Transport

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Wednesday 5th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. The Welsh Government are taking a serious issue more seriously, and they are to be commended for their work.

What is more, transport is the most emitting sector of the UK economy. It is responsible for more than a quarter of greenhouse gas emissions, and that is excluding international shipping and aviation. It is also the worst-performing sector when it comes to reducing carbon emissions, which are higher now than in 2010. Progress has been poor in comparison with that of other sectors: transport emissions were just 2% lower in 2016-17 than 1990-1991, compared with 60% for energy supply and 30% for businesses more generally.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

Would the hon. Gentleman care to comment on what happened to transport emissions under the Labour Government in the 10 years following 1997, before the financial crash?

[Andy McDonald]

We are dealing with 2020 and the risible record of this Government. I know that a number of Conservative Members think that the world started in 2020, but the Government have been in power since 2010, and they should take that on board.

The facts that I have given compound the Government’s depressing lack of ambition. Their failure to reduce transport carbon emissions and act on the crisis is a huge missed opportunity to lead the world in developing and manufacturing low-carbon technologies. Yesterday’s announcement of a 2035 phase-out of the production of petrol and diesel cars highlights the poverty of vision for the climate and for industry. Electric vehicles will be as cheap as diesel and petrol cars by the mid-2020s. It makes no sense to go on selling polluting vehicles that will be more expensive to buy and run into the 2030s. In its alternative strategy, Labour has set out a clear pathway to achieving significant reductions in climate emissions at the same time as reducing regional and social inequalities and improving the quality of life.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy McDonald]

I have already indicated that I will not give way because so many people want to speak.

Fifteen per cent. of the UK’s population accounts for 70% of all flights, and half the country does not fly at all in any given year. Ahead of a possible tax cut for the aviation industry next month, Ministers should be thinking more imaginatively, such as replacing air passenger duty with a fair and just levy that targets frequent flyers. The Government’s advisory body, the Committee on Climate Change, has called for the introduction of a frequent flyer levy. Such a move could reduce demand for flying without penalising the annual family holiday in the sun, instead making it more expensive to fly out for a weekend at the second home in Provence for the umpteenth time that year.

[Damian Hinds]

It is more about business.

[Andy McDonald]

No, it is not.

Is the Secretary of State aware that it is more than a decade since the effectiveness of regulators in the transport industry was seriously questioned or considered? [Interruption.] I know he is not listening, but he really should.

Regulators could and should have a positive role in driving carbon reduction in the industries they oversee. Does the Secretary of State agree that the powers of the Office of Rail and Road and the Civil Aviation Authority should be strengthened to ensure that the road, rail, bus and aviation industries meet their climate crisis obligations? Have the Government issued any guidance to the transport industry regulators in that regard?

Finally, the Department for Transport does not have a carbon reduction budget or target. The Government should set a carbon budget consistent with the aspirations of the Paris agreement and beyond. In addition, each of the sectors—rail, road, aviation and maritime—should have carbon reduction targets in line with that departmental budget, and departmental spending should be reallocated to achieve the changes required.

Claire O’Neill is correct to say that the Prime Minister “doesn’t get it” on the climate crisis. The Transport Secretary has an opportunity to show that he does get it by halting the colossal road-building programme and his plans for airport expansion, and by boosting investment in active travel, public transport and electric vehicles.

Dealing with transport is critical to confronting the climate crisis. We are compelled to take action by decarbonising not only to respond to the existential threat to our one and only planet but to embrace the green industrial revolution and, simultaneously, to address the gross and obscene deficits in social justice. We must level up so that everyone across our nation has affordable, accessible and sustainable transport. We must connect our communities and businesses, and we must give people the means to get to work, to get to college, school or university and to get to hospital, and to help address social isolation.

The moral, social and economic imperatives are urgent and stark, and I urge this Government to take the bold and radical action that is necessary. The country, indeed the world, is watching. I commend this motion to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

It is a huge pleasure and privilege to follow our new colleague the hon. Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Tahir Ali), who spoke with passion about some incredibly important issues. I was particularly pleased to hear him talk about National Apprenticeship Week. So many of us have had opportunities to interact with it in Parliament this week, and will continue to do so when we are back in our constituencies in a couple of days. The hon. Gentleman’s own career is clearly a very impressive back story, and I think it is abundantly obvious to all of us that he will be a great asset to this place.

Climate change is the defining challenge of our age. Although there is still so much to be done, we can take some pride in the fact that this country has been decarbonising faster than comparable countries in the G20. Much the greatest part of that reduction so far has been our success on energy supply; transport is now the sector with the most emissions, and we must therefore prioritise it strongly.

