means that Transport for the North needs to have effective powers and full accountability, but I do not see any mention of that in this Queen’s Speech. It is of course particularly important that electrification schemes that have already been proposed are properly costed and implemented. We do not want to see any more stop-start processes, where promises are made but much needed schemes are then either delayed or cancelled. When we are looking at much needed improvements across the Pennines—the trans-Pennine improvements and the so-called HS3—it is important for Ministers to remember that trans-Pennine improvements are not confined to Manchester and Leeds, but also include Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield and Hull, to name a few of these very important places.
I am very pleased that HS2 is going ahead, but I would like more clarity from the Minister on the stories now being circulated about possible changes to phase 2. To get maximum impact from that important infrastructure, HS2 needs to be linked with other rail investments, as we have been promised. For example, we need to enable a direct line to be built from Liverpool to link up with both HS2 and HS3. That is just one example of the way in which major infrastructure investments of national importance can also bring great benefits to the regions of this country.
I am pleased about the modern transport Bill, as the promises it makes for the commercial development of transport innovations are extremely important for this country, and that has too often been neglected. I also note the reference that has been made to the importance of using new technology for road safety. It is important to realise that although the trend on road safety over a decade or so is one of improvement, there has been a change in very recent years. In the last year for which we have recorded figures, 2014, we regrettably saw an increase in road casualties: 1,775 people were killed on our roads, and 22,807 people were seriously injured. Using technology to improve road safety is important, but technology on its own cannot do the job. Education and promotional campaigns and enforcement are also important. I remind Ministers that, yes, having the latest technology matters, but we also need more people enforcing the rules of the road and looking at bad driver behaviour, and we need more road traffic officers. This year, the Transport Committee produced a report that showed the impact of reductions in road traffic officers. For improved road safety, we need to harness the technology that is there and to use new technology, and we also need education and enforcement. The three go together.
I give a special welcome to the bus services Bill, although we have yet to see the critical detail of it. For too long, buses have been treated as the Cinderella of public transport, yet more people use buses than any other form of public transport. They are a lifeline for millions of people, enabling them to get to their jobs and to access important local amenities. This Bill—I hope I can repeat this when we see the detail of it—is an attempt to put right the weaknesses of the Transport Act 1985, which left bus services at the mercy of the free market, with local authorities picking up the tab for unprofitable services. London, which was spared deregulation, has gone from success to success, with franchise services using the private sector, but the private sector being employed to implement the transport plans decided by the public sector, Transport for London.
In the rest of the country, when local government cuts started to bite and financial cuts started to be implemented, local authority support for those subsidised services inevitably fell away. Increased numbers of people in communities have found that they are left out of essential transport services, with no access to work, hospitals and shops. It is not solely rural communities that have been affected, although they have been very badly affected; significant parts of towns and cities are losing not only night-time services, but important day-time services as well.
Barbara Keeley
I thank my hon. Friend for making those points. I agree with what she says. Night buses have been cut from Little Hulton in my constituency, which means that people cannot get into Manchester. Does she agree that among those who are excluded from these services are people with sight loss and that this Bill is an opportunity to make all new buses accessible for people with sight loss through next-stop and final-destination announcements?
Mrs Ellman
I thank my hon. Friend for her comments, and I certainly agree with her. A proper public transport service that includes buses has to be accessible for all people, and proper facilities should be available to enable people with sight loss and with other sorts of disabilities to use the service. This is a very important opportunity to do that. Indeed, the whole pattern that we have seen since bus deregulation is that, while services in London, where deregulation did not take place, have increased, services elsewhere in the country have reduced and bus fares have increased. That is not acceptable, and it cannot be tolerated any further. Measures to try to remedy that by having quality partnerships and quality contracts—the partnerships have been effective in some areas—have not resolved the basic question.
I look forward to the publication of the bus services Bill. Given the situation that currently operates so successfully in London, the proposal now is to enable devolved areas with an elected mayor to use franchise services. However, I would like to see the detail of how that can be extended to other sorts of authorities as well and to see what financial support goes with that. The power to make bus services accessible, accountable and effective is extremely important, but the finance to make that a real possibility must be there to go with it, so I look forward to seeing that.
In summary, I welcome some very important measures in the Bill. We need them to be enacted and not just to remain aspirations, and we need proper funding, too. It is vital that proper transport infrastructure is provided nationally, regionally and locally. It is also important that there are effective transport services that are accessible and passenger friendly. The test of whether this Queen’s Speech will deliver those objectives is yet to come.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
The Gracious Speech has already been described as “thin” and “short on detail”, and although I understand the sensitivity of the timing in relation to the EU referendum that my hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson) mentioned, that could have been avoided if the state opening had been delayed, as Labour Members suggested.
The Government’s programme falls short in a number of areas, including the provision of support to carers. There is nothing in the Gracious Speech to improve support for carers or to ensure that local authorities have the resources necessary to implement the duties that the Government placed on them in the Care Act 2014. The 2011 census shows that the number of carers increased by 11% over the previous 10 years, and the steepest rise was in those caring for 50 hours or more each week. The number of older carers is also increasing. Age UK has found that one in seven people over 80 now provides unpaid care to family and friends. In the last seven years, that number has increased by 40%, and now includes 417,00 people in their 80s.
Failure to address the needs of older carers will mean that many will find it difficult to cope with their caring responsibilities. Caroline Abrahams of Age UK stated that
“as public funding falls further and further behind the growing demand for care we worry that very old people are being expected to fill the gap. They can’t do it all on their own and we shouldn’t take advantage of their determination to do right by those they love.”
It is wrong to presume that when budgets for adult social care are cut unpaid carers will fill the gaps, and current pressures are bringing carers closer to breaking point.
Earlier this month, Carers UK released the findings of its annual “State of Caring” report, which highlights the difficulties of providing quality services for carers against a backdrop of continued local authority cuts. It states that
“the spirit of the Care Act 2014 and the Children and Families Act 2014 have not become a reality for all – and carers are struggling to get the support from health and care services that they need to care, work and have a life outside caring. The survey shows evidence of public services creaking under pressure – charging is up, the right services are harder to find and vital support is cut or under threat, leaving many carers anxious about the future and their ability to continue to care.”
I have raised the impact of funding cuts on the care sector in a number of debates, because social care is too easy a target for cuts. Ministers have been prepared to slash local authority budgets, leading to cuts of £4.6 billion in adult social care since 2010. The Local Government Association has estimated that the implementation of the national living wage—as the Government call it—will this year cost an additional £330 million for home care and residential care providers. In Salford, for example, the 2% social care precept—that is all the provision that the Government are making this year—will raise £1.6 million, but the cost of implementing the national minimum wage will be £2.7 million. It is easy to imagine that gap multiplied up and down the country.
Despite what Ministers say during debates and questions, there is no extra funding from the better care fund for social care this year, and only £105 million next year. Pleas were rightly made by the directors of adult social services and the Local Government Association for the Chancellor to bring forward £700 million from later years of the better care fund, to address those immediate financial pressures. Failure to do that could lead to care providers failing or walking away from publicly funded care, and that could have serious consequences for vulnerable people who rely on care services. It is unfair to think—as seems to be the view—that unpaid family carers will be able to pick up the pieces if care providers fail because of cost pressures.
Unpaid carers are already under increasing pressure because of the impact of Government policies, and one third of carers told Carers UK that they have experienced a change in the amount of care and support that they receive. Almost 60% of those reporting a change say that the amount of care and support they receive has been reduced because of cost or availability, and in some cases those cuts have been significant. One carer reported:
“The social worker who assessed my wife said all direct payments in the borough were being reduced. We discussed the needs and were advised we would be informed of any change. Without warning or notification the budget was cut by 30% immediately.”
Given those facts, it is not surprising that 54% of carers surveyed felt that their quality of life will get worse over this year, despite the Care Act 2014.
