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.

Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Gascoigne Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 6th November 2024 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Gascoigne]

1: Before Clause 1, insert the following new Clause—
“Purpose: improvement of passenger railway services(1) The purpose of this Act is to improve the performance of passenger railway services in the United Kingdom.(2) The Secretary of State must, in taking any actions under the provisions of this Act, have regard to this purpose.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would place a duty on the Secretary of State to have regard to the purpose of the Act, namely the improved performance of passenger railway services in the United Kingdom.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to fire the starting gun on Report with my Amendment 1. In doing so, I express my gratitude to my noble friend Lord Moylan for his support with this amendment. I also thank the Minister for taking the time to meet me the other day. I very much appreciated the opportunity he took to address my many questions in his usual cordial way.

This amendment today flows from my first amendment in Committee. Everyone wants the trains to improve. That is a given. As I said in Committee, and when I met the Minister recently, the reason I care about this is that we need the whole rail reform package and we need it not to be piecemeal. Personally, I would like to go down the route proposed under the Williams-Shapps review, but I recognise that that ship has probably sailed. That said, the overall goal is the same: to make it more efficient; to make it easier to travel; to make it more punctual and, ultimately, to improve the passenger service.

In Committee I used the word “Ronseal”: making sure that the Bill delivers what it is intended to, so that it does, in effect, what is on the tin. While I will not repeat word for word what I said, there are three technical points I want to address following on from Committee, for the benefit of the House today.

First, is this Tory language being inserted really a sort of Trojan horse, ready to pounce on the unsuspecting Minister in the Labour Government once they have welcomed it? No. In Getting Britain Moving: Labour’s Plan to Fix Britain’s Railways, published during the campaign, the then Shadow Secretary of State said in the foreword:

“We need a modern rail system—with improved services for passengers and better value for money for taxpayers—to serve as the backbone of a modern Britain”.


Later, she said:

“Labour’s challenge is to put our rail system back on track to sustainable growth and improvement”.


This was followed by:

“Labour’s vision is to deliver a unified and simplified rail system that relentlessly focuses on securing improved services for passengers and better value for money for taxpayers”.


Indeed, in just the foreword alone, there are eight references to either “improve”, “improving” or “improved services”, not to mention countless others in the rest of the document.

The Government and Labour may argue that those references are about the whole suite of rail reform: it is only then that you will get a better service after everything has changed. However, after the election, at Second Reading, in response to questions, the Transport Minister in the Commons said:

“Let me begin by dealing with the issue of public ownership. According to the shadow Secretary of State ... we have no proof that it will improve outcomes for passengers, but that is clearly not the case. We know for a fact that this Bill will save tens of millions of pounds in fees, and if that is not a good start, I do not know what is”.


A little later he went on to say:

“I am confident that public ownership will provide the right foundations to drive forward improvements for passengers”.—[Official Report, Commons, 29/7/24; col. 1135.]


I could read out plenty of other quotes which all use the same terminology and the same rationale for this Bill, but, as I hope noble Lords can see, this is not about me inserting language into this debate: it is already there from the Labour Party, both in opposition and in government.

Secondly, are we not overlapping existing commitments? My noble friend made the inspired observation in Committee that similar references are made in the Railways Act 1993. He is, as ever, correct that the obligation to improve services is used elsewhere and is not altered by this Bill, so why cannot it, or a reference to upholding that element of the 1993 Act, be put in this Bill?

Thirdly, from a technical point of view, do we need a purpose clause given that this Bill is focused on how nationalisation will take effect? I have said before that some will question whether a purpose clause is needed, given that this is a tightly focused Bill. I will suggest later why it is needed in general terms, but, from a purely technical point of view, in Clause 2 the Secretary of State will have to take a view and make a judgment of the virtue or otherwise of a franchise when deciding whether temporarily to extend the said franchise. By inserting this purpose clause at the outset, it is a necessary barometer setting out exactly what this Bill is seeking to do and what should be the Secretary of State’s overriding concern when making a decision.