I do not know where the figures in the Labour party’s manifesto come from, although, to be fair, not knowing where the figures come from is hardly a novel experience with today’s Labour party. I challenged the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald), the shadow Secretary of State, to say what had happened to transport emissions under the Labour Government, but he declined to engage in that conversation. I can tell him that, in fact, they rose in the 10 years after Labour came to power in 1997. At the time of the financial crash of 2007-08 they did fall dramatically, but for all the wrong reasons. Then, when we returned to government and started to rebuild the economy and build up employment, they rose from their level in 2012-13, but not to anywhere near the level to which the Labour Government had taken them in 2007.

It turns out that, although our success on energy is something of a stand-out story, our experience of transport emissions being stubborn and difficult to reduce is rather more common in other countries. The European Environment Agency has added together domestic emissions and international aviation emissions, and has found that between 1990 and 2017—the latest period for which it has figures—the change in transport emissions in the UK was basically the same as that in France, and comparable with what happened in Germany. Only Liechtenstein experienced substantial decreases in its transport emissions, and I am afraid that in the EU28 as a whole they rose by 28%.

[Robert Largan (High Peak) (Con)]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way—he is very generous. Does he agree that one way of reducing transport emissions would be to site train stations in areas to which people can walk rather than drive? As the Rail Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), is listening, may I now make a pitch for a new station for Gamesley?

[Damian Hinds]

My hon. Friend has made a good point about walking. Along with cycling, it is an important part of the picture, as are buses, which so many Members have mentioned today. I hope that the potential for “on demand” buses will benefit constituencies such as mine. We have also talked about rail electrification. As for heavy goods vehicles, there is a strong link with the development of autonomous vehicles. I am pleased that the UK continues to take a strong line internationally on aviation and shipping; it is important to remember that the targets for international aviation and shipping are set internationally.

We have heard more this week—encouragingly, I think —about alternative jet fuel technologies. As was mentioned by both my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman) and the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley), hydrogen remains potentially a very exciting technology for the future. However, the single most important element in transport is roads, and within that it is cars. In 2018, this country was the second largest European market for ultra low emission cars and the fourth largest for battery electric cars, and a fifth of the battery electric cars sold in Europe were made here. We now have far more charging points—over 22,000—and a penetration of rapid charging points relative to the extent of the road network that compares very favourably with the continent of Europe. Of course, there are many Government subsidies and support programmes that go with that.

We clearly need to do more, however. We had a debate in Westminster Hall the other day in which I talked a lot about how we can try to help consumers through questions about cost and help them to understand that it is important to look at the whole-life cost, particularly now that so many people are getting their vehicle through personal contract hire rather than buying it, even on finance. That comparison should be a lot easier. Clearly, we need to carry on working on the infrastructure network and do more on roaming, interoperability and the visibility of charging points. We also need to ensure that new homes have charging facilities. In my discussion with the Minister in Westminster Hall, I also mentioned that we need to do more on last-mile deliveries, given the huge growth in home shopping. Amazon lockers are great for Amazon, but that is a proprietary system. Can we start to use our post office network as a hub and spoke facility? That would be a good way of reducing the need for last-mile journeys as well as bringing useful footfall and business into post offices.

I will finish now because I know that others want to speak. It is possible to recognise that there is a huge amount to do while also recognising the progress that has been made. People need to know that we in this place understand the gravity of the problem, but also that we are committed, together, to doing what is necessary, and that we can and will do that. It would be so much better if we could return to doing that on the basis of the cross-party consensus that we have had in the past.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Net Zero Targets and Decarbonising Transport

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2020 Westminster Hall

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered net zero targets and decarbonising transport.

It is a genuine pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Nokes, and to have an opportunity to serve under your chairmanship. Tackling climate change is the defining challenge of our age. In the developed world—the rich world, with our higher per capita emissions—our responsibility is all the greater. I was proud last year when the UK became the first advanced economy to set in legislation a date for net zero, and I am pleased today that we are taking a further practical step by bringing forward the phase-out of petrol and diesel vehicles to 2035.

The UK has been decarbonising more quickly than any other G20 country, although one would not know that from hearing most commentary in this country. One would think that it is because of some accounting methodology, the cunning exclusion of some categories, or the financial crash of 2007-08. One would think that it all happened before 2010 and that nothing has improved since, or that it was because we have exported all our emissions to somewhere else in the world. But no, this country has made good and sustained progress on decarbonisation under Governments of both types. The greatest part of that progress has been made on energy decarbonisation, and the reality is that there is a limit on how much further we can go in that area with current technology, because of the intermittent nature of the sources—the sun and the wind. It will change as battery technology improves, but that is the situation today. We have made good progress, but it is not enough. To hit our net zero 2050 target, we need to increase the decrease, as it were, in our rate of emissions by about 30% compared with what we have managed per annum since 1990. Partly because of the success in energy, transport is now the biggest single source of emissions.