The 2014 Act was supposed to entitle all carers to a timely assessment of their needs, yet one in three carers who have had an assessment in the past year had to wait six months or longer. Worryingly, nearly 40% of carers caring for someone at the end of life also had to wait six months or more for an assessment. There is no time at the end of life to be considering what a carer needs “in six months’ time”, and I urge the Minister to press Health Ministers to respond to the independent review of “Choice in end of life care”, which was published more than a year ago, and to consider a new review that would extend choice at the end of life to children and young people.
Almost a quarter of carers had to request an assessment for themselves over the last year, instead of having one offered to them as the law requires. Even when carers receive an assessment, many feel that it does not address their needs. Almost 70% of carers felt that their need to have regular breaks from caring was not considered, and 74% of working-age carers did not feel that the support needed to juggle care with work was considered sufficiently. It appears to some carers that assessment is just a listening exercise that provides no real help. As one carer reported:
“All assessment areas were considered by my assessor but due to cuts there was no support they could practically offer me. I was listened to but there was no positive outcome.”
Along with the emotional stress and physical exhaustion that can occur from providing care without enough support, many carers are finding that it has a real impact on their finances. Of the carers struggling to make ends meet, nearly half surveyed are cutting back on essentials such as food and heating. Others are borrowing money, and more than a third are using up their savings. That is clearly not sustainable in the long term.
I urge Ministers to ensure that carers have the financial support they need. Carers also need access to services to help them in their caring role, and the health and social care system should have a duty to identify carers and take meaningful action to promote their health and wellbeing. Assessments should be accessible to carers, and they should be more than a tick-box or listening exercise. They should lead to carers being provided with tangible support.
The Gracious Speech did not provide any assurance that the Government will address the funding problems that local authorities face in providing social care, which I have outlined. The move to full business rate retention by local authorities will not address the chronic underfunding of social care. As with the social care precept, the proposed financial arrangement for local government fails to consider need, and could create further inequalities in funding for social care. I am concerned that those areas where most funding is needed will be those that gain the least from business rate retention. Unless the Government outline significant changes for carers in their upcoming carers strategy, it is likely that we will continue to see higher costs for carers, and lower levels of support for them or the person they care for.
It was disappointing that the Gracious Speech failed to mention addressing the injustice experienced by women born in the 1950s who are now bearing the brunt of the changes to the state pension age. They face additional financial hardship because of the Government’s failure to provide fair transitional arrangements—an issue we have debated a number of times. The pensions Bill will do nothing to address that injustice, and I would like to outline some of the options that have been suggested.
The new Work and Pensions Secretary keeps saying that there are no viable options, but he does not appear to consider those that have been put forward. In an Opposition day debate on this issue, six options were put forward by the shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, who suggested changing the timetable to delay the pension age increase until 2020, so that it would not reach 66 until 2021, and capping the maximum state pension age increase from the Pensions Act 2011 at 12 months. He suggested keeping the qualifying age for pension credit on the previous timetable, which would help some of the women who are facing the greatest financial hardship. [Interruption.] Ministers on the Treasury Bench do not seem interested in the 2.6 million women who are suffering hardship thanks to policies that they have introduced, and it is a pity that they bother to sit here but not to listen.
The fourth option, which the Work and Pensions Committee has put forward, is for people to take a reduced state pension at an earlier age or pay a lower state pension for longer. I do not support that option but it is one that is being put around. The other option is to extend the timetable for increasing the state pension age by 18 months so that it reaches 66 by 2022. I have suggested that the Government consider a bridge pension such as that which I understand is paid in the Netherlands to women affected by the increase in the state pension age.
Andrew Gwynne
I am glad that my hon. Friend has mentioned the 1950s women, and I congratulate her on becoming chair of the all-party parliamentary group on WASPI last week. She will no doubt be aware that Labour colleagues in the Welsh Assembly have tabled a motion calling on the British Government to introduce fair transitional arrangements for these very women.
Barbara Keeley
Absolutely. I fear that we will keep coming back to this until the Government realise it is unreasonable to expect these women, who were expecting a pension at 60 but had it taken away from them, to live on nothing. I have constituents trying to live on their savings.
Christian Matheson
Does my hon. Friend share my concern that the Government have made the cynical calculation that most of the women affected will have reached pensionable age come the next general election and that they are hoping the problem will simply go away, even if the injustice does not?
Barbara Keeley
They might have made that calculation, but they are wrong, because over the next 10 years, as the changes are made, 2.6 million women will be affected. I think the Government will find themselves with hundreds of thousands of very angry women, as well as their family members, husbands, sisters, children and so on. The numbers ought to make Ministers take this more seriously than they appear to be doing today.
I want to finish the detail because people are interested. One bridge pension was set at around £400 a month. That is better than forcing these women, who have worked all their lives and paid national insurance contributions for 40 years, on to the Work programme, employment and support allowance or jobseeker’s allowance at 62 or 63. It is disgraceful to treat women born in the 1950s that way. And while we are discussing transport and buses, I repeat what someone wrote on social media about the lack of concessionary travel in some parts of the country for people whose state pension age has changed. Why should there be concessionary travel at 60 in London but not in many other parts of the country? That brings further hardship.
I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) mentioned the all-party parliamentary group on WASPI, which I am delighted to say 120 hon. Members signed up to last week. It was formed to provide a cross-party forum in which we can hold the Government to account over the transitional arrangements to compensate the 1950s-born women affected by the changes to the state pension age and campaign on all the other issues around the state pension age. I look forward to helping the group pursue those aims and to making progress to help my constituents. I would be happy to work with Welsh Labour, too, if it is an important issue for it. I will campaign for the hundreds of thousands of 1950s-born women affected by this injustice.
I have raised issues of Government policy adversely affecting 2.6 million women in the UK and 7 million unpaid family carers. There was nothing in the Gracious Speech to help those nearly 10 million people, but I have talked about their issues. It is a pity there were no measures to help them, but we might have an opportunity to do so in the months ahead, when I hope to see extra measures.
Roger Mullin (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (SNP)
At a time of major economic challenges, it has become painfully obvious that Her Majesty needs a new scriptwriter who can add a bit more substance to the Gracious Speech. As I read the 21 Bills mentioned, I thought, until a short time ago, that this was simply a stalled Government awaiting the results of the European referendum. However, I listened to the Leader of the House this morning who indicated that these 21 Bills would mean the full accomplishment of the Tory manifesto—after only two years. We have a threadbare Queen’s Speech, with no future plans, and it would appear that a period of long-term economic misery awaits many people. We should be addressing the chronic UK productivity problem, a matter that is not even mentioned in the Queen’s Speech, where the word “productivity” does not appear.
Before I address some issues of transport and infrastructure, I would like to discuss an anti-terrorism matter connected with future initiatives, and I wish to give some praise to the Government. Some weeks ago I introduced a ten-minute rule Bill on establishing standards for forensic linguistic analysts—people who can analyse text messages and help identify some of the most dangerous people in our society. Although the Bill has fallen, I am pleased to say that the Government have agreed to a meeting with me to discuss whether this is something they could take up in the future, and I am very grateful for that.
Of the measures in the Gracious Speech, I welcome some of the moves on transport, and I wish to comment briefly on a couple of those areas. First, when the Government consider the buses Bill, I ask them to remember, among other things, the needs of students, particularly those in rural areas who attend college. The National Union of Students has already pointed out that it considers this to be one of the major barriers to some students engaging. I hope the Government will consider that, and perhaps it would be a good idea to engage soon in deep conversations with the NUS to address the issue.