This is not about stopping the Bill, nor is it about inserting assessments, reports or tests before anything can happen. There is no bureaucracy being created here, I am pleased to say to my friend the noble Lord, Lord Snape. It would not be costly—indeed, it would not cost anything—and I am not saying that it would lead to cheaper fares, although that is what people want to see and expect. It would not add anything onerous or new. As I said, this is language used elsewhere in legislation. It does not issue specific demands or expectations about cleanliness, the number of guards, ensuring decent toilets—or toilets that are open, which they absolutely should be. My amendment could talk about access and address some of the shocking things we heard in Committee about the experience of disabled people when travelling, which I know will come up later. But it merely sets out what the goal of reform is, to ensure that everyone from top to bottom knows what the Government are doing this for. We wish them to succeed in improving the service. It is language that Labour has used, and which is used elsewhere in legislation, to make it clear what the Bill will deliver. I beg to move.

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend on his Amendment 1 and will speak to Amendment 14 in my name. My noble friend very kindly referred to our debate on the same amendment in Committee. I note the reference in the Railways Act 1993 and that I see two merits in my noble friend’s amendment.

First, it is always a good thing for Bills to be clear about their purpose. Unless I am mistaking something, this amendment accurately reflects the Government’s purpose in this legislation. We may debate whether it will be successful or otherwise, but the purpose seems to be straightforward, and to have that in legislation is always helpful.

Secondly, because this Bill is essentially about amending parts of the Railways Act 1993 and nothing else, it is clearly subsidiary to the existing provisions of that Act, as amended. There are 10 general duties in that Act. The first is in Section 4(1)(zb),

“to promote improvements in railway service performance”.

My noble friend has accurately reflected the first of those 10 general duties, one of which we will come to debate in a subsequent group in relation to my amendment.

It seems to me that one of the abiding issues for public agencies, often including government departments, is the multiplicity of duties that are imposed upon them and the risk of conflict between those duties. Here, for these purposes, that would be clarified if it were made very clear that this important change to the way in which the provisions of the Railways Act are structured and to be used is to improve railway service performance. To raise that general duty in importance above the others would be helpful in clarifying the balance which the Government and the other agencies should take. I support Amendment 1 for that reason.

Amendment 14 refers to the new subsection of Section 30 of the Railways Act, inserted by the Bill, which provides that the provision of railway services can be made only via

“a direct award of a public service contract to a public sector company in accordance with regulation 17 … of the 2023 Regulations”.

Noble Lords will be aware of those regulations. Subsequently, the requirement for pre-award publication is disapplied by this legislation. However, paragraph (2) of Regulation 17 states:

“Where a competent authority makes a direct award of a public service contract under this regulation, the competent authority must, within one year of granting the award, and while ensuring the protection of commercially sensitive information and commercial interests, publish a notice on its website”.


The information required about the contract and the contractor is then listed in the regulation. Is one year right? Is it desirable that we should, in any circumstances, wait so long to be given information about the direct award of these contracts, given that they are instrumental to an understanding of whose responsibility it is to provide passenger railway services?

I have discussed my amendments with the Minister, and I am grateful for his time and that of his officials. I hope he has had a chance to think about my amendment and that, if he will not accept it, he will at least be able to tell us that it will be the Government’s intention to make new regulations quite soon, and in those new regulations to reduce to as little as three months after the granting of an award of a contract of this kind the publication of the notice and details. To assist later consideration, I say that it is certainly not my intention to press Amendment 14 when it is reached.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I was referring to the people who drive and operate the trains. There are more of them on Waterloo station than there are employees of Network Rail.