There are many different aspects of decarbonising transport, and we have only 90 minutes for this debate. Other colleagues might talk about active travel, such as walking and cycling, or about shipping, on-demand buses, the electrification of rail, heavy goods vehicles, the development of autonomous vehicles, alternative jet fuel technology or what could be the huge potential, eventually, of hydrogen—and it would be a turn-up for the books if nobody mentioned either HS2 or Heathrow airport. We could talk about many different aspects, but I will concentrate on roads, which is the biggest category, and specifically cars.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member on securing the debate, and I agree with him on road transport. Will he join me in urging the Minister to let us know as quickly as possible about the funding available in Greater Manchester for the clean freight and clean bus funds? We have good transport and clean air strategies, which were launched by the Mayor of Greater Manchester, but we need money to help small businesses and our bus network to become green.

[Damian Hinds]

I know the hon. Lady’s part of the world well, having stood for Parliament there in the mid-2000s. Buses are an important part of the overall mix, and for Greater Manchester, although I will let the Minister deal with her point in his own way.

On electric vehicles, there is a wide range of Government support and good cross-industry co-operation. There is a subsidy programme for vehicles, home charging points and workplace charging, and there are grants to local authorities for a number of different purposes.

[Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)]

Electric vehicles need electrical steel, and the only electrical steel maker in the UK—the Orb works in Newport, which was owned by Tata—was mothballed just before Christmas. Does the right hon. Member agree that supporting our steel industry at this crucial time will be vital for an end-to-end supply chain in this country?

[Damian Hinds]

Steel is of great importance, and the hon. Lady knows better than most people how important it is to our industrial base. It is also important to the development of many green technologies. As she knows, steel has its own challenges. It is a very energy-intensive sector; in time, hydrogen technologies and others might help in that regard, and we need to ensure that we maximise our efforts towards them.

We now have over 22,000 public charging points for electric vehicles. There is a particular concentration in London, but also in places such as Dundee. We have 125 rapid charge points per 100 km of highway, compared with the EU average of 25. In 2018, the UK was the second-largest market in Europe for ultra low emission cars and the fourth-largest market for electric cars, and one fifth of battery electric cars sold in Europe had been made here in the UK. For actual sales as a percentage of the total car market, we were above France and Germany but, as colleagues will know, we were below some of the very high-percentage countries, particularly the Scandinavian nations and others such as the Netherlands. It is the growth curve—the year-on-year growth, albeit from a small base—that is particularly encouraging.

Alongside changes in electric vehicle technology, a lot of other relevant changes are happening in society and the economy. We have been changing the way we shop, and how and where we work, and those things potentially have material implications for the number, type and length of people’s journeys. The product itself—the performance of cars—has been improving. At the same time, the charging technology has been evolving with things such as induction pads. We have the development of autonomous vehicle technology, which is likely to be particularly significant in the future for heavy goods vehicles.

I suggest that the most important change of all is one that has already started: a change in how we buy our own transportation. “Mobility as a service” includes everything from Boris bikes to car clubs. In the car market, it includes the growth of personal contract purchase plans and, significantly, personal contract hire plans. Why do I say that is so significant? Is it not just a way of financing a vehicle? It is significant because it changes the way that people think about the cost of a vehicle. Historically, people would compare the sticker price of a car separately from the monthly running cost, but with different types of paying for mobility, the formula has changed significantly.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I thank the right hon. Member for securing the debate, and he is making some important points. He says we need to change the way we do things. Does he agree that we need a modal shift away from cars and towards less carbon-emitting transport? Buses are key, and we need to shift bus pricing to invest in that sort of transport. If two or three people are travelling together in Sheffield, it is cheaper for them to get a taxi than to go on a bus. Does he agree that we have to change that by investing properly in our bus services?

[Damian Hinds]

As ever, the hon. Member makes an important and incisive point. A modal shift is clearly part of the response to this issue, but it will not be the whole response. As I mentioned earlier, buses are an important factor too, but there will always be a need for domestic passenger transport—cars, as we tend to call them. In a constituency such as mine, which is very rural and spread out, people need cars if they want to go to work. Making cars as environmentally friendly as possible, in terms of both carbon emissions and air quality, is an important goal.

