Oral Answers to Questions

Anthony Browne Excerpts

Thursday 29th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

Given that we have £2 billion of funding for walking and cycling—the biggest sum ever invested in active travel, as far as we can work out—the idea that there is a lack of investment is, of course, entirely untrue. The hon. Lady will have noticed that last year the coronavirus occupied almost everything we were doing, but it did not prevent us issuing a new cycling strategy, published by the Prime Minister and backed by me. We will be saying a lot more about that, and I welcome the hon. Lady’s enthusiasm.

[Anthony Browne (South Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

As chair of the all-party parliamentary environment group, I am incredibly supportive of the Government’s ambition to phase out diesel trains across the entire UK network by 2040. East West Rail is soon to build a railway line in my constituency, due for completion in 2030, but it is not being built as an electrified line, and my constituents are very worried that they might end up with a new diesel railway line. Will my right hon. Friend, or my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean)—I am not sure who is answering—work with me and the Treasury to make sure that East West Rail is aligned with the Government’s ambition to phase out diesel trains?

[Grant Shapps]

I will answer my hon. Friend. East West Rail, the company behind the new line, is aiming to deliver an entirely zero-carbon railway. It will be considering conventional and emerging technology solutions for powering trains, which could be part-electric and part-hydrogen or battery in the future, for example, so that services that operate along the whole length of the route are zero carbon.