Oral Answers to Questions

Ben Bradshaw Excerpts

Thursday 29th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Jones]

Baroness Grey-Thompson is an extremely impressive figure and the university will benefit from her involvement.

[Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)]

Not if she can’t get there!

[Andrew Jones]

Of course she has to get there and I will look into the case of Eaglescliffe station.

The point remains that the Department for Transport is committed to ensuring that disabled people have the same access to transport services and opportunities as other members of society. That is why we are fully backing the Access for All programme and rolling out more disability access to buses. That is a measure of its success. The programme has generated a positive response. Research at stations that have benefited from the programme has found that passengers with mobility impairment have a better travelling experience as a result, and that goes up among those who have wheelchair issues.

--- Later in debate ---

[Claire Perry]

I have the report here, I have read it, and I am happy to confirm that the other options would indeed be alternatives, not replacements.

[Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)]

What impact will the delay and cost overruns affecting the electrification of the Great Western main line have on the investment that the Minister has just mentioned?

[Claire Perry]

I am so sorry, Mr Speaker. May I ask the right hon. Gentleman to repeat his question?

[Mr Speaker]

The Minister was busily chuntering away to her colleague, with scandalous disregard for the right hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Bradshaw]

The Minister should actually listen to questions, rather than talking to her colleague. My question was this: what will be the impact of the cost overruns and delays affecting the electrification of the Great Western main line—from which we in the south-west are not benefiting beyond Bristol—on the investment that the Minister has just trumpeted?

[Claire Perry]

I apologise, Mr Speaker. I misspoke in my previous answer, and I was reassuring myself about that. I want to make it clear, if I may, that the new routes will be additional, not alternatives, to the main line.

The right hon. Gentleman knows that an enormous amount of investment is taking place in the south-west: investment in resilience, and in the new, faster AT300 trains. I wish he would get behind the Government’s attempts to connect this vital region, rather than keeping on shouting about things.