It feels as though we are on the cusp of some quite significant change or what might be called a watershed moment. With the conversion to electric vehicles, however, we are up against some quite significant challenges from a consumer perspective. The first is cost. There is a gap between the cost of electric vehicles and the cost of internal combustion engine vehicles. Although that gap is narrowing all the time, however, I do not think that, in general, the sector or the public sector has yet made the clear and compelling case for how close those costs are—looking not at the purchase price, but at the total cost of ownership over the car’s lifetime—as well as it could have been made.

The second challenge is so-called range anxiety—“What happens if I leave home and can’t get back again because the battery runs out?” That is a perfectly good, rational fear, part of which will be addressed by improvements in infrastructure. As an aside, although scientists would say that there is no benefit to having a spare battery, and that we should just make a bigger battery, I wonder what the psychological effect might be of having one.

The third perfectly rational worry is about the car’s residual value, particularly as a result of battery degradation. That is particularly rational, given what we have been told over the years about mobile phone and laptop batteries— we have been told, “This is the generation that will not lose any of its performance,” and it has never turned out to be true. Again, if the car is not owned in the same way, that worry should be somewhat dissipated.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making valid points about the roll-out of electric vehicles, but in Norway sales of electric vehicles is hitting 60%, which shows that it can be done and the anxieties can be overcome. Is it not a matter of looking at what Norway is doing and how its Government have incentivised electric vehicles and helped consumers get over any such anxieties?

[Damian Hinds]

That is perfectly worthwhile and reasonable. In preparation for this debate, I looked at countries such as Norway and other Scandinavian countries. It is usually instructive to start with the more comparable countries—those of a similar size and complexity, with a similar industrial base, traditions and so on—but the hon. Gentleman is quite right to identify that Norway in particular has a high penetration rate of sales, which is also linked to very high differences in the taxation regime.

I want to talk briefly about the shift to electric vehicle technology and what I would say is overwhelmingly a consumer acceptance challenge. The shift in the way people own cars, towards personal contract hire, is a great opportunity to convey how the whole-life cost compares for different groups of consumers, rather than comparing the sticker price of one car against another. It is also a way of allaying fears about residual value and battery performance. Allied to that, when it comes to cost, it would be helpful—I realise this is not in the Minister’s gift—for the Treasury to give a clear forward view on the vehicle excise duty regime so that people can project into the future.

Clearly, these technologies eventually have to be subsidy-free. It has to be business as usual, so subsidies will have to be withdrawn, but doing so smoothly will be of great benefit to the industry and the consumer. The experience from elsewhere shows that if subsidies are suddenly withdrawn, there tends to be a massive spike in demand just beforehand, followed by a return. That is obviously not good for meeting production schedules.

On the infrastructure network, there is a lot that the Government can do through a mixture of regulation and their convening power. We need to do better and go further on full roaming and interoperability. We can do a lot better on the visibility of charging points. There has been a lot of focus on visibility to users of electric cars, but I am actually less worried about them right now than everybody else. The point is that to get consumer acceptance, non-users of electric cars need to know that there are plenty of places to charge them.

[Ben Lake (Ceredigion) (PC)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making a very important point. It is especially important in rural areas, such as those that he and I represent, that people who have not looked at electric vehicles in the past know that it is feasible for them to make that shift.

[Damian Hinds]

That is absolutely right, and showing it on sat-nav tech is important. There are some good sat-nav applications, such as Zap-Map, but it is difficult to guarantee that such things are absolutely comprehensive. There is some old-fashioned technology that could be improved, such as common signage. National brand partnerships mean that people know that whenever they go to any branch of supermarket X, if it has a car park, they will always find a minimum of x number of charging points.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is making a powerful speech about the importance of electric cars and how we meet our net-zero targets. Does he agree that we cannot escape the fact that electric vehicles are themselves pregnant with carbon? A huge amount of carbon goes into manufacturing them. One of the best and most effective ways to meet our net-zero target its not to use vehicles at all, and to ride bikes as much as possible, particularly in urban areas such as Cheltenham. Just 2% of our journeys are on bikes; in the Netherlands, it is closer to 35%.

[Damian Hinds]

My hon. Friend is not only an advocate for walking and cycling but, in his high-vis jacket, a very visible advertisement for it. He is absolutely right, and that is another type of modal shift. Holland is in a slightly different position, in that it is a lot flatter than this country, which makes a huge difference. That should not take away from the fact that there are plenty of places in this country—London is one of them—that are pretty flat, and where there could be more cycling. Throughout our country, there is an opportunity for more walking and cycling. Those things have great benefits beyond decarbonisation, in terms of health, fitness and being outdoors.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

To echo the point made so well by the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk), something like 80% of journeys are less than 2.5 miles. Therefore, if we can make a modal shift, so that that type of journey is made by bike, on foot or by public transport, we will make a huge difference.

