Seaborne Freight

Debate between Lord Davies of Stamford and Baroness Sugg

Tuesday 8th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, the dredging of Ramsgate, which the noble Lord said is already happening, is separate from this contract. We have a prioritisation process in place to ensure we can facilitate trade in the goods that we need to. That is an ongoing process that will continue up until we reach a deal with the European Union.

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

My Lords, when did any British Government in any field last place a major contract with a company that had no experience whatever of operating? Are the Government confident that the contract given to Seaborne Freight is fully in accordance and fully compliant with our rules on public procurement and the European public procurement directive?

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, we are absolutely confident that it is fully compliant. We duly published the details of the contract. As with many operators in the maritime sector, it is not uncommon for it not to own its own vessels. Many operators charter them through third parties, as Seaborne is doing.

Airports National Policy Statement

Debate between Lord Davies of Stamford and Baroness Sugg

Wednesday 6th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, I know that there are some very interesting proposals around Manston Airport. One of the reasons why we chose Heathrow was because of its freight capacity and the expansion will deliver doubling of freight on that. Alongside that, we are already full at Heathrow, and expect to be full at other airports very soon. Alongside the laying of the final NPS, we announced the policy on making best use of existing capacity to ensure that other airports can do that.

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

My Lords, it is extremely good news that this project is finally going to go ahead but I fear that, as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, said—and I think that the Minister has already acknowledged the point—we may run into quite a lot of obstacles and sources of delay. If we do, I hope that the Government will consider proceeding by some accelerated legislative process to carry this through without undue delay. Undue delays in infrastructure projects are surely a great national economic handicap which we have had for some time, but will the Minister agree that this is a particularly egregious case? We have had delays of at least eight years, due to indecision, vacillation and the setting up of quite otiose inquiries, when their results were already known in advance, merely to delay the outbreak of conflict within the Conservative Party and disputes between that party and the House of Commons. That is a very bad example. I think that future generations and the international world as a whole would have noticed that. Does she accept that, had the last Labour Government won the 2010 general election—I declare my interest: I served in that Government, but I had nothing whatever to do with civil aviation or airports—this new runway would have already been built?

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, I welcome the noble Lord’s welcoming of the NPS. He is quite right to point out that this has taken some time and has been the subject of many conversations, which is why we were so pleased to be able to lay the final NPS yesterday. We absolutely need to get on with this. As to whether this would have happened should the Labour Government have won in 2010, I am sure a lot of things would be different, but I am not sure whether the runway would now be built.

Rail Timetabling

Debate between Lord Davies of Stamford and Baroness Sugg

Monday 4th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, I apologise to my noble friend for the disruption to services he has faced on the Northern route. I absolutely reassure him that the Secretary of State and the Rail Minister have more than daily meetings on this. I agree it is important that we communicate to passengers as quickly as possible the new timetable and the incremental upgrades that are coming.

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

My Lords, is not the most extraordinary aspect of this Statement that the priority of the Secretary of State appears to be to argue that everybody else was at fault and that absolutely no responsibility or blame attaches to him? Does the noble Baroness agree that that attitude is not only unedifying but completely non-credible? The Secretary of State was clearly incompetent if he did not know what was going on—he was not asking the right questions. He knew, as the noble Baroness has just said, that the new timetable arrangements were running into considerable delays. As she said, that was a matter of public knowledge. He was equally incompetent if he did know that things were going wrong and did absolutely nothing about it until the car crash.

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, as I said, we were aware that there were issues with the infrastructure upgrades and the new timetable but we received reassurance and were not aware that there would be disruption of this level. As I said, on other rail lines the new timetable has been delivered, but GTR and Northern have suffered unacceptable delays and disruption. I repeat that the Secretary of State has apologised, and I do not think it is right to apportion blame today. The priority is to make sure that passengers get a better service as soon as possible. We are also running the inquiry so that we can fully understand exactly what went wrong, learn from those lessons and make sure we do not have the same situation in the future.