East Anglia Rail Franchise

Claire Perry Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sir Simon Burns (Chelmsford) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill) on securing this debate. The fact that so many Members are present in the Chamber shows just how important the debate is. I am particularly pleased to see on the Front Bench—it is not often that we see so many Ministers in an Adjournment debate—my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Ben Gummer) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) because they, with my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith), were on the taskforce that was created by the Chancellor and that has done so much work to identify and then promote what we need on our railway.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Sir Alan Haselhurst) said, we are of course fighting for a better service for our constituents, but it is not solely a better service for them. East Anglia is an economic engine, and that engine needs to be sustained by improving communications. I am talking about the communications of commuters who commute on the line—whether it is into London to work in the City or into other parts of East Anglia. The benefits will also be felt by the freight service, which all too often has to come down on the main commuter line from Felixstowe to London to then go back up north. We need far greater improvements on the line from Felixstowe to Nuneaton to open up capacity on the lines down to London and up to Norwich.

Tomorrow is, of course, crucial because of the franchise and its implications for the future of our railways. The Minister will probably get bored stupid hearing this—

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

Never!

[Sir Simon Burns]

The Minister is very kind, and she can add to saying “never” by doing what we want. What we want and what we have to have is new rolling stock. Our rolling stock is archaic. It breaks down too frequently. Most of the eastern line from Liverpool Street, Chelmsford, Colchester and Ipswich to Norwich has two tracks—one up, one down—and if a train breaks down, particularly during the morning or early evening rush hours, there is utter chaos, with all the suffering that that entails. We must ensure, within the confines of the franchise wording, that whoever is successful in that bid and gets the franchise from October next year is under no misunderstanding—no ifs, no buts—about the fact that we will have new rolling stock that is fit for purpose for our railway needs.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

Before I respond to an incredibly powerful set of speeches, may I crave your indulgence, Madam Deputy Speaker, to put on the record my thanks to the staff of this place, who have done so much for us over the year? In my view, they never get thanked enough and I am truly grateful to them.

We have a star-studded Chamber for this Adjournment debate. Such debates are usually very ill-attended. I think there are more Members here than we had for the previous debate. It is quite terrifying to face this star-studded pack tonight. They represent—if I have not left anyone out—the fine counties of Suffolk, Norfolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire. They have very passionately and powerfully made the case for improvements in our railways.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill). Like many new Members in the Chamber she has been an assiduous correspondent and lobbyist for improvements in her railways. She has focused specifically on the requirements of her constituents and on what the improvements will bring to the broader area.

I am pleased that I have the time to try to set out what we are attempting to achieve with the franchising process. There is a tension between specifying everything, crowding out any form of innovation in the market and not being able to cope with franchise change and setting out more broadly what we expect bidders to deliver, while letting them come up with the right solutions.

My hon. Friend, like others, very powerfully made her point about the need for new rolling stock. Indeed, she referred to what is currently running as “decrepit and aged”. We have discussed this matter, so she will know that we absolutely expect the rolling stock on the whole franchise to be transformed, because we completely agree with the assertions made about its unsuitability for purpose. But we want the market to go away and find the best solutions for customers, based on what different customers along the routes may need. There is a combination of inter-city, metro and suburban services, and we want the bidders to be creative in what they come up with. I can, however, tell my hon. Friends that the score that we will give to rolling stock in this franchise process is the highest ever. We are no longer in the business, as previous Governments were, of letting franchises purely on the economics. That did a huge disservice to the customers who use the routes. Now, the process asks what the economics look like and, crucially, what the quality looks like for the passengers. Rolling stock provision will have the highest score ever in this franchise.

We will also have very clear customer performance targets in the franchise. I was shocked to find out that we used to let operators set their own. How can we possibly run a contract with an operator if we do not know what we are contracting for? I of course want to contract for measures such as punctuality and reliability, but crucially I want to contract for customers, because these are not empty boxes rolling around the network; they are boxes full of people, often over-full of people, trying to get to their jobs or home to their lives. I reassure right hon. and hon. Members that we are expecting a transformation in the quality of the rolling stock.

Turning briefly to stations, I know that my hon. Friend’s station is a grand old building that features all of 20 car parking spaces. We should expect to see real improvements at that station and at many stations across the network. We have asked bidders to make those improvements. We have asked them to work against a 40-year asset management strategy. We are trying to extend the management of the assets beyond the franchise period to ensure that investment proposals can be properly made for the stations in the franchise. We will look at those proposals in the bids and hold bidders to account against them.