[Damian Hinds]

I will let that point hang in mid-air because, like the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk) and the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Ben Lake), it is spot on. Those things are all part of the mix.

On electric vehicles and the infrastructure network, there is quite a spread in the concentration of publicly available charging points in local areas. That is partly because some areas have more on-street parking than others. Some have more off-street parking, and we would expect more private charging points there. The conventional wisdom would suggest that we should look at the places that have a low concentration and try to get them up. Actually, I think there is an argument the other way: places that already have quite a high concentration of charging points benefit from network effects, and we could concentrate on building up the number of electric vehicle users there. They are in very different types of places. London has a significant concentration, but so does Milton Keynes, Dundee, Oxford, West Berkshire and South Lakeland. A wide variety of places have relatively high concentrations of charging points relative to the population.

On regulation, I hope that the Minister will be able to say more about the required availability of charging points in new-build homes. I also hope that he will say something about electricity tariffs and ensuring that all domestic consumers can benefit from lower-cost electricity overnight, when the market rate is cheaper, in order to charge vehicles. I think this is outside the remit of the Department for Transport, but if fleet buyers create an extra surge of demand for electricity in one particular area, who bears the cost for upgrading the kit?

Most important of all on the issue of consumer acceptance is the fact that the product has to be in the consideration set. Whatever other cars consumers look at buying or hiring, they should at least think about an electric vehicle. Therefore, just getting people behind the wheel of one of these cars to try them out is a great opportunity. I wonder about the potential of a mass test-drive campaign across the country.

We should also think, perhaps less ambitiously, about the role of the dealer. We have concentrated an awful lot on manufacturers and consumers, but we have not thought much about the car salespeople.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Damian Hinds]

I am not sure how many colleagues intend to speak, but I have taken quite a few interventions and did not plan to go on quite so long. I will take my cue from Ms Nokes, but am very happy to give way.

[Lilian Greenwood]

The right hon. Gentleman spoke about the importance of ensuring that people think about purchasing an ultra-low emissions vehicle when they buy a car. Many people buy second-hand cars, a lot of which are ex-fleet. Does he agree that if the Government want more fleet purchases, they should consider their own fleet buying? Ensuring that fleet managers buy ultra-low emissions vehicles will, in turn, feed the second-hand market. The Government have an important role to play as a large fleet operator.

[Damian Hinds]

The hon. Lady tees me up with precision and grace. I was just coming on to the role of Government and the wider public sector. The Government car service has bought a lot of electric vehicles. Something of premium significance is what I would call totemic fleets. Seeing police officers driving electric vehicles has quite an effect on people’s perceptions of the performance of those cars.

Most of all, we need debate, conversation and analysis centred not on the machine and the technology, but on people and the different segments of the population whom we need to persuade to take up electric cars. We need to think about who the first target is and, although fleet buyers are an obvious and important segment, beyond that, should the target be drivers who have the highest mileage per year, or drivers who change their car most often? Evidence from consumer surveys suggests that it is much easier to persuade someone to get an electric vehicle as the second car in a two-car household than as the first car—we need to think about that. The requirements of commuting and the school run, for example, are very different.

I have spoken for longer than I anticipated, but I will briefly mention something slightly off-topic that could reduce the overall number of journeys. In the last few years, there has been a big growth in home shopping, with vans driving around delivering parcels, some of which are very small, to people’s homes. I welcome the e-cargobike initiative, which seeks a modal shift to electric bikes for the last mile of deliveries, but I wonder whether we could be more ambitious. Amazon lockers are fine for Amazon, but they are a proprietary facility. Our massive network of post office retail outlets has potential as a hub and spoke system for home shopping purchases to be dropped off and collected, which also bring much-needed business and footfall to post offices. That was slightly off-topic, so I will return to the broader point.

This country has an important and special role to play in decarbonisation. As well as domestic action, we have a role through international development and climate finance. We showed great leadership in Paris for COP 21, and we have in COP 26 another great opportunity to convene and make global progress.

So much can be done locally. Many councils are doing innovative things, including my own in East Hampshire, with walking and cycling initiatives, plans to plant a tree for every resident and local housing development, particularly in the town of Bordon. Like colleagues in the Chamber, I have local groups in my area that show remarkable leadership, starting with children. I am always impressed that schoolchildren are showing thought leadership on climate change. We have great local groups, such as the Alton climate action network and, soon, the Petersfield climate action network.

