(3 weeks ago)
Lords ChamberI shall have to write to the noble Baroness, but otherwise I agree with everything she said.
My Lords, the Minister will remember Boris Johnson’s promises of levelling up. This Government’s recent announcements on support for economic growth in transport and advanced manufacturing have favoured the south and east very strongly. Will they please ensure that in future planning they think about the impact on the rest of the country, and take into account that the south-east is short of water and is certainly short of renewable electricity?
An expansion of Heathrow will be of benefit to the entire UK, not just London and the south-east. A recent analysis suggested that over half the benefits would in fact be in the rest of the UK and not in the south-east of England.
(7 months ago)
Lords ChamberI welcome the comments from the noble Lord, Lord McLoughlin. It is important that rail freight increases, but the noble Lord is correct in referring to capacity problems on some parts of the network. There are two things to do. First, historically the freight companies have a number of paths that they do not use and never have done, which are getting in the way of running more passenger trains. Secondly, in return, the Government’s emphasis on the carriage of more freight by rail demands us to look carefully at the capacity of the railway and facilitate the paths that are needed for modern freight, particularly containers and bulk aggregates, in order that traffic can increase.
My Lords, is the Minister aware that one of the choke points if one wants to increase the amount of freight moved by rail is across the Pennines? The M62 is crowded every day with trucks carrying containers. I am told that there are no spare freight paths between the west and east coasts in the north of England. Unless extra path capacity is provided, the Government will be unable to fulfil their commitment to increase the carriage of freight by rail in the north.
There is certainly a constraint on the amount of railway capacity over the Pennines from east to west. The trans-Pennine route upgrade, which is currently costing £11 billion, is a significant project already in delivery that seeks to increase that capacity. I know the department’s officials have looked and are looking at what needs to be done with that upgrade in order to make sure that it is suitable for the carriage of more freight, including containers of the larger size.