I also wish to address an issue raised by the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley), who mentioned not only the great cause that many of us share in the WASPI campaign, on whose behalf she has done some outstanding work, but concessionary travel schemes, which are very important for women and men who are of or nearing retirement age. If I recall correctly, she said there were inequalities in England, in that in London it is possible to engage in these schemes at 60 but elsewhere in England the relevant age is already 63 for women, with the prospect of that rising. May I recommend that the Government think about the very simple solution adopted by the Scottish Government of having a flat-rate entry common for women and men at the age of 60 for concessionary travel? The difference that has made to the lives of large numbers of women and men over the age of 60 in Scotland has been remarkable. Other Members have talked about the importance of health and wellbeing in our society, and a measure such as this would command the support of the whole House.
Barbara Keeley
I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that point. He makes the good suggestion that the Government adopt the London model, whereby men and women have concessionary travel at 60. I met some WASPI women from Derbyshire last week here in the House. One of them was telling me that she no longer went out with a group of people who were her friends before, because she is still working, cannot afford the fares and has not got a concessionary bus pass, whereas they are retired with their pensions and concessionary travel. How unfair to divide friends in that way.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
It is my great pleasure to deliver the closing remarks in today’s debate. It is also nice to see the shadow Housing Minister in the Chamber, taking an interest. Given his absence throughout much of our deliberations on the Housing and Planning Act 2016 in the previous Session, I wondered where he had got to.
Happily, there has been no back seat for the Government’s agenda on local growth. Ministers in the Department for Communities and Local Government continue to play a prominent part in the debates that follow each Queen’s Speech, Budget and autumn statement, because local growth remains central to everything that the Government do. The right hon. Gentleman might be used to listening to Labour speeches that are full of high words and no action, but we are clearly focused on ensuring that we deliver for our country, and that is what this Gracious Speech is about.
Another thing that never changes is the shadow Housing Minister himself. He goes back to his old lines that he has used before, forgetting to mention that he was the Minister who oversaw the lowest level of house building that this country has seen since 1923, at just 88,000 homes in a year. He is rather like a fleetingly successful popstar of yesteryear—he cannot help but sing the same tune over and over again. Well, he is welcome to keep his record of boom and bust; we will stick to, and build on, our record of rescue and reform.
When the right hon. Gentleman was speaking about this country’s economic situation, it was as if he had completely forgotten the sheer mess in which the Labour Government, in which he was a Minister, left this country. We have not forgotten, however, and neither has the country. Indeed, the situation was well outlined in the letter from the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne), who explained that there was “no money left”. Under a Conservative-led Government, employment is up, inflation is down, rates are down, and wages are up. The country is on the move, and the Labour party would do well to stop doing it down and start recognising that we are moving forward. I am sure that at some stage Labour Members will come back and tell us what the spending reductions that they outlined in their manifesto would be.
We heard more original contributions to the debate from Members across the House. My hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove (William Wragg) stated his desire for more neighbourhood planning and outlined his work to support that not just in his area, but with Civic Voice more generally. I have already spoken to the Campaign to Protect Rural England, the National Association of Local Councils, and the Royal Town Planning Institute about proposals in the neighbourhood planning and infrastructure Bill, which were welcomed by them all.
The hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) was pleased with the innovations in the Queen’s Speech that were outlined earlier by my right hon. Friend the Transport Secretary and outlined the importance of seeing UK-wide benefit from those measures—I am glad that he now agrees that we are “Better Together”. My hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) continues to make a strong case for improvements to roads and infrastructure in his area, and I will come on to the comments made by the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) about 1 million homes in a moment.
I have worked closely with my hon. Friend the Member for Bath (Ben Howlett) to ensure that new and affordable homes are built in areas such as his, and that people have the chance to buy a home of their own. The Labour party tried to block that policy at every opportunity, but we have delivered it though the Housing and Planning Act 2016, and it can deliver new jobs. I look forward to working with hon. Friends and the hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick), and I appreciate his comments about our work to improve the situation for leaseholders. My hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) outlined his views on neighbourhood plans, again reinforcing just how important they can be. We should remember that such plans deliver more homes.
The hon. Members for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson) and for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) spoke about a wide range of matters that ranged from transport to health and business rates. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) also mentioned business rates, and the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn) outlined the issues with the Humber bridge. I reassure her that we will ensure that tolls on the Humber bridge do not return to their peak under Labour—we cut them in 2012. The hon. Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) spoke about investment in the northern powerhouse, as did the hon. Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins). The northern powerhouse involves vast investment and devolution, and that has been welcomed by Labour council leaders in the north, who are working with my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (James Wharton), the Minister for the northern powerhouse.
Barbara Keeley
Labour Members are getting used to discourteous winding-up speeches from Ministers, but the hon. Gentleman did not have the courtesy to listen when I and other Labour Members were speaking, and he has just summarised what three people said in about six words. I spoke on behalf of 7 million carers and 2.6 million women who are affected by this Government’s changes to the state pension age, and I think that that deserves a little more than three words from the Minister. He is extending a discourtesy. This is a “so what?” Queen’s Speech from a “so what?” Government who cannot even be bothered to support it.
Brandon Lewis
I am slightly surprised, if not disappointed, by the hon. Lady’s slightly snipey intervention, because I have not finished mentioning what Members spoke about. If she had paid more attention when she was speaking, she would have seen that I listened to everything she said, particularly about the pensions Bill. I will ensure that the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions reads her speech so that he can respond to it, and when the Bill is brought forward, he will no doubt respond to her directly. The hon. Lady can do better than that kind of intervention.
Hon. Members from across the House have outlined their views and concerns about the effect that the vote on 23 June could have on investment and about the importance of our EU membership. I agree with them that our membership is important for investment, particularly overseas investment, and the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) will agree with me that stability for investors is vital if housing is to continue to grow. Any disruption to that could be quite damaging, and if housing is damaged, our economy will be too. I think, therefore, that hon. Members have made an important point.
Today’s debate, as was fitting to its subject matter, has ranged far and wide, from pensioners and integrated transport to intergalactic transport, but hon. Members will excuse me, I hope, if I bring us back to the Bills that my Department will be leading on in the year ahead. Having just completed work on the Housing and Planning Act 2016, in the last Session, DCLG officials, who like to stay busy, are delighted to be taking on two new Bills. The first is the neighbourhood planning and infrastructure Bill. Since 2010, the number of homes granted planning permission has increased by over 50%. In the last year, permissions have been granted for over 255,000 new homes. Net additions to the housing stock have recovered from the record lows that the right hon. Gentleman oversaw and which were achieved under the last Labour Government, while the number of first-time buyers is up by 57% since 2009, with 262,000 first-time buyers last year alone. But we must go further and faster. We want 1 million more homes this Parliament and 1 million more first-time buyers. The right hon. Gentleman might want to update his figures. Homelessness remains below its peak under the last Government. We have been clear we want to deliver 400,000 affordable homes, meaning the biggest Government-led building programme since the 1970s. More than 181,000 homes were built last year, up from the 88,000 he left us with. That is a 25% rise last year alone, which dwarves the 2% he referred to.
Brandon Lewis
Actually, the Labour party did not vote or even call a vote on the neighbourhood planning third-party right of appeal. The hon. Gentleman might like to check back and see how that issue played out. What we want to ensure, through the Bill, is that there is no need for a third-party right of appeal, because the community’s voice will have been heard at the beginning of the process. I think prevention is much better than cure. Having talked to organisations such as the Campaign to Protect Rural England, and to colleagues and people who have drawn up neighbourhood plans around the country, that certainly seems to be the more popular way to get things done.
Barbara Keeley
I was one of the shadow Ministers on the Localism Bill and we did support the community right to appeal—I know because I was there. A big issue is brewing in my constituency. There has been a lot of talk about neighbourhoods having a say, but the Secretary of State appears to have dropped support for a substantial local application. My community and my constituents are thoroughly sick of the lack of support at national level from the Secretary of State for important local green-belt issues.
