Oral Answers to Questions

Claire Perry Excerpts

Thursday 28th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Lab)]

2. What recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of the schedule 8 disruption payment scheme for Network Rail and train operating companies.

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

The framework and the amount of schedule 8 compensation are set by the Office of Rail and Road, which is conducting a review into this issue at the moment. The Department has provided input into the consultation, and the right hon. Lady is welcome to raise her concerns directly with the regulator.

[Joan Ryan]

I know that the Minister has concerns about schedule 8 payments, as do I. It is scandalous that train operators make millions from rail delays at the expense of passengers suffering from a poor standard of service. What immediate steps might the Government take to give power to the regulator to ensure that any net profits made by train operators from unplanned delays and cancellation caused by Network Rail go towards improving rail passenger services across the country, particularly in the light of the very low levels of passenger satisfaction?

[Claire Perry]

The right hon. Lady and my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince) have raised this matter with me eloquently on several occasions. I know that those things are part of the considerations of the current review. The right hon. Lady and I are as one on the view that the rail industry has to do more to improve the current compensation payments, which are rather generous in absolute terms but are not well advertised or well claimed, and I am looking forward to introducing the policy to reduce the delay repay threshold to 15 minutes. Ultimately, our goal should be to get the trains running on time so that passengers do not have to claim compensation. That is what underpins the Government’s record investment in the railway.

[Mr Speaker]

It is good that the hon. Gentleman is doing more than just talking to himself about the matter. That is very encouraging.

[Claire Perry]

My hon. Friend represents many thousands of travelling constituents, and he is assiduous in raising their concerns. I will, of course, meet him and look at what can be done to speed up that particular piece of work.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

Passengers are, of course, completely inadequately compensated for delays, and I welcome the support that the Minister is giving to my campaign to halve the delay repay timings. Would she also support my campaign to sack Southern, which has proved itself completely incapable of running a railway service and should have its services handed over to Transport for London?

[Claire Perry]

I am delighted that the right hon. Gentleman is supporting the Conservative party’s manifesto commitment to reduce delay repay to 15 minutes. It is lovely that at least some shreds of that coalition co-operation are still in action. He and I have discussed the Southern franchise many times. It is difficult. There are record levels of engineering work taking place on the line, and we are doing all we can, as he knows, to ensure that passengers suffer the least disruption possible and get the compensation to which they are entitled when their trains do not run on time.

[Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)]

Schedule 8 compensation is not making its way to my travelling public. Eddy Leviten regularly contacts me from Acton main line station, where there are no staff, no way of buying a ticket, no indicator board and only two trains an hour. Travelling from Acton main line station, which is only one stop from Paddington, should not be a case of taking your life in your hands and leaping into the unknown.

[Claire Perry]

I am not going to give the House a boring diatribe about the purpose of schedule 8. [Interruption.] I know hon. Members would all be fascinated. The point of schedule 8 is slightly different from the point about compensation paid to passengers under the delay repay scheme or the national conditions of carriage. It is absolutely right that we should bring forward proposals. For the hon. Lady, a compensation threshold that kicks in at 30 minutes is probably not worth a lot, but one that starts at 15 minutes may be valuable. Ultimately, however, the hon. Lady’s constituents have a far greater choice of transport than many other people in this country, and that is why we are investing in the railway—north, south, east and west.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Some 80% of passengers entitled to a refund when their train is cancelled or delayed make no claim, largely because train operating companies make claiming too difficult. To improve passenger compensation arrangements, the Office of Rail and Road recommended that the provisions of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 should apply to rail. This month, however, the Government have further delayed introducing that by another year. Why should train operating companies have such beneficial compensation arrangements, while the Government intervene to delay giving passengers their right to compensation?

[Claire Perry]

The question that comes to mind is: why did the hon. Gentleman’s Government do nothing about this for 13 years? It took a Conservative Government—[Interruption.] I encourage the hon. Gentleman to stay focused on the facts. Delay repay compensation levels have increased eightfold over the past five years, but there is far more to do. The actual amount of compensation available is more generous in this country than in almost any other country in Europe, but I want to reassure him about the CRA exemption. The industry had argued for a permanent exemption, which I found completely unacceptable. We have given the industry time to adjust to make sure it gets this right.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

3. What plans his Department has to upgrade the A30 and A303.

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[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

10. What steps are being taken to ensure that ticket offices at train stations are accessible to disabled people.

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

As my right hon. Friend knows, rail travel in this country is booming. A vital part of that growth is ensuring that rail is accessible to all, including passengers with disabilities, at every stage of their journey. The statistics suggest that disabled people are using the railways in ever greater numbers. In fact, the number of disabled persons railcards in circulation has risen by 12% year on year—a growth rate that far outstrips that for passengers without disabilities.

[Mrs Spelman]

The concourse at Birmingham International train station in my constituency is to be improved to provide better access for the disabled, but will the Minister put pressure on the Chiltern line, where the carriages are much higher than the platforms? Would it not be possible to replicate what Transport for London does, at Westminster station, for example, by elevating a section of the platform?