To finish what I was saying, most people on the railway refer to their employer and their work as “the railway”, which tells you something about the way in which the franchise system has dealt with loyalty to employment.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for Amendment 14 and the discussion we had in the last few days. He is right that Regulation 17 requires the publication of a specified list of information within one year, following the direct award of a contract, where that information has not already been published. However, we expect the majority of the information included in Regulation 17 to have already been published well before one year has expired. That is because Regulation 23, which covers post-award publication, requires a competent authority to publish a similar set of information within two months of contract award. The information which must be published is set out in Schedule 2. Regulation 23 also allows interested parties to request the reasons for a direct award within one month of the post-award publication. I agree that a year would be a very long time to wait before the information is published. However, I do not believe that the noble Lord’s amendment is needed because similar and, in many respects, more detailed publication requirements are already provided for in Regulation 23. I urge him to withdraw the amendment, and I note that he does not intend to press it.

I note that Amendment 16, from my noble friend Lord Berkeley, is somewhat novel constitutionally, as it would constrain parliamentary sovereignty by imposing limitations on when primary legislation relating to the railways could be introduced. I am very happy to confirm to my noble friend, to the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, and to others who mentioned it that the Government intend to set out their key proposal for the railways Bill in a consultation document that I very much hope will be published before the end of this calendar year. This will give all interested parties, including Members of your Lordships’ House, the chance to review and scrutinise it and to feed in their views before the Bill is introduced later in this parliamentary Session. The Government do not intend to publish a draft of the Bill before it is introduced, as I would expect that to delay progress in implementing the Government’s planned reforms.

It is now more than six years since the previous Government declared that the structure of the railways is

“no longer fit to meet today’s challenges”

and appointed Keith Williams to lead his review. Passengers, freight and everyone on and who uses the railway have waited too far long already to see meaningful change. I have to say that my own experience is that the previous Government went through pre-legislative scrutiny in a desultory manner, and frankly, we all concluded that they did not intend to bring a Bill before either House any time soon.

While the Government are keen to hear the widest possible range of views on their proposals, including the noble Lord’s, I do not on this occasion support the idea of publishing a draft Bill. It also does not seem necessary, given that noble Lords can submit their views during the consultation I have committed to and will be able to debate the Bill once it is before the House. I am of course happy to meet with my noble friend Lord Berkeley and other noble Lords at the time of the consultation launch to seek their views, as we have done during the course of the Bill before us, if that would help persuade him to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for his response, to all those who spoke in this relatively short debate, and to those who supported my Amendment 1. I am pleased to see that the Government Chief Whip is on the Front Bench, and I am conscious that many people have sat through days of Committee and we are about to head into recess, so I will not detain noble Lords for long.

As I said in Committee and earlier, I want to make the case for why this amendment is not against the spirit of the Bill. It does not stop it, and I want to ensure that everyone knows that these changes are not being done through ideology and that they are focused on the passengers. Effectively, it forces the department, Ministers, civil servants and everyone to deliver this mission and this mission alone. Otherwise, we will enter into what President Ronald Reagan called “trust me” government.

Without boring on for too long, and to repeat the point I made, Labour has used this language repeatedly, in opposition and in government, so I am still not sure why the amendment cannot be included, especially given that the Minister, who I respect greatly, warmed to the sentiment behind it and understands it. As I said, we risk entering into the world of having to trust the Government that that is the intention. Despite those words of reassurance, the Bill still needs something on the face of it—Ronseal, like I said. With that, I would like to test the opinion of the House.

Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Gascoigne Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness O'Neill of Bexley (Con)]

My Lords, I rise in support of the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Moylan, in seeking some clarity and assurances about transport in London, as a result of the Government’s plans to renationalise our railways. Before doing so, I will remind your Lordships’ that I am the Leader of the London Borough of Bexley, which is an outer London borough, so many of my experiences are driven by that.

It would be helpful if the Government could set out the intended relationship between them and the Mayor of London and Transport for London, should the renationalisation go ahead. Will the mayor and TfL’s powers be impacted and, if not, who will advocate for those in outer London or, indeed, outside London? The recent introduction of the Superloop showed how the Mayor of London and TfL do not understand the needs of outer London, especially in places like Bexley, Bromley and Sutton where there is no Underground infrastructure. The original TfL proposal was to take the Superloop to Bexleyheath station, where it would have been difficult to turn around, instead of taking it to Abbey Wood, where the recently completed Elizabeth line is now operational.

