Queen’s Speech
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, I join the general acclamation of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford for his maiden speech. I hope the House will forgive me if I move from acclamation to condemnation so far as some aspects of the Queen’s Speech are concerned. I will confine my remarks entirely to the transport section of the gracious Speech. I listened with interest to the Minister opening the debate. She painted a bright picture of the future, particularly the introduction of Great British Railways. It is not an organisation that has been greeted with such acclamation elsewhere. I refer your Lordships to yesterday’s Times where, in the business section under the heading
“Danger signals flash at British Railways”,
Mr Robert Lea had some hard facts, in his opinion, to express about this future organisation. He wrote:
“Does the consumer side with railway leaders who want to move ever closer to autonomous and guardless vehicles? Do passengers want or need the human interaction with ticket offices; or is everyone happy ordering tickets and getting journey information on an app? Are travellers relaxed that the track fitness regime can now be determined by algorithms and predictive maintenance rather than boots on the ballast?”
Scottish colleagues will be aware that the lack of boots on the ballast was directly responsible for the recent Stonehaven accident, where fortunately—I mean that sincerely—only three people were killed. Had it been a normal service train, the carnage would have been much greater. That accident was caused entirely by the failure of any boots on the ballast. Carillion, the contractor, installed the drainage system almost a decade ago. The system had gone without any physical checks over that decade, and that accident could have occurred at any time. The lack of maintenance and of boots on the ground ought to concern all of us who are concerned about railway safety and railway maintenance. That Network Rail, the organisation responsible for railway maintenance currently and in future, is proposing to dispose of 1,500 people ought to give us cause for concern.
So far, at least, Great British Railways appears to provide only photo-opportunities for the Secretary of State. The other thing is the lack of any detail about future fares reorganisation. I have looked at fares reform, and I have mentioned it before in your Lordships’ House, and before making this speech I consulted Mr Barry Doe, who those of us who take an interest in these matters know and respect as a man who has written a column called the “The Fare Dealer” for Rail for the past 20 years or so.
Mr Doe had this to say about fares, Great British Railways and the future:
“The supreme irony is that we have gone from a (nationalised) railway run totally by railway professionals to a so-called ‘private’ railway effectively run by civil servants … BR had gone from pence-per-mile to selective pricing, invented railcards and reached the structure we know today. All that has happened since is a severe muddying of the waters with complicated ticket restrictions and parochial fares that have given rise to split ticketing—but no new structure: in short we have had a wasted quarter century when it comes to fares and need to recoup those lost years … GBR must have an HQ with professional pricing managers, as BR once did, to ensure uniform fares”
and eradicate the nonsense of split ticketing. He concluded:
“The Treasury seems to be terrified of such fares reform lest it reduce income. That is as stupid as saying that Off-Peak fares reduce income. They don’t, because they increase usage”—
and GBR must be given proper control of the fares structure in future.
I revert to the Times view of the future so far as Great British Railways and its structure are concerned. Mr Lea went on to say:
“We come out of the pandemic with a renationalised national rail system, commanded from the DfT’s Marsham Street eyrie and operators merely fixed-fee contractors.”
Again, this is something that has bothered those of us who take an interest in and speak regularly on these matters.
A couple of years ago, I invited the Minister to accompany me on a trip around the Birmingham outer ring road on a National Express bus. Unaccountably, she turned me down. As her noble friend Lord Lexden suggested the other day, I suggest that she uses Avanti trains and comes, perhaps with me, to Birmingham. If we catch a not-too-late train and arrive at Birmingham International station after 10 pm, there will be no staff. Birmingham International is not a wayside halt; it is an intercity station a mile or so from an international airport. After 10 pm, more than 20 trains go to destinations as diverse as London and Reading, as well as local trains to Birmingham and Coventry, yet there is no one to sell or collect a ticket. The expensively installed barriers are open from 10 pm, so lots of people travel by train after 10 pm from Birmingham International without paying their fare—and who can blame them? There is no check. Surely that is the weakness of a contracting system that pays a company such as Avanti regardless of whether it delivers a proper standard of service—and I am afraid that it does not. If Great British Railways is to persist with the idea that after 10 pm there is somehow no need to staff mainline stations, fare evasion—which in my opinion is already at a considerable height—will get worse in future.
I have to say to the Minister who replies that not all of us are thrilled with the idea of Great British Railways. Those of us who have worked in the railway industry are aware of the negative nature of the Treasury so far as expenditure in the railway industry is concerned. We are aware that civil servants love to second-guess railway managers on where expenditure should take place. One of the reasons we have so many uncomfortable trains at present is that over the years the Treasury has insisted on cramming more and more passengers into smaller and smaller trains. When in the 1980s British Rail replaced its classic diesel multiple-unit services, which were built as three-car units, the Treasury insisted that those three cars be replaced by two-car Sprinter trains and trains of similar ilk. Cramming in more passengers will not attract any more people to travel by rail, regardless of whether Great British Railways is in charge and whatever the colour and nature of the staff uniforms.