The greening campaign began in my constituency back in 2008, and was all about helping individual families and households to know what simple and practical things they could do to help tackle climate change. The campaign eventually spread to 100 towns and villages far and wide. Colleagues may disagree, but in terms of civic society action on climate change, East Hampshire is perhaps the most active area in the country. Members of Parliament can play a really important role to make those things happen.

We should recognise success in decarbonisation in the UK, while acknowledging that we need to step up our efforts. We must never underestimate the scale of what we need to do—I doubt that anybody here in Westminster Hall is likely to do so—but we should not suggest that nothing has been achieved, because if we do that, people begin to feel disheartened and we will lose public confidence and engagement.

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Damian Hinds]

I am sorry, I had better not.

People need to know that there is a big problem, but we are making progress and need to accelerate that progress. They need to know that we can and will do what is necessary. Ultimately, countries like ours need to do more than our fair share because people look to us for leadership. We had our industrial revolution first, so it makes sense to have our decarbonisation revolution first too. Transport must be at the heart of that.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

South West Trains

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Mr Hollobone, especially as you are fresh from your doughty defence of parliamentary prerogatives in the main Chamber yesterday.

My constituency is home to a large number of commuters. Every day, more than 22,000 residents of Elmbridge commute to London for work. That represents roughly 38% of the borough’s work force—no small proportion. Many rely on the rail network, which means travelling with South West Trains. As a commuting MP, I know first hand what the service is really like.

The number of people using the railway has increased sharply in recent years. Reflecting national trends, the number of recorded journeys to and from stations in Elmbridge rose by 78% between 2002 and 2010. The most recent figures from the Office of Rail Regulation reveal that, in the financial year 2010-11, 11.6 million passengers used the various Elmbridge stations.

With that in mind, the quality of the service provided by South West Trains is an important issue for local residents. The latest figures published by the consumer watchdog Passenger Focus are disappointing. In autumn 2012, it received 31,500 responses to its national passenger survey. South West Trains was rated the joint-worst train operating company for providing value for money, with just 37% of respondents expressing satisfaction. By contrast, Merseyrail achieved a 70% rating for value for money, and Grand Central achieved 73%.

There are various reasons why so many passengers do not feel they get value for money. For one, overcrowding has worsened. In 2011, the most recent year for which information is available, the company’s morning services ran at 4.1% over capacity, up from 2.8% in 2008. In the evenings, they ran at 2.4% over capacity, up from 1.7% in 2008.

Some services are much worse. According to Department for Transport data, the South West Trains 7.32 am service from Woking to London Waterloo, which I regularly take, is the second most overcrowded service in the whole country. It normally runs at 64% over capacity, carrying 471 more passengers than it is meant to.

The punctuality of South West Trains services has stayed flat over the past five years. On average, a commuter will experience at least one late train per week, and far more at certain times. On top of that, a spate of signalling problems has caused longer delays. The service is also often unable to cope with what must be described as relatively minor snowfall. Of course, some of that is Network Rail’s responsibility. Unfortunately, Network Rail is pretty hopeless too.

It remains to be seen whether the new alliance between South West Trains and Network Rail—the train company and the infrastructure operator—makes a significant difference in practice. I hope it will. We should bear in mind that, in 2012, 4,232 trains were cancelled, up 39.5% on the previous year.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend share my hope that the alliance between South West Trains and Network Rail will, among other things, elicit some co-operation on looking in depth at some of the capacity issues, particularly on trains into Waterloo? That might be fundamental to addressing some of the overcrowding and overcapacity issues.

[Mr Raab]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He is spot on. Too often, there has been something almost like buck passing on the issue between the train company and infrastructure operator. It is to be hoped that the alliance allows a slightly more coherent, joined-up approach, although I suspect there are limits to what even a more integrated approach can deliver.

The company’s wider performance must be set against a backdrop of sharp increases in fares. Further analysis by the Office of Rail Regulation reveals that season ticket costs for companies operating in London and the south-east rose by 46% between 2004 and 2012, which was just above the national average. Currently, a season ticket between Guildford and London Waterloo costs £3,224 every year. That does not take into account the rising parking charges at stations, an issue that is also the responsibility of South West Trains. Frankly, it is difficult for me to stand on the platform with commuters and residents and to tell them they are getting value for money. I am just not convinced that they are.