Your Lordships will know that Sir John Armitt of the National Infrastructure Commission will tell you the value of linking up transport options—that is what we sought to do. Fortunately, TfL did agree to our suggestion, and there is now a cross-borough connection linking the main transport hubs—that is, apart from Bexley Village, where that discussion continues. The lack of any Underground stations—something that the first Mayor of London tried to find in Bexley—also means a dependency on cars, especially with a high percentage of elderly residents. The mayor’s introduction of ULEZ charges, as well as the threat of road user charging, is therefore very unpopular and, again, shows a lack of understanding. This introduction also impacted those who live outside the London borders so, if the mayor and TfL have greater powers over the train infrastructure, who will advocate for those who live outside London but use services in London?

I recall being a commuter in the days of nationalised train services. It was great fun jumping off the trains before they reached the platforms. While you can argue that technology and change would have brought about some of the improvements that we see nowadays, there is no guarantee that Governments of all colours would have invested the money to make those changes.

There is a lot to be said for holding to account through contracts and performance reviews. As we know, investment in transport can bring about housing delivery. That has definitely been the situation in Abbey Wood post the Elizabeth line, which is why we want the original business case to take the Elizabeth line to Ebbsfleet to be completed. We know that it will bring about regeneration in Bexley and elsewhere, and bring about some of that housing delivery that London desperately needs.

Another case of opportunity missed is the Docklands Light Railway. The Mayor of London and TfL are proposing to extend the DLR across the Thames to Thamesmead town, which is a dead end. Our suggestion is that, if it were extended to Belvedere, it would not only link to Southeastern trains but, with a quick change, to both the Elizabeth line and Thameslink services—coming back to Sir John Armitt’s point. We know that the Government will need to invest, but who will determine that priority?

In addition to future planning of services, there is also the question of accessibility. If the proposals go ahead, who will determine when we get step-free access at Erith, Falconwood and Albany Park stations?

I am afraid that I have posed more questions than answers, but they are legitimate questions that need to be answered if the residents are to be protected from the Mayor of London. I support my noble friend Lord Moylan’s amendment.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Moylan’s Amendment 47, which addresses the interaction between Transport for London and public sector companies. There are three points I wish to make.

First, if, in future—as the Minister knows all too well, having sat in on these conversations—the Mayor of London wished to build an entirely new part of the network and go for, let us say, Crossrail 2, what would be the Government’s position on that? Would they allow London to retain its independence and choose between public and private or insist, not least because projects require significant government funding, that the Bill takes effect across all new infrastructure and future services in London?

Secondly, and linked to that—as again the Minister knows all too well—infrastructure in London requires the private sector to play its part and contribute at least to help unlock wider renewal and regeneration. I referred to Crossrail, of which, from memory, London businesses paid about 40%. Has there been an analysis of the Bill’s impact on the ability to raise funds from business? I imagine that the Minister will say that that is a matter for the mayor, but there surely must be wider read-through from the Bill to the country far beyond London.

Thirdly, I wish to seek clarity from a policy point of view. My noble friend’s amendment exposes a real problem with the entire premise of the legislation. After all, it does not merely address what the relationship will be between one entity inside London and another that falls outside, which takes precedence. In the main, the amendment demonstrates why London is an anomaly that undermines the coherence of the Bill and the credibility of the whole policy. Ultimately, we are having the debate on this group because London is exempt from nationalisation.

As we heard repeatedly in Committee, part of the agenda for reform is to try to bring all the transport network together and make it less fragmented, yet London is exempted from this for whatever reasons. I make this point because, with this Bill, we are enacting a two-tier system. Choice is gone, and we are strengthening or at least reinforcing fragmentation. I can almost sense the response from the Benches opposite. It will be, as we heard before, that their manifesto talked about this, but it talked about public ownership, not the retention of freedom of choice in London.