Brandon Lewis
I am sure the hon. Lady will appreciate that I cannot comment on any particular planning application, but when it comes to support for the green belt, this Government have gone further than ever before to ensure that the green belt is properly protected. Ultimately, it is a matter for the local community, but as I said, when it comes to neighbourhood planning, she might like to have a look at what her party called votes on during the passage of the Housing and Planning Act 2016. She might like to update her knowledge on that.
To date, almost 200 neighbourhood plans have passed referendums, including a case in the last couple of weeks. We saw 18 go through in just one week—pretty much a record—with more going through week by week. Local people are now participants, not bystanders, in the planning process. That is helping to transform attitudes to development, and there is a much more positive approach to it. It turns out that when planning is done with people instead of being done to them, we create trust and see more homes given planning permission. We want to go further, and I am determined to provide the certainty and ease to neighbourhood planning that people want.
The Bill will make sure that planning conditions are imposed by planning authorities only where necessary. Let me be clear about the problem. As the Minister for Housing and Planning, I have had examples come to me of planning permissions with hundreds of conditions attached, the worst of which are those that stop any work happening at all until further details are agreed—so-called pre-commencement conditions. The worst I have heard of so far had over 800 of them.
I am aware of cases where half of the conditions attached require further agreement from the local authority. These are planning permissions that have been given the green light for building, but it can take months or even years to resolve these conditions. Many Members of all parties will have had residents affected or seen for themselves examples of sites for which permission has been granted, yet they have not been built on. It is most frustrating for a community to see that, and we need to put an end to it. We need to get people building on sites more quickly. The grief this causes is not restricted to companies who cannot get on with building because it affects communities themselves—the local communities that draw up their neighbourhood plans and go through the process of getting planning permission. They decide for themselves where they want new building to take place, and that localisation and simplification of the planning process is behind much of the successful new building since 2010.
When sites that have gained permission are drowned with pre-commencement conditions, disillusion with the entire planning system sets in. Frankly, it is toxic. We need to make sure that the power to decide where building will take place stays in the hands of local communities, which is why we need to refine the process. This is not—let me be very clear—about taking away any protections or checks; it is about stopping needless bureaucracy and time-wasting. Our intention is that many issues will be resolvable at the same time that the building is under way, making sure that any legitimate concerns are addressed without holding up production of the houses that we need.
Another key element of the Bill is the completion of our reforms to compulsory purchase. For the avoidance of confusion, this involves purchase at current, not future, use value. The Government do not propose changing the existing fundamental principle that compensation should be paid at market value in the absence of the scheme underlying the compulsory purchase. These proposals are intended to make the compulsory purchase process clearer, fairer and faster for all parties involved in it. The key point is that we are not changing anything like that.
If we want a much wider range of developers to play their part in building the homes and infrastructure we need, we must remove risk from the process of planning and land acquisition. Needless uncertainty does nothing to protect the countryside or to guarantee good design. What it does is restrict home building to the biggest players. The Bill, however, will give communities the tools that they need to diversify development, enabling both quantity and quality to be achieved in house building. It will also establish the independent National Infrastructure Commission on a statutory basis. I appreciate what was said about that by the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne. The establishment of the commission is the next step in the Government’s plan to improve UK infrastructure, and will help us to deliver our manifesto pledge to invest more than £100 billion in our infrastructure networks during the current Parliament.
The second piece of legislation, the local growth and jobs Bill, will make an equally important contribution, not least by giving communities a direct financial stake in their future growth. Most important, the Bill will deliver on our commitment to allow 100% retention of business rates by councils, and, moreover, will allow them to reduce the business tax rate. It will also enable combined authority mayors to levy a supplement on business rate bills to fund new infrastructure projects. That will require the support of the business community through the relevant local enterprise partnership, but the potential for locally led infrastructure investment is clear.
All this takes place within the broader context of localism—of growth and devolution deals throughout our country, and of the decentralisation of billions of pounds of infrastructure funds. Local communities have never had a bigger opportunity to direct their future development. Indeed, who can blame certain Opposition Members for eyeing up those opportunities? With the political undead occupying their Front Benches, a new life in our newly empowered city halls has never looked so enticing. “In the name of God, go!” is what Oliver Cromwell told a previous Parliament. What I would say to Opposition Members such as the shadow Home Secretary who have itchy feet is “Yes, go for it: there has never been a better time to be in local government, with more influence and more power to do things for your local community than ever before.”
Public Transport (Greater Manchester)
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(9 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Jonathan Reynolds
It absolutely is. It seems absurd, given the cost of creating new rail capacity, to have a line that is not utilised, when the reason it was not originally closed but turned into what is called a parliamentary service no longer applies, because transport patterns have changed so much. When we consider the bus links between Tameside and Stockport, with less than one bus an hour in some parts of my constituency, it does seem absurd.
In putting forward this case, I want people to recognise the crucial point that, primarily due to the completion of the M60 motorway, people now choose more than ever before to live and work in different parts of Greater Manchester. Our public transport network needs to reflect that change in travel patterns. Many boroughs, including Tameside, are very keen to see an orbital expansion of the Metrolink network to connect key town centres, and to see it extended to Manchester airport, with the huge potential for jobs and growth that could bring. I would love to see Metrolink extended to run from Stockport town centre, through to Denton and Hyde, and then on to Ashton to create a genuine circle line for south and east Manchester.
Metrolink is wholly operated by Transport for Greater Manchester, but central Government have always been instrumental in supporting it, including when it comes to expansion, so I would be interested to know the Minister’s thoughts on whether this Government would support further Metrolink expansion—perhaps using Government funds to match the retained revenue from the increase in business rates that might occur through expansion.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
There will be profound disappointment among my constituents, who have suffered the installation—or part-installation—of the Leigh guided busway, which is a gross mistake. We should have had Metrolink built. Guided busway schemes are expensive, and that one should never have been installed.
Jonathan Reynolds
I know that my hon. Friend feels strongly about that. The expansion of Metrolink could certainly fulfil such a need.
I want to go on to the subject of buses. Journeys by bus within Greater Manchester remain the predominant form of public transport used, with over 210 million journeys last year, but bus patronage continues to flatline, as opposed to what we have seen in London, where it has vastly increased. Transport for Greater Manchester recognises that that is an issue, and the preferred answer seems to be much further transport devolution.
I am very much in favour of bus regulation, similar to that in London. I know that Transport for Greater Manchester, too, is keen to explore the benefits of bus franchising in order to properly integrate and co-ordinate the public transport network so as to secure the growth in bus usage that has been lacking in recent years. A model such as the London one would mean a simpler single identity and a set of easier multi-modal fares and tickets across Greater Manchester as passengers’ travel patterns change. A good recent example of why this is necessary is surely the Healthier Together hospital reorganisation initiative, which shows that there is a crucial need for local transport authorities to be able to plan bus services and not be at the whim of timetables that do not always suit passengers’ requirements. We also need to be able to guarantee transport services in order to better provide other public services.
Of course, the true test of a region’s public transport success is whether it manages to decrease the number of car journeys taken—something that Greater Manchester has not yet achieved. The benefits of this are obvious, not least in terms of emissions and air quality, about which, as the shadow climate change Minister, I care a great deal. We should want people to get out of their cars and on to public transport, both for leisure and for commuting purposes. Greater Manchester did attempt this in a rather crude way with a proposal to bring in a London-style congestion charge back in 2008. The proposal was put to the people of Greater Manchester, and to say that it was overwhelmingly rejected would be an understatement, with 79% of votes cast being against bringing it in. I always smile when we talk about the Scottish independence referendum and it is suggested that it is difficult to make the case for voting no. That was not our experience in Greater Manchester with the congestion charge proposal.