In conclusion, in the words of Mr Nat King Cole, so far as the railway industry is concerned, I can see only “trouble ahead”. Unless the Government give GBR and its management the freedom to properly run the railway and get the Treasury’s dead hand off the railway’s windpipe, trouble is what we shall see in the years to come.
West Coast Main Line
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Snape
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have, if any, to replace Avanti Trains as the principal operator on the West Coast Main Line.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Vere of Norbiton) (Con)
My Lords, the department is currently in discussions with Avanti West Coast, as per the prior information notice first issued in October 2020, about a subsequent direct award. A decision will be made later in the year.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that not-too-helpful response. Does she regret the replacement of Virgin Trains by this particular organisation? Does she agree with me that the problem of national rail contracts is that, under the present system, they are, in effect, cost-plus contracts? There is no incentive on train operating companies either to run trains or to provide a decent service, something this particular company has taken advantage of. Will she send Avanti a short message—how about, “Arrivederci”?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
I am grateful to the noble Lord for that. I also am aware that he has written to Avanti West Coast citing his concerns. It has no record of any correspondence from him; however, the managing director is very happy to speak to the noble Lord—perhaps he can say that Italian word at that meeting. It is the case that both for the ERMAs and the national rail contracts, there are very firm incentivisation elements. For example, Avanti earns a fee based on performance and, for the six months to March 2021, it was judged as getting a score of one for customer experience—that is the lowest, not the highest. Therefore, because it got the lowest, it got no fee for that element. So there is incentivisation, and we hope to make it better because we want to see excellent customer service across our railways.
Highway Code (Rule 149)
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Young of Cookham (Con)
My Lords, I begin by commending my noble friend Lady McIntosh for bringing this important matter before the House this evening, and for the diligent research she has done in forming her speech. I agree 100% with what she said at the beginning about cyclists who ride dangerously. I have no time for them. They bring into disrepute the vast majority of cyclists who behave responsibly, and they give us all a bad name.
My noble friend raised the important issue of why the measure before the House does not apply to cyclists. I hope that when my noble friend Minister replies, she can confirm that cyclists who ride while using their mobile phone can be prosecuted, perhaps under some other legislation than that before us. Of course, cyclists are slightly different in that, whereas a motorist can have points on his or her licence for the offence, that does apply to cyclists, who do not need a driving licence. Can the Minister reassure both my noble friend Lady McIntosh and me that cyclists who risk their own lives as well as being a danger to pedestrians by talking on their phone can be prosecuted under legislation?
My final point, to pick up on a point made by previous speakers, is about e-scooters. It seems to me that the best way to handle e-scooters that are illegal is simply to confiscate them. They are portable and quite easy to put in the back of a police van. By definition, that would prevent a reoffence by that person with that scooter. I wonder if my noble friend has any statistics on whether there are more e-scooters in London now than, let us say, three or four months ago. My impression is that the exponential growth has perhaps stopped, but that may just be my own perception. Could my noble friend say what guidance is given by the Metropolitan Police to officers on the beat for when they see an e-scooter that is not a legitimately rented one? What are their instructions? How are they meant to deal with what is manifestly an offence? Having said that, I welcome the provisions before the House this evening.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, I too congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, on introducing this Motion. I have previously made my views about e-scooters plain, and I shall not bore the House by doing so again.
I know it is the Minister’s job to defend the wretched things, but I can see no purpose in them. The last time we had a debate about them, she said—again, I understand why—that they are seen as another method of transport and as an alternative to the overuse of the private car; I do not think she used those words, but I shall use them now. Perhaps I can look forward to going down to the other end of the building and, when I pass Speaker’s Court, instead of a line of ministerial limousines seeing a rack of e-scooters, and I will watch the noble Baroness—I am not sure what will happen to her red box—sail out of Carriage Gates on an e-scooter. I do not think it is likely to happen, and I am not sure that it should, given her ministerial responsibilities.
So far as the Motion itself is concerned, I differ slightly from the noble Lord who has just sat down. The noble Lord was known as the Bicycling Baronet in his younger days.
Lord Snape (Lab)
The Bicycling Peer, as he now is. He was right to remark that there are a minority of cyclists who, to say the least, do not do the cycling fraternity much credit. But he also talked about how there must be some way of prosecuting them for using a mobile telephone. I refer him to the tragic case mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, in which the prosecution for “furious riding”—or whatever the phrase was—was dredged from the Victorian era and referred to hansom cabs. The fact is that there are no specific offences so far as the furious or dangerous riding of bicycles is concerned. I believe, and I think the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, would agree, that there should be. Those specific offences should also cover the use of mobile telephones.