Despite rising fares and low customer satisfaction, remuneration at Stagecoach Group, which runs South West Trains, increased between 2010 and 2012 by 8.2% for directors and by 9% for executive directors. The dividends rose by 44% between 2008 and 2012, to 7.8p per ordinary share. That was dwarfed by the one-off dividend issued in 2011, when Stagecoach Group completed a return of value to shareholders of 47p per share. That was worth a grand total of £340 million, including a reported £51 million for the chief executive, Sir Brian Souter.

I appreciate that South West Trains is just one part of Stagecoach Group, but when the performance of South West Trains has been so underwhelming, such figures smack of complacency, if not outright reward for failure. What levers do the Government have under the franchise agreement to press South West Trains to do more to improve the quality of the service and value for money for customers?

Then there is a whole series of questions about the role played by central Government. Under the terms of its franchise agreement, South West Trains pays a premium to the Government for the right to run its services. That was worth 4p per passenger kilometre in 2011-2—the second-highest rate paid by any train operating company to the Treasury. The subsidy paid by South West Trains can be contrasted with the subsidy of 11.4p per passenger kilometre received by ScotRail and the 12p per passenger kilometre subsidy paid to Arriva Trains Wales. Altogether, over the three years to 2011-12, South West Trains paid a whopping £544 million in subsidy to the Treasury— £140 million more than any other train operating company. That is inevitably reflected in fares paid by South West Trains users.

Those figures raise a slew of questions. First, while South West Trains has been the largest net contributor to the Treasury through its premium payments in recent years, other train operating companies in the south-east region were still receiving a Government subsidy. Those included Chiltern Railways and Southeastern. Will the Minister therefore clarify what objective criteria are used to determine which travellers subsidise other lines, how that subsidy is calculated and what can possibly justify the stark discrepancies in the figures?

There is a second range of questions about the regional train companies group, which includes the five train operating companies that received the highest Government subsidy in 2011-12: Arriva Trains Wales, ScotRail, First TransPennine Express, Northern Rail and London Midland. In direct consequence, passengers who use those regional train companies, as classified by the Office of Rail Regulation, have enjoyed below-average increases in the cost of their season tickets.

Let me make a broader point. It is one thing for the Government to seek to control ticket prices in more remote destinations, to prevent them from soaring out of control. However, it is another thing altogether to ask passengers on South West Trains to subsidise below-average season ticket rises in the north, Scotland and Wales, when, as I have made clear, some passengers in the south-east have faced price increases above the national average for their season tickets, in return for crowded carriages and poor service.

That is not just a redistribution of wealth out of general taxation, which understandably and rightly takes place to a degree, but a massive redistribution of wealth from the fares paid by specific commuters using a specific rail service. Can the Minister understand why so many in my constituency, particularly those on low and middling incomes, will find being targeted in such a flagrant manner so unfair?

I suspect most MPs, let alone constituents, have little idea of how their rail services are funded, at least in detail—the mix between user-pays and general taxation—or the criteria being deployed and implemented for each. I wonder what steps the Government are taking to correct that frankly lamentable lack of transparency—which is inherited, I hasten to add—over a vital element of national infrastructure.

Furthermore, it seems reasonable to expect that at least some guarantee can be made that a certain proportion of the premium payments received from busy lines will be reinvested back into those routes. Can the Minister give me any transparency or clarity on that? What assurance can he provide passengers on South West Trains that the premium payments they make are properly reflected in Government investment in the line on which they travel?

Looking at the big picture, the independent review of the rail network by Sir Roy McNulty in 2011 highlighted the extent of the underperformance of the rail network nationwide. Its calculations suggested rail costs in the UK are 20% to 30% higher than they need to be. That is a major cause of concern. The report concluded that up to £1 billion of savings could be made by 2018-19, without any reduction in services. That echoed the analysis of the Office of Rail Regulation in 2010 that revealed Network Rail was up to 40% less efficient than the top European rail infrastructure managers.

I welcome the fact that the Government accepted the McNulty recommendations to end the micro-management of rail operations and give operators greater flexibility to meet passenger demand. I also welcome Ministers’ commitment to achieve the efficiencies McNulty outlined. I would like to ask for an update on the progress made in delivering—not just accepting—the McNulty recommendations. I think a lot of people listening to the debate will not understand why so much is being paid in rising rail fares when such an important element of national infrastructure is lagging behind that in Europe and, to some degree, other developed economies.

I raised the point about the impact on commuters and residents and the sense of value for money. However, there is a broader question about the competitiveness of our economy, in a vital area of infrastructure. There is a huge amount of emphasis and focus on airport capacity and there is some on roads. I fear we are failing to grasp the nettle on this important element of our national infrastructure, with serious knock-on implications for the economy.