Next we heard—not today, sadly—that public opinion polls said that people want nationalisation. When we heard this the other day, the only thing that struck me in my mind was this: are we really governed by public opinion? The other day—it might have been yesterday—there was a poll in which, I am afraid, our illustrious Prime Minister had fallen behind and was now more unpopular than Rishi Sunak. Does Labour, as it believes in public opinion, now believe that Rishi should be the Prime Minister?

Next is that the capital is so important, and that is indeed correct, but Liverpool is granted these freedoms too. Next it will be that I want to level down the capital —not at all.

Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Gascoigne Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Snape’s Amendment 43 and will speak to many of the other amendments in this group. I support most of the statements that have been made from all parts of the Committee in this debate.

We have been talking about devolution for years. It started off as levelling up—and we can debate whether it was levelling up or levelling down—with the last Government. But the Labour Party has been very keen on what I would call devolution for a long time and has supported the mayors of Manchester, Leeds and the West Midlands in trying to get control of their transport services, as the noble Lord just said. It is equally important to be able to decide what services are provided and who pays for them.

One of the key things which we have been debating for some time is these so-called regional authorities being given a lump sum, if one likes, and told that they can spend it on transport and then be allowed to get on with it—let them decide, on the basis of local elections and local politics, what they want to provide. Everybody’s objective would probably be to see in the north and the Midlands a general quality of service compatible with and just as good as that provided in the south-east, around London. It is not all provided by TfL—although much of it is—and I think most noble Lords would say that it is very good. I do not understand why the Government do not go the whole hog and say that they will give these regions a lump sum, to be negotiated, and let them get on with it.

The noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, asked whether Manchester could deliver. The answer is that it cannot deliver if Whitehall is in control. We have quite a serious problem here and I do not know what the answer is, except to say that I am convinced that some of the clauses we are debating tonight are counterproductive to what I thought the Government were trying to achieve.

What is the point of taking certain rail franchises into the public sector and turning them into something else if, next year, a Bill will give them a new franchise or concession? The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, has not mentioned the word “concession” yet today, but I expect he will. Concessions are very good in some places, but the key is this: what is the point in making this massive change now and then coming back in a year or two to say that we will let the West Midlands run all local services—it can put them out to tender, and have the money to provide the service with the frequency and fares that it wants—and ditto in the north west and north-east?

We really need to know the final outcome planned by the Government before we can know whether the Bill will be helpful or not. If we make a change now and then another change in two years, the people who will be damaged are the passengers on the railway.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Moylan on Amendments 12 and 13 and I echo some of the great speeches in this group. As my noble friend said, it is right to ensure that, through some mechanism, the nations and regions are consulted, and, crucially, engaged, to ensure that they are brought into the decision-making process so that the service which eventually emerges is as effective as possible.

I am sure some will hark, yet again, that we are calling for more consultation and bureaucracy, but let us be clear: we on this side have always believed in devolution and power to the people. As my noble friend Lord Moylan said, the Government themselves have committed to the concept of devolution when it comes to transport. Therefore, is it not right that we utilise the opportunity to bring the Council of the Nations and Regions into discussions to ensure that we have the best services possible where there is overlap between the nations? Everyone is citing different quotes, but the PM said when the council was created that “we work as one team” and a “partnership”. If it is the view that that is too onerous, as I am sure the Minister will say, then we could at least try to engage the much- trailed but lesser-spotted envoy to the regions.

I support the noble Lord, Lord Snape, as I always do, in his Amendment 43. It calls for the Secretary of State to produce a report on whether a service could be devolved when it awards it to a public operator or renews a private franchise. That is wise and right, and I assume the case for doing so would be to assess the pros and cons for commuters, which we on this side of the Committee believe should be the focus of the reforms.

Supporting this amendment takes me back to what was said on day one of Committee on my amendments, when it was deemed that:

“Amendment A1, to which the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, spoke earlier, would create another bureaucracy”.


Later, this noble Lord hoped that the Minister would

“not get too bogged down in the bureaucratic desires of the party opposite”.—[Official Report, 21/10/24; cols. 433, 435.]