I will close with an anecdote about the minority of cyclists who misbehave. If you stand at the corner of Parliament Square and Bridge Street, as I did waiting to cross the road only last week, you can see that, despite the facilities provided for cyclists, there are some—again, a minority, I emphasise—for whom the sight of a red light is a challenge and the sight of a pedestrian is an obstruction around which it is all-too-easy to weave. I did try to remonstrate with one such cyclist as recently as a week ago. I shudder to repeat what he said, but I have not been called such a name since I left the British Army more than 50 years ago.
So I have to say that legislation in this area is long overdue and I hope the Minister will give a sympathetic response to the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, this evening.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, I rise to support my noble friend Lady McIntosh and commend the way she introduced her regret Motion. There are over 1 million privately owned e-scooters. Does my noble friend the Minister really believe that all of these e-scooters are being ridden on private land? Is it not time that the Government got serious about e-scooters and what is actually happening out there? Similarly, even in the trial areas, does the Minister really believe that e-scooters replace journeys that would otherwise have been taken by car? It is a completely different way of getting around.
Since the pandemic, the number of e-scooters and cyclists has dramatically increased, shooting through crossings and red lights. Does my noble friend the Minister not think that it would be a good idea to increase the level of vigilance and pulling people over? I know my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham is a bicycling aficionado. Perhaps he could be used in an advertising campaign to promote proper, responsible cycling on our roads.
In conclusion, can I ask my noble friend why this opportunity with the Highway Code has not been taken to address the issues around e-scooters raised by my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering? It sems an ideal opportunity and, having not addressed it in this current draft, I assume we will be looking at future action that will have to be taken. To build on what the noble Lord, Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate, said, e-scooters are not a catastrophe waiting to happen; it is happening right now.
P&O Ferries
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
All I can say to the noble Lord is to reiterate what I have already said: we are working at pace on a package of measures which we hope to announce very shortly.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that it is not just P&O, appalling though its conduct has been? Will she answer the question from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench and tell us how many other shipping companies which ply British waters are not meeting the British minimum wage?
Payments to Train Operating Companies
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Snape
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what estimate they have made of the impact on train services of a 10 per cent reduction in payments from the Department for Transport to train operating companies.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Vere of Norbiton) (Con)
My Lords, the department has no plans to reduce payments to train operating companies by 10% and has not assessed the impact such a reduction would have on train services. As noble Lords would expect, we have asked operators to provide credible, efficient and sustainable business plans which will deliver reliable and resilient train services that adapt to passengers’ evolving needs and drive value for taxpayers.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, will the Minister accept that the twin attacks of a 3.8% increase in rail fares, the highest in almost a decade, together with any reduction in subsidies—I would still like to know exactly how much the Government are prepared to put forward towards our rail industry in the next financial year—will lead to reduced numbers of passengers travelling by train and more congestion and pollution on our roads? Surely that is not the way forward as regards the Government’s carbon reduction targets.
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
The Government are very focused on making sure that the services we provide for passengers meet their needs. Ridership at the current time is around just under two-thirds of what it was pre-pandemic. There may have been substantial and enduring change, so we are working with the train operating companies, asking them to look very carefully at timetables, remove duplications where possible and look for savings and efficiencies. At the end of the day, we need to provide services that meet passengers’ needs, and they need to be punctual and reliable.
Bus Improvement Plans
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
Yes, I can. There will be probably three different tranches of funding. Some areas—those that produced the best BSIPs, matching all the stated outcomes set out in the national bus strategy—will get transformation funding. A second tranche of local authorities will go into the improvement category, whereby they are on their way to preparing the sort of BSIPs that take into account all the outcomes from the NBS. Other areas will probably need more support, in terms of capability and capacity, so that they can fully understand how buses can meet the needs of their communities. We understand that no place must be left behind. We hope to provide support to areas where the BSIPs are not fully developed but where there is huge potential to do so.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, can we have a straight answer to this question? How much have local transport authorities asked for under the Government’s bus service improvement plans? Is the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, right that only £1.2 billion is available for these plans? Are we once again to put up with the Prime Minister’s sloganising? “Bus Back Better” bears no resemblance to reality if the figures the noble Baroness gave are accurate.
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
My Lords, we asked the local transport authorities to be ambitious and, goodness gracious, they were. That is absolutely right. Indeed, I am not sure I have ever done a competition in the Department for Transport that has not been significantly oversubscribed. In aligning the amount of money we have, we have to really look at how that money will be used and whether it meets the requirements in the national bus strategy. I will mention no names at all but, for example, one local authority bid to build a new road from the bus funding. That does not necessarily strike me as exactly what we need out of the bus funding. My officials are making sure that the areas we fund with taxpayers’ funding get the best bang for our buck.
