Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Gascoigne Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments
Wednesday 20th November 2024 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Gascoigne]

Leave out from “House” to end and insert “do insist on its Amendment 1”

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

Despite what the Minister just said at the Dispatch Box, I genuinely thank him for the collaborative approach with which I thought we had been dealing with each other. I thank all those who supported this amendment previously. I am also grateful to the Minister’s officials for the advice they have given and for all the words the Minister has just said. I thank the Liberal Democrats for their consistent support for the amendments throughout the Bill’s passage so far.

So that everyone is aware, this amendment is to set out at the outset a clear explanation of what the Bill does: putting passengers front and centre and improving rail services. As I have said previously, this is not a trap, it does not cost anything, and it does not kill the Bill nor tie it down in bureaucracy. It is what the Labour Party itself has said, both in opposition and in government, the Bill will do. It is, as the Minister says, what the people want and expect. This has been said at the Dispatch Box in both Houses.

Omitting the purpose clause makes one question what the Bill is for. After all, some have said that the Bill as a whole is merely about the delivery of nationalisation for purely ideological reasons, with no drive for further reform until the further legislation appears. I am saddened that, purely for cost reasons, we seem to be allowing the continuation of the worst-performing services. This purpose clause makes it clear that the Bill is not being driven by ideological reasons and brings it back to focus everyone’s minds on what it is for—the passengers.

When we replace one franchise with another, who or what is holding the successor to account? What does that entity do with this new-found power? Surely there needs to be something that says that the country expects things to get better or, at the very least, to not get any worse. As I said before, it is needed because under the Bill a Secretary of State has to make a judgment on whether or not to extend an existing franchise. We need a purpose clause to be clear about what the Secretary of State’s overriding desire should be.

I have sought at various stages to set out why this clause is needed, and will briefly respond to the Government’s arguments against this. Yesterday in the other place, the Secretary of State said that the Government are already improving the railways, or that there has been “progress”, as she described it, saying:

“I am more than happy to reassure the House that improving the performance of the railways is at the top of my priority list”.


However, she immediately went on to say that this amendment was

“misleading and potentially harmful, because it picks out improving the performance of passenger rail services as the sole purpose of the Bill”.

How on earth can you say that the Government are already delivering the purpose clause and then immediately go on to say that it is harmful? If that was not enough, the Secretary of State then deployed the age-old ripcord language, saying:

“Improving performance is of course a vital objective, but it is certainly not the only one”.—[Official Report, Commons, 19/11/24; col. 181.]


So in one statement alone, over the course of literally minutes, the Secretary of State said that the Government are improving the service but that it is misleading and harmful to say that they are doing so; despite that, though, they are doing it and a bunch of other things too, but they cannot support the amendment. It feels a bit like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. What is the Government’s position? Are they improving the service or are they against it? Are they delivering the clause already or is it misleading? Is it harmful, yet the Government are doing it? I could ask much else besides.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord Snape (Lab)]

If the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, who I have clashed with a couple of times in this Chamber, wishes to intervene, he should indicate and of course I will give way to him. It seems he does not wish to indicate. In that case, I would be obliged if he sat down and listened just for once.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate. I will address just a few points.

I very much agree with the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and his description of the previous Government as being dilatory. It is six and half years since the timetable went wrong in the north-west of England and on Thameslink, in May 2018, and nothing really has been done. The railway is suffering and its passengers are suffering, and something needs to be done about it. I have referred to this before but, at some speed, we will be consulting shortly about the content of the wider Bill to reform the railway. I think that differentiates this Government and the speed at which they choose to operate.

On Motion A, I want there to be no doubt that this Government will undertake reform with a clear purpose and direction. As published in Getting Britain Moving, our objectives are set and are more ambitious and wide-ranging than the proposed purpose clause. We want to see reliability, affordability, efficiency, quality, accessibility and safe travel as the DNA of our railways—the foundational values that drive reform and deliver on what passengers expect. Public ownership will be the first step in ensuring better services, by placing the passenger front and centre as we rebuild public confidence, trust and pride in our railway.

I listened carefully to the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, on the commitment that passengers should be at the core of the future of the railway. In that respect, the wider railways Bill is a different matter. It will establish Great British Railways as a new body at arm’s length from government, which will not be directly accountable to the electorate in the same way as the Government are. In that context, it is essential that the railways Bill should clearly set out two things.

The first of those is the functions of Great British Railways—what it is actually going to do. The second is what Great British Railways is supposed to achieve by exercising those functions—in other words, its purpose. I can absolutely confirm to your Lordships’ House today that the forthcoming railways Bill will set out both of those things, and that delivering improvements for passengers and maintaining high standards of performance will be a crucial part of its purpose. I will be more than happy to engage with the noble Baroness on how we express that in the Bill.

I urge your Lordships’ House to support the Government’s Motion A and to reject the amendment in Motion A1, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, for two reasons. First, it is unnecessary, because the Government have already set out our objectives for the railway, we are already acting to achieve those objectives, and we are ready to be held to account on whether we deliver against them as we transfer the services to public ownership under this Bill. Secondly, as I have just assured the House, we will ensure that the railways Bill sets out a clear purpose for Great British Railways.

With regard to Motion B, the Government simply cannot accept an amendment that would delay reform, therefore going against the wishes of the electorate, and which would place additional cost on the taxpayer. We will use every tool at our disposal to resolve poor performance, including contractual termination rights, where they are triggered.

On the Bill itself, public ownership is not only the will of the voters but the right step towards bringing an end to years of fragmentation. Tens of millions of pounds in fees will be saved each year due to public ownership and, with the new direction and focus that this Government are now providing, current in-house operations are already seeing a reduction in cancellations. The evidence that public ownership is the way forward is clear.

On top of this, poorly performing train operators are being held to account, as I described earlier, and with Great British Railways coming further down the line, this Government have shown that we are serious about reform. None the less, improvements are needed now, and the Bill starts that process.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I thank everyone who spoke in this brief debate, particularly the two Opposition Front-Benchers. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, for Lib Dem support up to now; I hope that will continue. I am especially grateful to my very good friend, the noble Lord, Lord Snape. It is always a pleasure to hear from him. Before I came into this House, I was told repeatedly that everyone is very friendly, very compassionate, very polite and respectful. Yet, there we are.

[Lord Snape (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

No, I am okay, thank you.

This debate is about the Bill; it is not about an individual on the Front Bench, in the form of the Minister, whom I still consider to be a very good friend and who, I can confess, drove his own bus at my wedding—our history goes back a long way and I hope our friendship will continue after today. This is not about an individual and it is not even about trust. I do not think we should be trusting people to do something when we now have an opportunity to put it in the Bill. The Minister just repeated the line, “We are already doing this”, so I ask the question: why not put it in?

On the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, I cede the ground to my noble friend on the Front Bench. This is not about my party in government either. Trust me, I could wax lyrical—I say this to my boss on the Front Bench, the Opposition Chief Whip—about all the things I wish that my party had done in government, but it is not about that either. It is not about what we did; it is about what this Bill is going to do. It is Labour’s own language, and in the absence of anything more, I do not believe, despite what the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, thinks, that we should be in a situation just of trust: there needs to be accountability. For that, I would like to test the opinion of the House.