Who was so opposed to putting in a mere purpose clause, lest it be too bureaucratic? Lo and behold it was the one and only noble Lord, Lord Snape, who is now calling for an amendment to include a report when a rail service is awarded to a new operator. I welcome this Damascene conversion from the Labour Benches; I say yes to the noble Lord’s amendment but yes to Amendments A1 and 48A.

[Lord Snape (Lab)]

Before the noble Lord ruins entirely my career, such as it is, with his praise, I must tell him that he is comparing lemons with oranges. More accurately, what I said last time had nothing to with the devolution of railway passenger services to our great conurbations. I am rather against bureaucracy; it is the party opposite, as far as this legislation is concerned, that seems to be obsessed with it.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

I do not know what the protocol is but I find it novel, if I may say so, that the noble Lord opposes bureaucracy when this side proposes it and yet supports it when it is convenient to himself.

Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Gascoigne Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support my noble friends Lord Young of Cookham and Lord Moylan on their Amendment 42, which calls for an annual statement setting out the liabilities to the public purse.

As I said on day one, the whole rail system is duplicated, messy and costly. Given that this Bill is piecemeal and without the other substantive and necessary reforms, it runs the risk of not fixing the problem but making it worse and costing the taxpayer even more. As has already been noted, in the Labour Party’s Getting Britain Moving document, there is a section titled “Failure is increasing costs”, which talks about the savings to be made. The Government’s September press release hails the Secretary of State as having

“fired the starting gun on rail reform”,

and clearly notes that it will be

“saving taxpayers up to an estimated £150 million every year in fees alone in the process”.

So we will bank that—well, the Treasury will, rather than the taxpayer—but the indication from that is that there will be savings of at least £150 million every year. I am not disputing that figure, but what other savings will there be?

I was reading the other day that nationalisation could be costing the taxpayer £1 billion per year by the end of this Parliament. There is an argument that it is only because of privatisation that we can see what the system costs and what is profitable and what is not. There is a legitimate concern that the cost will once again become opaque, with the passing of this Bill and when it starts to take effect. In assessing the virtue of these reforms, not just from an ideological point of view, the country should know what else it is taking on, not least because it will effectively be the owner or shareholder, not just of the railways but now the liabilities of the companies which will be transferred on to the Government’s balance sheet.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, the amendment and the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Young, indicate the obvious advantages of nationalisation in terms of greater access to information and transparency; it has disadvantages, which the noble Lord set out, but it also has advantages. The speech by the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, was compelling: the evidence and information he gave us illustrated much better than I have heard before the issues that have been referred to—I referred to them on Second Reading and on Monday—regarding the imbalance between the attitude of the Government towards the speed of taking over the train operators and the fact that they are prepared to leave well alone the roscos, which can quite clearly be seen to be exploiting their situation and therefore getting excess profits as a result. I will be very interested to listen to the Minister’s explanation of why that is happening.

Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Gascoigne Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 21st October 2024 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Gascoigne]

A1: Before Clause 1, insert the following new Clause—
“Purpose: improvement of passenger railway services(1) The purpose of this Act is to improve the performance of passenger railway services in the United Kingdom.(2) The Secretary of State must, in taking any actions under the provisions of this Act, have regard to this purpose.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment requires the Secretary of State to have regard to the purpose of improving passenger railway services when taking any actions under the terms of this Act.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, in moving my Amendment A1 I will speak also to Amendment 48A in this group. First, with permission, as it is the first time that I have addressed the new Minister in the House, I congratulate him on his promotion—I think it is a promotion—in joining the Government. I have had the absolute pleasure of working closely with him and knowing him personally since 2008. I saw at first hand his sterling work when he ran Transport for London, alongside the equally impressive Mayor of London, Boris Johnson—something on which I know the whole Committee will agree with me. There are few people in the land more knowledgeable, so it is the country’s gain in having the Minister help tackle our many transport issues.