Bus Services: Covid-19 Emergency Funding
Lord Snape Excerpts(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Berkeley
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have, if any, to extend the COVID-19 emergency funding for local bus services beyond the end of March.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Berkeley, and at his request, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in his name on the Order Paper.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Vere of Norbiton) (Con)
My Lords, I am pleased to confirm that a final tranche of recovery funding for local transport providers, totalling over £150 million over six months, was announced earlier today. This builds on previous funding packages and will support transport operators and local authorities responsible for bus and light rail systems to transition their networks and adapt to new travel patterns as we build back better from the pandemic.
Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, would the Minister accept that that has rather ruined what would have been a coruscating supplementary on my part? Can I ask her whether she should congratulate my noble friend Lord Berkeley on his perception in tabling this Question in the first place, and can I tell her that this is the first time in nearly half a century that I have received such a positive response from any Minister in any Government? Perhaps I may ask her to be specific as far as the West Midlands is concerned. Can she offer some comfort to the West Midlands Combined Authority, which estimates a deficit of £50 million in its transport budget for the next financial year?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
I am always grateful to receive a Question from the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, but today it was a particularly good one. We will be working with all the local transport authorities as they not only put in place their best service improvement plans, but also make best use of this funding. We have service levels running at approximately 90% while current patronage is approximately 77% and within that there are some quite significant regional variations. For example, we know that in the West Midlands people use buses more than elsewhere. Particularly with the Commonwealth Games coming up, we are very cognisant that we need to keep local transport running.
Integrated Rail Plan: North and Midlands
Lord Snape Excerpts(3 years ago)
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Lord Snape (Lab)
My Lords, if the Minister believes that this solution of hers is so elegant, why have she and fellow Ministers been advocating something different for so many years? That is the first and obvious question. The second one is that she talks about capacity. Is she aware that any student of the railways will tell you that capacity on a stretch of line is governed by the speed of the slowest train? Taking fast trains away and running them on their own infrastructure enables capacity to be increased on other lines too. The mixture of freight trains, slow passenger trains and fast passenger trains, as well as HS2, will not increase capacity; indeed, rather the reverse.
Finally, what the Government propose will mean years of delay, dislocation and bus substitution because, as we proved as far back as the 1960s, it is impossible to run an intensive service on a railway while you are improving it and electrifying it. It just cannot be done.
International Travel Rules
Lord Snape Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his suggestions, and I will ensure that my colleagues at the Home Office listen to them as well. We have always been very clear that wait times at the border may be extended due to biosecurity checks being carried out. These are essential to protect the public and the success of our vaccination programme. Passengers have a key role to play in this, as to a certain extent do airlines, because they do some checking before passengers board aircraft. The noble Lord mentioned e-gates. Automation is also really important. We have been able to upgrade the e-gates to speed passengers through the airport.
Lord Snape (Lab)
I draw your Lordships’ attention to my entry in the register of interests. The travel industry is at present on its knees. Regular changes in government policy, as well as changes in the government policy on the admittance of British businesspeople and holidaymakers from other countries, are making the situation considerably worse. Could the Minister tell us what consultations, if any, have been held with the Treasury about some sector-specific assistance to this vital industry?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
My Lords, we believe that by the end of September 2021 the air transport sector, for example, will have benefited from around £7 billion worth of government support since the start of the pandemic. Decisions around the sector support will of course ultimately be a matter for the Chancellor based on the evidence that we have been able to provide. Of course, we have regular conversations with our colleagues at the Treasury, but also with industry. We are listening very carefully to the sector.
Great British Railway Plans
Lord Snape Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
My Lords, there are no such plans. In reference to the noble Lord’s statements about HS2 and East West Rail being separate infrastructure managers, I say that there are 13 different infrastructure managers already on the rail network. GBR will obviously work closely with them, as indeed it will have to with Transport for Wales and ScotRail. GBR will be set up to collaborate; that is what we want to see it doing.
Lord Snape (Lab) [V]
My Lords, bearing in mind that the recently issued White Paper stressed the importance of a “guiding mind” so far as the railway industry is concerned in future, is it not completely illogical to leave out HS2 and East West Rail, its two major construction projects? Surely there will be considerable involvement in both projects. Does the Minister not remember John Junor’s famous phrase in the Sunday Express: “Who is in charge of the clattering train?”
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
Sadly, I do not remember that from the Express. One of the words that the noble Lord said was absolutely critical: “construction”. HS2 and East West Rail are indeed both in construction at the moment and will be for some time. There is therefore ample time as both become operational railways for them to collaborate with GBR to ensure that all their services interlink.