North of England: Transport

Lord Inglewood Excerpts

Wednesday 17th June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Con)]

My Lords, like many taking part in the debate this afternoon in your Lordships’ House, I was born in the north of England. Although I was educated and have worked away from the area, it has always been my home, so when I saw that a debate was coming up to take note of transport connectivity and infrastructure in the north of England, it seemed that I really ought to take part.

Having heard about the arc that runs from Liverpool through Manchester and Leeds, with a spur to Hull, going up north to Newcastle, I said to myself, “There is a dog that has not barked—what is it?”. So far in this debate, which has now gone on for quite some time, Cumbria has not been mentioned. Minor allusions have been made to parts of it, but its land area is probably not much less than that of the other places we have been talking about. I want to talk about what you might describe as the “North of the North”: that bit of the north of England which is above and further from London than what is often conventionally described in shorthand as the north of England.

Speaking as an individual, I am absolutely sure that what is good for Lancashire and Yorkshire and the immediate surrounding area, described by my noble friend the Minister as within a 40-mile radius, is good for Britain. I speak as someone who—slightly to my own surprise, it is true—was top of the polls in the European elections declared in St George’s Hall in Liverpool in 1999. I am sure that is right but I do not believe it follows that whatever is good for Lancashire and Yorkshire is necessarily going to make an enormous difference to the “North of the North”—to Cumbria. After all, where I live is roughly as far from Manchester as Amiens is from where we are now. If you think of that kind of distance south of Manchester in England, it is an unusual argument to advance that the development of Manchester will directly benefit the areas around Birmingham in some tangible and obvious economic way. It is important that we are aware of this when talking about northern transport and the north of England.

I am in many ways echoing a point made from the opposite Benches by the noble Lord, Lord Liddle. He is a Cumbria county councillor and he and I are neighbours. We are concerned because it does not seem to us that the enormous and welcome political initiatives around the northern powerhouse will necessarily be of any especial benefit to us. Of course, we welcome what is being done but it seems to me that the economic, social and other problems to be found in this big part of the north of England are not necessarily on all fours with those which have mainly been described this afternoon.

In the case of road transport, particular road schemes are obviously of importance in Cumbria. My noble friend Lord Jopling mentioned one—it was either the A66 or the A69. If those are set in the context of the kind of sums of money that we have been talking about, let us just do them both now. That would be peanuts in the overall scheme of things. However, it is true that the main road links to the south of England are important. Indeed, one of my definitions of hell is driving late at night in a rainstorm down the road between Birmingham and Preston for the rest of eternity.

Rail, too, is important to us. I remember being given some advice when I was standing on the hustings in my early days. It was: “Remember, nobody ever lost votes knocking British Rail”. I would like to put on record my appreciation of the fact that, possibly apart from last Thursday night, the west coast main line service is probably as good as I have ever known it. The concerns we have about HS2 are that the character of the service that will continue down to London, after it has been built, will mean that we will not get regular through services without changing. There is no doubt that whatever happens in Scotland, Edinburgh, Glasgow and the central belt are going to need good rail connections to the south of England. I do not want to see the area I come from in some way punished for that.

The most severe infrastructure shortcoming in the area where I come from is that of internet connection. Some years ago, I had the privilege of chairing the Communications Committee of this House when it did a report on the roll-out of broadband. We identified the real danger that many sparsely populated and not rich quarters of England would have inadequate broadband connections. We all know that steps have been taken to improve this. They have been slow; things are happening but not to the extent that they should. What concerns me very much, although I understand why, is that it is being said in the south that it is terribly important that those areas which have good broadband connections should have even more superior connections because that is essential for the national economy. I am not against doing that but, at the same time, as the counterpoint it is imperative that the areas where I come from actually have a half-decent broadband connection. It was explained to me the other day that that whirling disc which goes around and round on the screen is the trademark for poor internet connection. It is a familiar trademark to almost everybody who lives in the county of Cumbria.

My concern, and this will be the concern of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, too, is that in terms of the policy decisions being taken in London, Cumbria is like a small country far away of which we know little. Can the Minister confirm that the Government recognise that that corner of the north of England has rather different issues from much of the rest of the north? We welcome the steps they are taking to help that part of the north of England. Will they make sure that they treat us separately and specifically address the problems that we face?