That shows the scale of the challenge faced. One of the reasons why so many people were against bringing in that congestion charge was that they felt that the public transport infrastructure was not adequate for them to feel confident enough to ditch their cars. There is an argument that this was a chicken and egg scenario, and that public transport would be sufficiently improved if the demand existed, but that the demand would never materialise while the public transport infrastructure was not deemed adequate.
Jonathan Reynolds
Absolutely. I look enviously at the night tube proposal for London. In big cities, so much of the offer within the evening economy is attractive, yet for people who live in my constituency, which is a relatively short distance from Manchester city centre, access is severely limited. The trains do not run and night buses are infrequent and under threat, so it is a huge issue.
If the investment is put into the public transport infrastructure, people will be more than willing to use it if it meets their needs. The benefits to the area, to the economy and to people’s health should not be understated. We often hear a great deal about London in terms of health and life expectancy because of the pollution issues, but those problems are seen in Greater Manchester too. Progress has been good, with improvements year on year in the number of non-car journeys, and I know that Transport for Greater Manchester is committed to further improvement. I also believe that there is huge potential in cities for the expansion of electric car use. I recently tested our electric car charging infrastructure in Greater Manchester, but I will leave that for another Adjournment debate.
An improved public transport system in Greater Manchester is vital to the region’s economic growth and to the success of “devo-Manc” and the northern powerhouse initiative, as I am sure the Minister would agree. A fully integrated transport network including all modes of public transport is key to this, and can be achieved only by devolving further powers to the region. In particular, I believe public transport should be one of the directly elected Mayor of Manchester’s key areas of responsibility, much as it is in London.
I hope that in his reply the Minister will be full of warm words for Greater Manchester and for the northern powerhouse, and feel able to express his agreement with a lot of what I have said regarding what Greater Manchester needs. What I want most from him, however, are not just words, but a firm commitment that the Government recognise the need in Greater Manchester, and that powers and access to funding will be forthcoming in order to allow us to fulfil that need. One thing that can always be said of us in Greater Manchester is that if we are given the tools we will always do the job.
Mr Speaker
I assume the hon. Lady has the consent both of the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) and of the Minister.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
I wish to make only a small number of points, because my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) made an excellent speech and most of us from the area would agree with almost everything—if not everything—he said. As an MP representing Salford, Worsley and Eccles South, I wish to talk briefly about the knock-on effect that this delay in rail electrification is having on planned upgrades affecting local rail services. We were in a ridiculous situation over the winter. As a result of rail electrification, we faced greatly increased congestion and delays while a bridge was rebuilt just off the A6 in Salford. It caused problems and tailbacks for commuters. We went through weeks and months of delays on the roads so that a bridge could be rebuilt for a project that has now been delayed. That sort of thing makes people really angry. All we have now are the delays and uncertainty.
Excellent work is being done by the Friends of Eccles Station, the Friends of Patricroft Station and the Friends of Walkden Station, which are dedicated friends groups in my constituency. They do award-winning work, brightening up the stations with flower planting, gardening, murals and other artwork, but they do not want just to make the stations better; they want better rail services too. They do not only talk to me about the wonderful work that they are doing to make commuting easier for people. They are as aware as I am that, for example, 70 to 80 people are left on the platform at Walkden station at peak times in the morning because we do not have the rolling stock and they cannot get on the trains. Those groups are all committed to improving our rail services. They want more services to stop at the stations on the way into Manchester, more and better carriages, and improved, up-to-date rolling stock. The promise—the tantalising, faraway thing—was that rail electrification would have a knock-on effect, and that rolling stock would become available for our local rail services. What we now have is uncertainty and delay. Those excellent groups, which do all that work in trying to get that modal shift, are profoundly disappointed.
Junction 13 of the M60 is one of the most congested anywhere in the country. Transport Ministers are looking at the string of motorways—the M60, M62 and M602— that span around my constituency to try to do something about the congestion, given that we do not have the congestion charge, thank goodness. But there is no improvement in sight. We cannot shift people on to rail, because there is no capacity, so we have truly faced the northern power cut to which our excellent Manchester Evening News has referred—and all the while congestion is building up. I implore the Minister to think of all those wonderful campaigning groups and the wonderful work they do in trying to improve our rail services, and tell us what hope we can give them that all their work is not in vain and that some improvement is in the distance.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
I, too, commend my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) for securing this important debate, albeit that it has perhaps kept a number of Greater Manchester MPs in the House of Commons for longer than they had anticipated on the last day before the summer recess.
I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) for making some very important points, not least about bus deregulation. He has long championed the cause of re-regulation of bus services in Greater Manchester, but not in the old monolithic way. He has been quite progressive in that he has always said openly that he is not against competition between bus companies, but that it should not be on-street, causing the chaos that we have seen over the past 20-odd years. It should be done in a controlled manner in a tendering system whereby Transport for Greater Manchester—or Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive, as it used to be known—could set the standards, the network and the ticketing arrangements, and we could have the properly planned and effective bus network across the county that, sadly, we have been missing for far too long.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde talked about rail services and his desire, which I share, to have some kind of orbital service. Orbital services, not necessarily involving trains but certainly involving buses, are not new; we used to have them. Until about 10 or 15 years ago, there was a service that ran from Bolton in the north through Bury, Rochdale, Oldham, Ashton-under-Lyne, Denton and Stockport all the way to Manchester airport—the 400 Trans- Lancs Express. That was great for getting from Bolton in the north of the county through to Manchester airport in the south, along the eastern towns. There were similar services in other parts of Greater Manchester. As my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton said, those services, sadly, were removed in favour of services into Manchester. The perversity of the current transport network in Greater Manchester is that 15 years ago someone who lived in Denton and wanted to get to Manchester airport could get a bus, but now they have to get a bus into town and then a bus out of town. The journey is twice as long and twice as expensive so, realistically, most people will not use that method of getting to Manchester airport from my constituency.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde raised an important point about the underuse of the existing rail infrastructure in Greater Manchester. If ever there is a line that highlights that best, it is sadly the Stockport to Stalybridge line, which runs through my constituency.
Perhaps the Minister does not know the history of that line. It used to serve a useful purpose back when trans-Pennine trains went into Manchester Victoria. Services from the south of the country go into Manchester Piccadilly, so if one was connecting from one of those services to a trans-Pennine service in the days before Metrolink, rather than going into Manchester Piccadilly and trudging across Manchester city centre with one’s baggage to Manchester Victoria, one would get off at Stockport and use the very useful service from Stockport to Stalybridge, where they could connect to the trans-Pennine trains. When trans-Pennine trains were diverted into Manchester Piccadilly, that link was no longer necessary.
Having said that, the eastern side of the conurbation has grown and travel patterns, including travel-to-work patterns, have changed. We now have a piece of infrastructure with two stations, Reddish South and Denton, that are sadly served by one train a week in one direction only. The service is so pathetic that one cannot even get a return ticket from the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde to mine.
We have two excellent friends groups: the Friends of Reddish South Station and the Friends of Denton Station. For seven or eight years, they have championed the desire for a train service that uses the Stockport to Stalybridge line, or at least part of it. There is even a connection just north of Ashton Moss that would allow trains to be diverted along the line into Manchester city centre. I urge the Minister to look carefully at their campaigns, which I fully support, and to try to get Northern Rail and Network Rail to include in the new franchise a proper passenger service that utilises that line.
Barbara Keeley
On behalf of my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), who is not here, I want to mention the importance of keeping such urban rail lines open. Leigh must be one of the last places in the country that has no railway and no stations at all. I am sure that he would have added to this debate if he had been here. It is vital to keep such lines open.
Andrew Gwynne
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Apart from Denton and Reddish South, which do have rail lines and stations, Leigh is probably the poorest served community by rail in Greater Manchester.