Turning briefly to routes and services, I was delighted that we were able to confirm the absolute requirement for Norwich in 90 and Ipswich in 60. I pay tribute to the group that has been led so ably by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith); my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) and my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Ben Gummer), who have to remain silent as they are on the Front Bench; and my dear friend the former rail Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Sir Simon Burns). That group has become the poster child for how to do it.

I am the most popular Minister and, in a way, the most unpopular Minister, because I am deluged in the Lobbies and at other times by people who want to talk about railways. What I say to them is, “Go and look at what was done in this study”, because, for the first time, it tried to capture that elusive thing that we all know is there: it asked, if we invest a bit of money in transport, what is the broader economic value that it delivers?

You will be amazed to hear, Madam Deputy Speaker, or perhaps you will not, that every major infrastructure project in this country—the extension of the Jubilee line, HS1, the M25—has failed the economic value test that the Government have imposed on it, because such projects are looked at through a very narrow prism that does not factor in the economic value added that good transport investment brings. This group broke that mould and created a model—we are working hard to see how to capture this—that showed what we all instinctively know to be true: that if we invest in transport infrastructure, we grow the local, regional and national economy. That is an incredibly important point.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds asks why no half-hourly service is specified between Ipswich and Cambridge, via Bury St Edmunds.

[Matthew Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)]

And Newmarket.

[Claire Perry]

I do understand the need for special services on race days, my right hon. Friend will be pleased to hear.

Such a service has been looked at carefully and I looked at it again today. Two things would need to happen to make it work. The first is a series of infrastructure investments, including in the Ely North junction, which several Members have referenced. The disappointing news on that is that the original project cost of about £30 million to £40 million has escalated to more than £130 million in the current analysis. Given that we are in the business of delivering infrastructure against the very tight Hendy review, with a known amount of funding, that is simply not acceptable. The team has been sent away to look at how that work could be delivered more cost-effectively.

Other works such as doubling track, putting in passing loops or improving signalling capability would also need to happen to deliver a robust service. I believe that work will be done on that as part of the analysis going into the next control period, which starts in four years’ time.

Alternatively, a service could be provided that skips stops. One challenge on our network is that we always want stops from everywhere to anywhere, but it is also possible to provide fast and semi-fast services with slightly different stopping patterns. The beauty of having a unified group of people who work intelligently together, is that they can work out what such a measure might look like for the benefit of the region. I do not suggest that there should be a bidding process for whose station will be missed out, but we could consider whether there is a way to serve better an enormous housing development or a new town by using existing infrastructure.

It has become clear that we are good in this country at specifying enormous investments in infrastructure without necessarily thinking more creatively about how we could deliver that solution through better rolling stock or minor track improvements. For example, we might not necessarily need dual tracking, but perhaps there could be some passing places, and I encourage people to work on that.

[Chloe Smith]

I am grateful to have another moment to speak in this debate. The Minister has asked for a couple of fast services that will achieve Norwich in 90 and Ipswich in 60. Will she confirm that in a way those are bonuses, because the true version of Norwich in 90 and Ipswich in 60, and the better services that we all look for, will come when we have new trains and improved infrastructure? Those extras are just that—extras—until we can achieve the long-term goal.

[Claire Perry]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and controlling the franchise levers is the first step in the process. We expect bidders to exceed what we have asked for in the franchise, because we are saying “This is the minimum that we expect”. We will, of course, award the franchise to the bidder that is able to exceed those minimums, including with possible additional services. When the bids come in tomorrow I have no idea what they will contain, but we are confidently expecting those specifications to be exceeded.

As I have said, I am confident that the winning bidder for this franchise will deliver huge, tangible, transformational improvements that are commensurate with the economic weight of the region. We will see route improvements, and we have set out what we expect as a minimum. However, this is not set in stone; this is a starting point. When the franchise starts up next October, there will be every opportunity to change routes, add additional service patterns or new stations—that has happened across the country—improve timetables, and deliver better scheduled services, or even special services such as to Newmarket on race days.

I urge Members to continue to work together, pulling in the excellent provision of help and information from the local enterprise partnership and local businesses, and to help us make the business case for the improvements to infrastructure that the Government will make. We must also work with the operators to encourage them to change their patterns.

