Transport: North-east

Calum Kerr Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Calum Kerr (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (SNP)]

On that bombshell—be careful not to encourage them to do so. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Sir Edward. You have obviously been a naughty boy; you have been sent here many times recently, by the looks of it. [Interruption.] We can see the connotations the Tories take from the phrase “naughty boy”—I don’t know.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson) on securing this debate and her colleagues from the north-east on turning up in numbers to support her. They are clearly all concerned and passionate about the issue, and she gave an excellent introduction, which is so important in Westminster Hall debates. Her plea for the north-east to be given the powers that it requires to meet the challenges that she articulated so well cannot have failed to be heard.

The hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mrs Trevelyan) also did well. I see that she now has a friend from the other side of the country, the hon. Member for Carlisle (John Stevenson), so she does not feel quite so isolated. She tried hard and succeeded in making a contribution that was positive about what has been done and at the same time pleaded for much more. I can tell hon. Members that she clearly backs the dualling of the A1, because she gave me a sticker and encouraged me to put it on my car.

The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) makes an excellent contribution to any debate, although I will now be concerned every time I see a No. 1 bus—is it the correct one? Going by his detailed contribution, the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) is quite clearly an expert on buses. He sparked some interesting thought processes about HS2, and I will deal briefly with the challenge of what exactly to spend our money on.

I am struck that the imbalances between Scotland and England that my party is somewhat guilty of always complaining about also apply very much to the regions of England. Those imbalances, and in particular the London effect, make me question why new infrastructure such as HS2 needed to start in London and could not have started in—

[Tom Blenkinsop]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Calum Kerr]

Happily, yes.

[Tom Blenkinsop]

As a result of the Chancellor’s announcement today, Scotland will apparently receive an extra £800 million. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that authorities in the north-east should be included in the Barnett formula and get an equivalent sum, which we could use for transport funding?

[Calum Kerr]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution. I have not given any thought to how money should be allocated. I do not like the phraseology that he uses, but he certainly puts forward an interesting idea. How do we rebalance the economy across England and across the UK? Devolution of power, including spending power, is an important aspect that needs to be considered. As I was saying, if HS2 is indeed so important, why could it not have started in the north of the country? Why could it not be part of redressing the balance between north and south instead of being done in a kind of hub-and-spoke way that reinforces the idea that it is all about London?

I was told that this room would be full of northerners. I do not know whether this makes any difference, but they are all southerners to me. That probably feels like an insult; I assure them that I do not intend it as one. Let me make a couple of points. First, why I am here to sum up, apart from the fact that the third party is asked to sum up in all debates? The reason is, despite being the spokesperson on the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and on digital, I am from across the border. Interesting interventions were made about how we in the south of Scotland work with the north of England. The more we can collaborate and work together, have a collective voice and look at ways in which we can become more connected, the more we can collectively redress the pull of the south to which I referred.

I will touch on an example that may appeal to the hon. Member for North Durham, which is to reference the longest piece of domestic railway to be constructed in Britain for more than 100 years: the Borders railway from Edinburgh down to Galashiels. It cost £353 million, it was delivered on time and on budget and it is smashing all predictions on passenger numbers. It was predicted to carry 650,000 passengers a year and the figure is now well beyond a million—it hit those passenger targets within six months. I give that as an example not necessarily of an alternative to high-speed rail but of the kind of projects we should consider.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

That is a good example of the sort of project that could deliver for the north-east, not to compete with high-speed rail but to bring rail back to communities in rural Northumberland and parts of County Durham, which would be beneficial to local people.

[Calum Kerr]

I 100% agree. With the fixation on high-speed rail, as the hon. Gentleman rightly said, the danger is that that sucks up too much money and prevents other projects that could deliver greater economic benefit while attacking some of the geographic challenges that hon. Members have mentioned. The Chancellor in his autumn statement today was keen not to mention too many individual projects. Bizarrely, he decided to talk about one country house refurbishment, although it seemed to me that that was more about scoring a narrow political point against the Labour party than anything else, but such is life.

I appreciate that I am going somewhat off-piste, so if the Minister wishes to bat this back to me I will understand, but is there any mention in the autumn statement or elsewhere on what the Government’s position is on extending the Borders railway through to the constituency of the hon. Member for Carlisle? The Scottish Government have a multi-modal study looking at transport across the Scottish borders and a key ingredient in that is extending the Borders railway service from Galashiels to Hawick and through to Newcastleton and Carlisle, which would create an extra link. That is the kind of project that we should be looking at. That is not necessarily to the exclusion of high-speed rail, but I know which project I would pick if I had to pick between the two. If the Minister could give me any kind of response on that, I would be grateful.

My final point is on pathways. The east coast main line remains an important line for us. The Scottish Government are committed to new stations at East Linton and Reston and a new service with new trains. My concern is that sometimes again we fixate on services to London—Edinburgh to London—which exclude local services, and that means that main lines become less viable. At the moment we are looking at a two-hour service, and once things are made irregular their viability and usefulness diminishes. The Government have a key role to play too in looking at all pathways and the balance between national services serving major cities and local services. I close by congratulating the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South again on securing the debate.