Lastly, I want to mention integration. It is all fine and well having great rail services and Metrolink services; possibly one day even having tram-train services, with trams using some of the under-utilised rail infrastructure across Greater Manchester, thereby reducing the capital investment that new tram lines cost the taxpayer; and having improved bus services when we have a properly franchised, re-regulated system, but none of that is any good to my constituents unless there is joined-up transport planning and integration.
The Chancellor announced in the Budget that the northern powerhouse is to secure an Oyster-style card that may, by the sounds of it, be used across the whole of the Northern franchise. That is an important step forward, although I am not sure that we want to be using state-of-the-art technology on 1980s, clapped-out Pacer trains, so I hope that the Minister will answer the questions from my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton on the timing of the upgrades and the introduction of the new rolling stock in Greater Manchester.
My one desire is that we end up with a transport system like that in London. Ten years ago when I first became a Member of Parliament, I could not believe it when London MPs complained about the state of public transport in the capital city. If I decided to start a journey on one mode of transport in Greater Manchester—tram, for example—and then connect to a train and finish my journey by bus, as someone can in London with an Oyster card where the services join up, people in Greater Manchester would have thought I was bonkers. The services do not join up, and that is the problem. Someone would be left stranded on some station in the middle of the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde, without the opportunity to get a return ticket.
Andrew Jones
I certainly do agree with my hon. Friend, who makes a timely intervention. Only yesterday the giant tunnelling machine was named “Fillie” by a local schoolgirl who has links with the area. The tunnelling machine being used for the Farnworth tunnel is greater in scale than those used on Crossrail, so this is a significant investment.
Rail is a big success story. Our rail industry is struggling to cope with the scale of passenger demand. Over the last 20 years, passenger numbers have grown from 750 million to 1.6 billion. In Greater Manchester last year there were 25 million rail journeys, compared with just 22 million five years ago and 18 million 10 years ago. Rail is vital to the local economy, and more and more passengers are using Manchester Piccadilly, Victoria and Oxford Road. Town centre stations, such as Stockport and Bolton, remain among the busiest in the Greater Manchester area, and that is excellent news. But passenger growth needs to be provided for, and the rail network in Greater Manchester needs investment to improve people’s journeys and to support economic prosperity. That is why the investment in the northern hub has been so important—something that Greater Manchester and the north have called for for years. It was supported across parties and regions—I am a Yorkshire Member, but I heartily supported that investment and lobbied for it in the last Parliament.
The northern hub is a significant scheme and commitment that will deliver better journeys, modern trains and more seats, including electrification between Manchester and Liverpool, with new trains and quicker journeys. Further electrification is under way between Manchester and Bolton and, further afield, planned between Blackpool and Preston. The magnificent redevelopment of Manchester Victoria station and the provision of a fourth platform at Manchester airport station have been completed.
We have also seen the reopening of Todmorden curve, which is providing a direct link between Manchester and Burnley for the first time in 40 years. As hon. Members mentioned, most importantly and popularly, the outdated Pacers will disappear from the north’s railways. I am aware of Pacer trains, as they serve the Leeds-Harrogate-York line and I catch them most weeks—indeed, I think most colleagues representing northern constituencies are aware of them. They are disappearing, and that was part of the invitation to tender in the franchise process.
Several hon. Members mentioned their concern regarding the recent announcement of the pause on trans-Pennine electrification. That is most certainly very disappointing. An improvement in the area’s rail links is critical, but it is because it is critical that we have to get a grip on Network Rail’s management of the work. We cannot tolerate cost overruns on the scale last seen on the west coast main line upgrade. The Transport Secretary has taken action to reset the programme and to get it back on track. This includes pausing the work on midland main line electrification and north trans-Pennine electrification east of Stalybridge, but let me be absolutely clear: this is a pause; it is not a stop. This is about getting the project back on track. To do that, we have a new chair of Network Rail, Sir Peter Hendy, who has a proven track record of delivering on major transport challenges. He will report in autumn to the Transport Secretary on how that will be achieved.
The hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) talked about work on rail in her constituency. That work is not paused. The area of trans-Pennine investment in northern electrification that is paused is to the east of Stalybridge. If she would like any further information, I am of course more than happy to help to provide it after the debate.
Barbara Keeley
The uncertainty is twofold. I mentioned the excellent friends groups. The Minister should take them into account in terms of the expansion of passenger numbers, because they do a great job in letting people know about rail services. They are constantly frustrated by Network Rail, because it has not been willing to talk to them or to consider timetable changes. Nothing moves for them in terms of getting the better services through these stations. If there is to be a report, these local aspects of our urban services really need to be looked at, too.
Andrew Jones
I agree that friends groups across many parts of the north do a very valuable job and the hon. Lady is right to highlight that. In terms of having a responsive rail service, part of that is having franchises that generate growth. Of course, the previous Northern franchise was a no-growth franchise. Her basic point, however, about listening, communicating with the public and supporting those seeking to drive public transport usage is clearly appropriate.
Let me be absolutely clear: this is a pause, not a stop. Even without electrification, we will see significant improvements to rail in the north. On trans-Pennine services between Leeds and Manchester, there will be better journeys, more modern trains and additional capacity as part of the new franchise. The new franchise arrangements will be awarded later this year, to come in from April next year. To put to one side any concerns hon. Members may have, let me say that the budget for rail enhancements remains intact.
There is one huge rail project that has not yet had a mention in the debate: HS2. I have to mention it, because it will have a significant impact on public transport in Greater Manchester. We are committed to building the full Y network of HS2, including building the line from Birmingham to Crewe earlier. There is more work to be done on further analysis and final decisions on the preferred route. We are also looking at the case for accelerating construction of the Leeds to Sheffield part of the line. HS2 will transform north-south connectivity throughout our country and cut journey times. For example, the journey time between Manchester and Birmingham will be cut to 41 minutes—currently it is one hour and 28 minutes—which is a saving of 47 minutes.
The point, however, is not really about speed, but capacity on the network. We have not built a railway line north of London in our country since the reign of Queen Victoria. Indeed, our railway network is only a fraction of the size it was. The Beeching cuts might have been appropriate at the time—they were before I was even born—but they might not look quite so right now. We have failed to invest historically in our rail infrastructure, and HS2 is a part of correcting that.
Andrew Jones
I do indeed appreciate the points being made—they have been made to me before—but as regards investment in our classic rail network and in HS2, I make the point that it is not one or the other; it is both. Progress on both needs to happen in parallel. I hope that reassures the hon. Gentleman and those who have contacted him.
The huge increase in capacity that HS2 will deliver will transform rail connections around our country, but even that will not be enough. Many rail journeys in the north, particularly east-west journeys, are too slow, too infrequent and suffer from unacceptable overcrowding, which has put people off using our rail network and certainly discourages development of city-to-city connections and business. The Government are determined to improve the situation, and we will do this in partnership with the north.
In the Budget, the Chancellor allocated £30 million to Transport for the North, which will act as a single voice for the whole of the north and work with us to identify the strategic transport investment priorities across the entire region. It is fantastic that we are seeing far more devolution. We should be working on the principle that decisions affecting local services should be taken as near as possible to where those services are delivered, so that they are more tailored to local needs. Incidentally, that devolution in transport is mirrored by other areas of devolution and is very encouraging and long overdue.
I would like to say a little about local transport. Most journeys in Greater Manchester are local and often less than 5 miles. We have invested heavily, alongside Greater Manchester, through our local major scheme budgets—the local sustainable transport fund and the cycle city ambition grant—and most recently with the local growth deals through which more than £500 million has been provided to support local transport investment, including improvements to the Bolton to Manchester bus corridor; enhancements to Salford central station; and new transport interchanges in Ashton and Stockport; plus, of course, the new trams for Metrolink.