We have heard from several hon. Members tonight, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Sir Alan Haselhurst), who is an assiduous campaigner on this issue, re-emphasised the absolute importance of new rolling stock in this franchise. Crucially, he also mentioned the linkage of rail services to airports. I am lucky not to have airports in my portfolio, or indeed HS2, but the linkage of rail services to airports is vital. He will be pleased to know that already an early morning service has been introduced from Liverpool Street to Stansted, because it turned out that more than 500 people a night were sleeping at the airport because they could not get there early enough. That has now changed, and a new service is running.

[Peter Aldous]

The Minister is setting out her case well. As well as linkage to airports, in such a rural area we also need linkage to public transport and buses.

[Claire Perry]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about integrating the transport system so that it works for people who might take a bus or drive a car, and who need a car parking space before they get on the train. We must assume that transport plays that role.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Sir Simon Burns) made a wonderful speech and referenced the importance of freight, which is a particular boon and issue on these lines. I am very sympathetic to the issue of freight disrupting passenger traffic. We need more freight paths. Freight is strategically important to productivity and air quality. The more freight we can get off the road and on to trains the better. My Department will be undertaking a strategic freight review. I am very pleased that in the spending review we preserved the majority of funding for freight.

[Mr Carswell]

Regardless of who is awarded the franchise, does the Minister agree that unless we address the fundamental issue of corporate governance and accountability, and the underlying problem, which is Network Rail and its mediocre service, we will not see the transformative change she wants? A year ago almost to the day, we had a debate in Westminster Hall about this. I would be interested to hear if she has given the issue any further thought.

[Claire Perry]

We have made huge progress on Network Rail’s governance. It is now an arm’s length public sector body. I think Sir Peter Hendy, the current chair, will transform the organisation.

[Jo Churchill]

I urge the Minister to have a conversation with the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones). Moving freight on to the railway has such an impact. We were talking only earlier this week about freight travelling down the A14. Freight trains can take up to 35 containers. If we could get that freight, at a whoosh, off the A14, it would have a really big impact on the roads.

[Claire Perry]

My hon. Friend is right. [Interruption.] Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) says, “Off the A12 too”. My hon. Friend will be interested to know that one fully loaded freight train can take up to 72 HGVs off the road. That is astonishing. That is why we make money available through the modal shift grant and for the strategic freight network.

I really cannot pay tribute enough to my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith). She has been a live wire of co-ordination and energy as the person to whom others must come and talk. I do not feel I am in a position to deliver rocket-powered trains just yet, but I would certainly like to try. Maybe there will be a train called Major Tim very soon, which would satisfy her.

My hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge) raised the very worrying issue of leafgate. There is an important point here. I would be happy to confirm I will ask Mr Curley to meet representatives of his constituents and others. The question for me is this: what is the productivity loss to the British economy from accepting the fact that every year for a few weeks we are all late for work by 10, 15 or 20 minutes? I want to start looking at investments in our rail network through the prism of passengers and of productivity, because the two things are linked. We are making people late consistently, year after year after year, because of leaves on the line. Other places do not shut the lines, he will be pleased to hear, but they do slow down trains and run them slowly. People are cautious. I used to refute leaf stickiness as nonsense, but it is a problem. And it is not just us who face this: the Netherlands have a problem and Germany has a problem. Let us have a pan-European get-rid-of-leaves-on-the-line prize. The productivity improvement it could deliver for the British economy would be huge. I am determined that the productivity improvements rail can deliver are factored into the investment decision.

[Lucy Frazer]

It is concerning that the cost of improvements to the Ely North junction have gone up. If the improvements come in early in control period 6 —we very much hope they will—it might still be possible to have them finished in the franchise period, which we all want, so we ask her not to rule that out.

[Claire Perry]

I rule nothing out on that point. I am very keen that what is funded and delivered will be delivered by Network Rail in this period.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), who has already, in the first few months of this Parliament, been such an incredible campaigner for his constituency. He raises the very important point that we are not in the business of peddling jam tomorrow. That is why we have to deliver what is in the Hendy review, and that is why we have to make this franchise absolutely deliver for all passengers.

I want to make a couple of final points. First, we are in an unprecedented place for rail. We are investing more in our rail network than at any time since Victorian times. We will spend £38 billion on our railways over this period, and I am bound and determined that that money is spent for passengers who can see and feel the benefit. I urge this group, who are working so well together, to bring their collective intelligence and the network effect that one of my hon. Friends talked about to help us make the business case for these improvements. The benefits are much, much broader than the narrow rail prism that we often use.

Question put and agreed to.