I declare that I am a regular commuter, and have been for years, travelling in and out of London from home almost daily—not least today, when I had a 15-minute delay to a 25-minute journey. It is because of my time as a commuter, as well as my time in London City Hall, working alongside TfL and many others, and my time in Downing Street looking at rail reform, that I am speaking today.

I turn first to Amendment A1. I do not intend to rehash the universal view that something has to change when it comes to our rail services, and I shall park temporarily whether I believe that the Government’s plan in this Bill is the right one. For now, I will take them at their word and do them a favour by setting out at the outset what this Government believe that the Bill will achieve. It is worth reminding ourselves that the Labour manifesto said that the Government will

“put passengers at the heart of the service”.

In April, the then shadow Secretary of State, who is the current Secretary of State, said in Labour’s Plan to Fix Britain’s Railways that:

“Public ownership for our railways is about the practical need to deliver better services where they have failed”.


My amendment tries to encapsulate that in something concise, setting out that the overall aim of these reforms is improving service. It does not set out every promise that the Government have made in trying to deliver these reforms, such as saving tens of millions of pounds and having more affordable tickets and even better mobile connectivity—more power to your elbow on that one. Amendment A1 is simple, short and streamlined. The Bill would open with what its purpose is and what the goal is, so that, in effect, like Ronseal, the Bill does what it says on the tin.

Some have already quizzed me on whether this purpose clause is necessary in the light of the Bill’s tight scope and focus solely on the effect of nationalisation of passenger rail services. In answer to that, I draw the attention of the Committee to those clauses relating to the temporary extension of privately run franchises. In that part of the Bill, it is clear that the Secretary of State will have to make a judgment on whether it is practical for a service to be provided by a public sector operator. With the addition of the purpose clause and the connected duty, the Secretary of State will have to have due regard to the improvement of passenger services under the Bill when making these decisions.

Turning to my second amendment in this group, Amendment 48A, as I have already said, and as was well covered at Second Reading, no one can deny that the current system is not working. It is fraught with endless delays and cancellations, yet year on year we have fare increases, so my amendments today are not done to halt reform of the railways and certainly not done from an ideological position, even if it has been said that the Government are driving this policy for ideological reasons. For me, it is quite the contrary.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

Well, the noble Lord should not be, because it is quite clear to me that the Government intend to take a large amount of activity out of the Department for Transport and put it in a body that is responsible for the performance of the railways. That being the case, it would be extremely logical that monitoring performance is done by GBR but properly scrutinised by others.

Lastly, I simply say to the noble Lord opposite that there has been a change of government. The policies that this Bill and the railways Bill will seek to enact are the policies that the Government were elected to carry out.

[Lord Gascoigne (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to everyone who spoke in what I thought was going to be a relatively brief debate, but I think we have clocked up over an hour and it has become far-reaching, showing the wealth of knowledge in your Lordships’ Committee.

I will cover some of the points that were raised. The noble Lord, Lord Grocott, raised HS2 and my own position. As a northerner, I have my own personal views, but I have to say that I was merely a Whip on the Government Front Bench and, as powerful as I may have been in controlling speaking times from the Dispatch Box, I did not have the power to control spending. It is something I will raise with the Opposition Chief Whip, my former boss, later. With respect, perhaps the noble Lord may want to speak to his own Front Bench about future spending plans. If I may say so, I think the Prime Minister’s own position on HS2 has been perhaps confused over the years.

Turning back to the debate, I think this group was about the future plans covered by this Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Snape, suggested that my Amendment A1 would create bureaucracy, and I think the Minister said that it would not; it is merely a purpose clause. I repeat what I said earlier: my only wish is to make it clear that services will improve.

I am grateful for the Minister’s response, but I would have thought that the Government could have at least supported Amendment A1 as it is a purpose clause. It could demonstrate that the Government do not believe that the Bill will improve services. Although the Minister said at the Dispatch Box that it would improve services, he then listed a number of other things it would do. I do not know if I should take that as meaning that the Government will accept my amendment but also list all the other points they believe it will do as a purpose clause. That said, obviously this will be an ongoing conversation and for now I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment A1 withdrawn.