Most journeys by public transport in Greater Manchester are by bus. In 2014, out of the 267 million public transport journeys I mentioned earlier, 211 million were on the bus network. Buses are vital. I am a huge champion of them. They are part of the answer to our public transport challenge. As the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde mentioned, unlike with Metrolink and rail, passenger numbers are not growing and, despite significant investment in facilities and vehicles, have continued to decline. Greater Manchester has ambitious plans to arrest this decline, and it is right that areas with ambitious plans to grow and develop should be given the powers they need to promote an integrated transport system.
We signed a groundbreaking devolution deal with Greater Manchester last year in which we committed to providing it with powers to franchise its bus services, and we will legislate to make this deal a reality. The hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) asked about the timing. I will have to check with the Leader of the House, but I am expecting a bus Bill to come through the House later this year. Areas such as Greater Manchester that are given the powers to franchise their services will be able to better integrate buses with other public transport modes and plan services to link with new developments or regeneration projects.
Franchising will provide local areas with the opportunity to introduce more Oyster-style smart ticketing—not necessarily the exact same technology—to improve service for passengers. It is a powerful tool for making public transport more attractive by making it more convenient and removing some of the barriers that people encounter in switching from one mode of transport to another. Smart ticketing integrates bus, train and tram journeys, driving convenience. Our aim is for public transport in Greater Manchester and across the north to become more convenient and attractive and for it to build on the enormous growth in demand that we are seeing. We know that a better transport system supports economic growth.
Before I finish, I would like to add that although this debate has focused on public transport, we are by no means neglecting the motorist. We have incredibly ambitious plans for our road network up and down the country. Specifically in Manchester, the M62 will provide a continuous four-lane smart motorway to Leeds. Similarly, the M60 between junctions 8 and 18 is being improved and will become a smart motorway. The south-east quadrant of the M60, between junctions 24 and 4, is also being upgraded.
Barbara Keeley
I understand that the Minister is taking a very positive outlook in his speech, but I should tell him that the M60 smart motorway roadworks are an out-and-out disaster, causing my constituents and many others to be kept awake at weekends and leading to great delays. I am happy to seek an Adjournment debate to tell him about it at much greater length, but we have got two years of torment ahead of us, so please can he not adopt such an optimistic outlook?
Andrew Jones
I am somebody who is generally a glass-half-full person. I find it reasonably difficult not to take quite a positive tone and, as I have just gone through the significant transport investments and the progress being made in Greater Manchester, I am feeling relentlessly cheerful, so I am not entirely sure that I can change the tone with which I operate. However, I nevertheless agree that it is unsettling and causes problems when we have roadworks. I regularly use the M1, about 40% of which has seen the introduction of smart motorways, and I have not yet found a way—and nor has Highways England—to work on the roads without having some roadworks.
Barbara Keeley
Will the Minister therefore accept my invitation to come along and tour the bit of the M60 motorway that goes through my constituency—we have three motorways in my constituency; I am really lucky—so that I can show him the extent of the disruption and the problems caused for my constituents? I would be happy to do that.
Andrew Jones
I have some knowledge of the area, having driven along that road only very recently, and there is indeed a challenge. I recognise the difficulties—I do not mean to make light of them—and we see that all over the country where road works are taking place. We are in the middle of a huge period of road investment. We are seeing a tripling of the budget in our first road investment strategy and we will be opening the process for the second road investment strategy—RIS2—later this year. Delivering such a significant scale of investment will cause some disruption. I am certainly keen to hear from colleagues about the challenges they are facing locally, and I will be taking them up with Highways England, but we need to get through this period. In part, this goes back to the long-standing failure to invest in our transport infrastructure over decades. We are playing catch-up and it is not at all straightforward.
Hon. Members have asked about the powers and the finances to deliver our ambitions. This Government are driving devolution and investing in public transport in record numbers. I would say gently to hon. Members that they are pushing at an open door. This Government are buying the idea that transport investment is a driver of economic growth—a regenerator of communities—and has a positive social function. Devolution is taking place in an unprecedented way. I hope that provides some comfort to hon. Members.
In summary, I hope I have been able to demonstrate just how important public transport in Greater Manchester is to this Government. We are committed to working alongside Greater Manchester in delivering the improvements that it decides are the most important for its economy, its residents and its future.
Question put and agreed to.
Infrastructure Bill [Lords]
Baroness Keeley Excerpts(9 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hayes
The hon. Gentleman will have the chance to make that case as the Bill makes its passage through the House. I am not in the other place and it is not really for me to anticipate the amendments that he or other Members might table. Of course, we will listen—this is a Government who listen and learn, as I shall describe in a moment. Given the hon. Gentleman’s record in this House, I know that he would be the last person to turn his back on innovation and stand in the way of progress. Indeed, he has been one of this House’s greatest advocates of innovation and scientific progress.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
My constituency includes the community of Barton Moss, where a six-month exploration for shale gas took place from November to May. That was dumped on frightened communities and people as a result of a 2012 planning application for coalbed methane gas. There was no reassurance.
Even worse, the Government have changed the planning process, shortened time scales, and taken some vital aspects of planning consideration away from local planning authorities and given them to the Environment Agency; that made it so much more difficult for communities such as mine to comment and be involved. They were not involved and they did not comment. The things the Minister has said about reassurance just did not happen.
Mr Hayes
I do not want to be unnecessarily partisan, because that is not my way, but I can say only that the hon. Lady has either misread the Bill or misunderstood the Government’s intention. After my explanation of that aspect of the Bill, I hope the hon. Lady will leave the Chamber if not convinced, at least with many of her worst fears assuaged. If I am imperfect in making the argument, so be it, but I will give it my best shot. I will say no more than that.
The hon. Lady and others know that, because of our commitment to long-term delivery, unemployment has dropped below 2 million for the first time since 2008 and we have produced the first ever road investment strategy, which has been warmly welcomed not only by Members of this House, but by the RAC Foundation director, Professor Stephen Glaister, by Richard Threlfall, the head of infrastructure at consultants KPMG, and by many others. I will not tire the House by listing the many supporters of the Government’s approach. That would not be entirely fair to the Opposition, either. I do not want them to start with such a profound disadvantage; I want to give them a fair shot on what is, after all, an extremely sticky wicket for them.
I genuinely believe that our impressive commitment to the long term, which stands in sharp contrast to the record of the previous Government, is one of the hallmarks of this Administration. According to the World Economic Forum’s global competitiveness survey, under the Labour party—as I have said, I do not want to dwell on this for too long—our roads and railways plummeted from seventh in the world to 33rd.
We know that if Labour had been re-elected in 2010, things would have only got worse. Mr Miliband admitted to the BBC after the election that Labour had planned to cut investment in rail and road by 50%, telling Radio 5 Live that
“we’re going to halve the share of national income going to capital spending.”
That was, of course, Mr David Miliband, Mr Speaker, as you probably remember.
The sharp contrast between anyone called Miliband and Benjamin Disraeli is of course clear to all in the House. That great Prime Minister once said:
“In a progressive country, change is constant;…change…is inevitable.”
The role of Government is to prepare for change, and to plan for the long term. The various measures in the Bill will help to bring about such changes and make a real difference to people’s lives and livelihoods. Let us look at the changes in turn.
First, on roads reform, the Government have announced hundreds of extra lane miles on motorways and trunk roads, and action to improve some of the most important arteries in our country, such as the A303 to the south-west and the A1 Newcastle-Gateshead western bypass. It is fair to say that our work at Stonehenge—the bold engineering work to be done—is probably the most ambitious scheme there since the stone age. It is totemic, as it were, or emblematic of this Government’s willingness to tackle matters that have been neglected for a long time by successive Governments.
Major roads run by the new strategic highways company will create better connectivity and minimise environmental impact. The new name for our strategic highways company will be Highways England. I intend to set it up as soon as possible. The Government have already committed more than £24 billion to upgrade England’s strategic road network through to 2021.
