Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Curtis Excerpts

Thursday 26th June 2025 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Chris Curtis (Milton Keynes North) (Lab)]

1. What steps she is taking to help ensure that the transport system supports economic growth.

[Kanishka Narayan (Vale of Glamorgan) (Lab)]

14. What steps she is taking to help ensure that the transport system supports economic growth.

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Heidi Alexander)]

Economic growth is this Government’s top priority, and the Chancellor put growth right at the heart of her spending review, announcing more than £92 billion of capital investment in transport infrastructure to give people access to jobs and opportunities. This includes long-term funding for our largest city regions, billions of pounds of investment in roads, hundreds of millions of pounds for walking and cycling, and delivering transformative projects such as the trans-Pennine route upgrade and East West Rail. This will make a real difference to people’s lives up and down the country, now and in the future, showing the difference a Labour Government make.

[Chris Curtis]

Every French city with a population of more than 150,000 has a mass rapid transport system, yet over 30 UK cities or towns of that size still lack it. Research from Centre for Cities shows that poor connectivity holds back growth and productivity by limiting mobility. A key reason why we have so few is cost, because building a kilometre of track in the UK is twice as expensive as the European average. Can the Secretary of State set out what her Department is doing to bring down costs and help kickstart a tram-building revolution?

[Heidi Alexander]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that matter with me in person a few days ago and for sending me further information on the report and the research. Trams do have the potential to support growth at much lower cost than heavy rail, but he is right that the cost per kilometre of new tramline is much more expensive in the UK than elsewhere in Europe. I have asked my officials to look into what we can do in this area as we look to unlock growth across the UK.