[Claire Perry]

My right hon. Friend raises the valuable point that there has to be a joined-up approach—we need operators and Network Rail to work together. I will look at the issue she raises about the station, but she should be aware that any improvement works carried out at a station in the UK have to comply with UK disability standards.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Minister for her reply earlier, but given that Network Rail has financial issues and that £50 million is being taken out of the Access for All scheme, will the Minister explain what pressure she can put on Network Rail to make sure that stations that are not accessible to disabled people, such as Reddish North in my constituency, are upgraded, so that everybody can have access to a good rail service?

[Claire Perry]

I am afraid that many of this country’s stations date from Victorian times when this was not even an issue. We are very proud of the Access for All scheme. Almost half a billion pounds has been spent, and money will continue to be spent, with the prioritisation of stations based on footfall and other such criteria. I would be more than happy to see whether anything can be done at the station the hon. Gentleman mentions, but we have to make sure that the money is spent in areas where most people are travelling. For me, this is absolutely part of railways for the future: it is vital for people with disabilities to be able to access their trains, and rolling stock will be fully disability compliant by 2020.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

11. What plans he has to support the development of regional airports.

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[Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

15. What recent progress has been made on rail electrification schemes in the north of England.

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

We have electrified five times as many miles of track in the last six years as the previous Labour Government did in 13 years, and almost all that work has been in the north of England. I call that good progress.

[Diana Johnson]

Can the Minister explain why the privately financed £100 million Hull to Selby rail electrification scheme has been stuck in the Department for Transport for nearly two years, while her Department is announcing schemes such as the one involving £27 billion for Crossrail 2 between Hertfordshire and Surbiton? If she is really serious about the northern powerhouse, why can she not get a wriggle on and get this privately financed scheme to happen?

[Claire Perry]

I think that that is Humberside for a wiggle, Mr Speaker. Rail North and I completely share the hon. Lady’s enthusiasm for faster and better rail journeys for her constituents, which is why the new franchise that we let last year will give her constituents brand-new trains—bye-bye, Pacers!—more services and more direct connections. Hull is getting £1.4 million for its station in time for the city to take pride of place as the UK city of culture 2017. She should be pleased with that record.

[John Pugh (Southport) (LD)]

The Southport to Manchester line has been prioritised for electrification, but we might lose our direct link to south Manchester and the airport through Piccadilly. Why is that happening, and how does it constitute progress?

[Claire Perry]

The hon. Gentleman has raised a service question that I am not across, but I will get back to him.

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

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[Stephen Phillips (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

T3. Every time I come across Network Rail, it seems to have a great deal of power, but to be utterly unaccountable to central Government. As we are seeing in Lincolnshire, that power can be used to frustrate growth infrastructure schemes that have the support of local authorities. What can the Minister do to ensure that Network Rail does not act to stop schemes that are in the best interests of local people and supported by local authorities?

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

The best schemes are those that are strongly supported by local authorities, local enterprise partnerships and local businesses. Network Rail is in a new phase in which route responsibility will be devolved, and it will work to a set of investment plans that are agreed, based on important bottom-up analysis.

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

Over the past 10 years, destinations and routes from Scotland have doubled, but flights to London have fallen by more than a third. Not only do we need starter routes, such as the Inverness to Heathrow route that we will have next week, but we need to up the frequency of these routes and guarantee them, as that would allow them to bed in and become fully established. Will the Minister establish a point-to-point public service obligation, including specific regional hub airports, and do all he can to create PSOs for airports such as Skye in my constituency?

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

T4. The slogan of CrossCountry trains is “Going that bit further”; my constituents would be delighted if it did exactly that and instructed more than three out of 63 trains a day on the inter-city service between Birmingham and Bristol to stop at the city of Gloucester. Will the Minister with responsibility for rail confirm whether the Department will require CrossCountry to restore decent commuter services from Gloucester on that line as part of its franchise extension?

[Claire Perry]

Nobody could be more assiduous in calling for those service requirements than my hon. Friend, but we must not have services to cities such as Cheltenham lost as a result of a change that he is requiring. I can confirm that discussions are ongoing. We have asked CrossCountry to report on the best way to deliver the services that he is talking about, and I am looking forward to discussing that with him shortly.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

Despite the Secretary of State’s pride in the Pacer announcements, there remains huge under-investment in transport in the north, compared with London in particular; the ratio is 24:1. Ministers are now saying that they are going to cut the subsidy to the Northern franchise by up to 85%. Does he really think it adds to the credibility of the northern powerhouse if it takes half a day to cross it, in trains that are better suited to a railway museum than a railway system?

[Claire Perry]

I would sometimes like to offer Opposition politicians another briefing about what these new franchises are going to deliver. It sounds a bit like “The Generation Game”, but thanks to my Government, the hon. Lady’s constituents will be rid of those outdated trains, and will get many more services of a much better quality; that will be delivered at less cost to the taxpayer. Only a Labour politician could argue for worse services and more subsidy.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

T5. We have been very positive about the new Northern rail franchise. However, there are throngs of people who want to get from Leeds to Goole but cannot do that at the moment; there may even be some who wish to get from Goole to Leeds. The situation is the same on the Brigg to Sheffield line. Both lines are very under-utilised, so what opportunities are there under the new franchising agreements to get those improved services? Will the Minister come and ride the train with us?