Mr Hayes
The hon. Gentleman will be familiar with the impact assessment. I have a copy here and I would be happy to let him read it. It is available and if he looks at that impact assessment he will be able to gauge how far we have performed the analysis he describes. If he feels that we have done so insufficiently, I shall be more than happy to correspond with him directly on the matter. I know that he always brings fresh thinking to the consideration of this House.
The Bill will enable communities to be offered the chance to buy a stake in new, commercial renewable electricity schemes in their local area, so that they can gain a greater share in the associated financial benefit. We would consider using this power only if the voluntary approach to community shared ownership in renewable energy did not bear fruit. A right to buy would give communities the opportunity to have a real stake and sense of ownership in projects happening in their area. The Shared Ownership Taskforce recently launched its voluntary framework, and we brought forward an amendment to the Bill in the other place in order to provide greater certainty on the minimum time scales for this voluntary approach to take effect. We are proposing, too, to allow changes to the renewable heat incentive to provide more flexibility in financing arrangements for renewable heating systems.
Let me come on now to what I described as the exciting part of my speech, which deals with the Wood review. We recognise that increasing renewable energy sources is important, but we realise that a dynamic and flourishing oil and gas industry remains important, too. It can contribute to our energy security and to the economy, supporting around 450,000 jobs and showing record capital expenditure in 2013 of around £14 billion.
The Government agreed with the findings of Sir Ian Wood’s independent report, which concluded that changes to the recovery and stewardship regime in the North sea could deliver around £200 billion of additional value to the UK economy. We intend to deliver all of Sir Ian’s recommendations, but further work is required with stakeholders on a number of detailed aspects and parliamentary time is scarce. We are therefore starting by introducing two measures: one will put into statute the principle of maximising economic recovery of petroleum from UK waters; and the second will introduce a power so that the costs of funding a larger, better resourced regulator can be paid for by the industry rather than through general taxation, as is currently the case.
We need to explore all our energy options. This is the age of increasing costs, uncertainty and insecurity in overseas energy suppliers. The shale gas industry in the UK is at an embryonic stage, and the changes in the Bill would simplify the procedure by which onshore gas and oil and deep geothermal developers can obtain underground drilling access, and are accompanied by the industry’s commitment to pay communities in return for the right to use deep-level land. We do not yet know what is commercially viable, but we are encouraging exploration. These provisions will help us to address this question to ensure that the regulation is compatible with these new methods of underground drilling.
There has been a great deal of unfounded scaremongering on the environmental impacts of shale gas, much of it based on examples from other jurisdictions. The Bill does not alter the involvement of local authority planners; nor does it erode in any way the strength of our regulatory regime, the effectiveness of which has been demonstrated over 50 years of development, which is one of the strictest and safest in the world.
Barbara Keeley
I am sure that a number of Members are concerned about it; I am not the only one, although I may be one who has been disturbed most recently by this sort of development in my constituency. The Government should be determined to do the right and the safe thing by communities, but they are not doing so. They are determined to have this rushed through. Indeed, the Prime Minister is determined to win the debate on shale gas. My constituents suffered for the best part of six months from exploration for shale gas. Businesses lost money and people could not sell their homes, yet the whole issue of compensation was never dealt with, and it was the same with the policing of protests. The community in Greater Manchester suffered by having to pay for the policing of the protests, and local people were really damaged by what went on at Barton Moss.
The key point is that none of the arrangements up to now has helped to compensate people in that position by one jot. Random schemes that provide some funding here and there are not the answer; the compensation should go to the people who were hurt.
Richard Burden
My hon. Friend makes an important point that was repeated in the other place and if the Bill gets to Committee, and we will be seeking a much more robust regulatory environment. My hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller) said that securing public confidence is not just important to us as parliamentarians when representing our constituents, but it is also important to the industry, which needs public concern about this issue like a hole in the head. If questions are to be answered they should be answered, and we should have transparency and a proper regulatory regime.
Barbara Keeley
The planning process for shale gas was changed on the first day of the recess last year—a day after we had debated it here—and there was no chance to comment. As my hon. Friend says, it is important that the public have confidence, which they cannot have at the moment. Planning authorities such as that in Salford should not have been denied the chance to comment on and take into account certain measures that were removed by the Government last year, and the time scale should not have been shortened. People need time to get their heads around this complex process, and planning authorities have fewer staff than they once had. I mentioned the payment scheme, which is totally unsatisfactory. People whose businesses lost money or who could not sell their homes will not be compensated by giving small amounts of money to the scout group down the road. This must be dealt with—
Charles Hendry
We need to satisfy the public, but the principle remains the same: the best way to deliver the toughest standards is by putting an unlimited obligation on companies to meet them, and by using the best technology and skills available to do so. That has put us in a position where our system is trusted, and people from across the world look at it to understand how well such a system can work. I hope that in this debate and in the wider debate on shale, we can start to differentiate the legitimate concerns about the transportation of liquids, what is injected and water management from the wholly bogus claims that are often made.
Barbara Keeley
I want to make a point about open spaces. We have been through that issue in my constituency; there is a school secure unit a quarter of a mile from the site and residential streets just over half a mile from it. That is not an open space situation. Companies such as the one at Barton Moss can go around and select sites that are grossly unsuitable—right on top of schools and where people live. That should not be allowed.
Charles Hendry
I hope that those issues are entirely legitimate to raise within the planning process. Those matters should be looked at in that way to decide whether an activity is or is not appropriate, and I believe that the right processes are in place to ensure that that happens.
As the shadow spokesman, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield, said, the proposed underground access is not exceptional; it already happens for cables, gas pipelines, tunnels and coal mining. As the debate is taken forward, I hope that we can reassure people that we are not doing something draconian or very different, but simply allowing a change that brings the activity into line with others.
I hope that the Bill can still be amended in one area, however, so that it addresses an issue of gas security at the same time. The focus on the North sea and shale gas highlights our vulnerability on energy security. As a country, we are already dependent on imported gas. Historically, the North sea was our gas-storage capability—when we needed more, we pumped out a bit more—which is why we have never stored the same volumes of gas as the French and the Germans. As we move into a period of dependency on gas imports, we need to look again at gas storage.
That is particularly true in the current climate, with the oil price where it is. The risk from the oil price’s being lower than it was just a few months ago is that the North sea will be harder to sustain in the longer term. It is one of the most expensive basins in the world, and there is therefore a risk that some fields will be closed down earlier. They will be abandoned, and it will not be possible to reopen them. At the same time, a low oil price—the gas linkage comes into that—means that UK shale may, because of its cost, be harder or simply not economic to extract. We therefore need to consider how to preserve our security of supply, which means looking again at gas storage.
We should pay tribute to, and recognise, the tremendous difference made by the liquefied natural gas terminals in the Thames and in south Wales, and the important contribution made by pipeline infrastructure from Norway—Langeled, for example—and what it has brought to this debate. However, looking back at gas issues over the past eight years or so, I think that we came too close for comfort during four winters, overwhelmingly because of factors over which we had no control.
The first time was in 2006, when there was a fire in our main gas storage facility at Rough. In 2009, there was the Russia-Ukraine dispute. Even though we were as far away in Europe as we could have been from those issues, gas was coming in through one interconnector and the same volume was going out through the interconnector next door to meet the demand in continental Europe. Eighteen months ago, the winter before last, we came within a few hours of running out of gas because the winter was so long and cold. We cannot leave the situation to chance. We need to take action now to guarantee our energy security for the future.
I believe fundamentally in market principles and approaches, but the market approach has not delivered the level of new investment that we would wish to see in this area. My right hon. Friend the Minister, who introduced the debate, well knows my views on this matter. We had a discussion a day or so after he took over from me as the Minister of State; I said that the one thing on which I wished we had done more was gas storage. I still hold that view today—perhaps even more strongly.