Beyond the set of issues that the McNulty Report looked into, does the Minister have any wider views on whether and how more effective competition could be introduced, in order to promote the innovation and value for money that rail users want, and that Britain sorely needs if we are to compete economically in the 21st century, with rising competition from Latin America through to Asia?

To what extent are the changes in systems and the innovation that we want being stymied by militant union leaders such as Bob Crow, who periodically relies on brinkmanship and outdated strike laws to hold the system, and the public, to ransom? I know that Network Rail has quite a broad, serious and substantial programme of reform. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s view on the extent to which that is being held up by the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers and other unions.

In conclusion, South West Trains provides vital services in Elmbridge, but also well beyond. I recognise that running a train service across ageing infrastructure in a time of rising demand is not an easy challenge. There is also the compound effect of rising fares on customers, commuters and residents at a time of rising energy prices and the standard of living becoming a real issue, particularly for the squeezed middle. There is not a huge amount of extra money in the pot. In fact, we are trying to be as frugal as we can, given the huge debt problem inherited from the previous Government.

However, it is important that the managers and directors of South West Trains hear the message loud and clear that their passengers demand better value for money. Commuters pay a substantial and rising share of their income to get to work. It is right and understandable that they expect a fair deal in return. That must comprise reasonable fares, trains that run on time and decent travel conditions. Government must also play their part by providing a coherent overarching framework that promotes innovation and productivity, and transparency in relation to the funding arrangements, in particular by ensuring that passengers on South West Trains are not treated—let us talk frankly—like a cash cow to subsidise other parts of the network, without getting a fair deal in return such as investment in the line and the level of fares.

To sum up, it will take a combined effort to ensure that my residents, all those travelling on South West Trains and the country as a whole get the rail network that we need for the 21st century.

Cycling

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Thursday 23rd February 2012 Westminster Hall

[Neil Carmichael]

That is a very good point. People parking on double yellow lines is infuriating enough, but if someone is blasting down on a bike and they find that a car is parked on a route that should normally be used by cyclists, that is disgraceful, selfish behaviour and inappropriate in any respect. I thank my hon. Friend for the intervention.

The one thing that I want to encourage through my speech is parking and riding. I am talking about people taking their bike in a car to the vicinity of where they want to be, getting rid of the car outside the town and using their bike to go about it.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend about that, but I wonder what assessment he has made of the potential for getting people out of towns and cities, particularly this city, and into the surrounding countryside on the train, either with their bike or renting a bike at the other end of their journey. They could get out to the South Downs national park or the new Shipwrights way in East Hampshire and experience the wonderful countryside that my hon. Friend has talked about.

[Neil Carmichael]

My hon. Friend cannot have read my speech, because I have only some notes, but he is absolutely right. It is so important to encourage people to take their bikes on trains to get them to the places where they need to go. That is partly about integration. I hope that the Minister takes that point on board, because I have seen students and others struggle with the idea of taking their bike on to a train. Rail franchise operators, especially in the south-west, might want to note that.

As I was saying, park and ride is certainly worth considering. I shall make one final observation before I get to my main point. In Stroud, we have a lengthy canal, and one of the great things about the regeneration of that canal is that it is providing fantastic routes for cyclists. My wife and the rest of my family often use them.

My main point is this. Many people have been talking about road design and so on. It would be a good idea for the Department for Transport to take a close look at what happens in Europe, because in Europe there is much more integration between road users—between cyclists and car drivers. It is important that we get that point across. Most of my cycling is done in France, where cyclists can get about with considerable safety because the roads are properly designed to accommodate them. We would do well to note the importance of properly integrating road planning with the interests of cyclists.

Oral Answers to Questions

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Thursday 10th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Villiers]

There is no suggestion of doing that. The point of the McNulty review is to find a way to deliver current services—and, one hopes, more services in the future—at a lower cost to the taxpayer. It is vital that Sir Roy comes up with good proposals for doing that if we are to relieve the burden on the taxpayer and the fare payer.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

7. What recent steps he has taken to encourage cycling as a means of transport.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

We have announced a local sustainable transport fund of £560 million over four years, which we are committed to even in these difficult times. We are also committed to funding Bikeability cycle training for the remainder of this Parliament.

[Damian Hinds]

Will my hon. Friend join me in welcoming the opening this coming weekend of the first sections of east Hampshire’s super-scenic highway for cyclists, walkers and riders, Shipwrights way, which will link in with the rail network for commuters and recreational users of the new South Downs national park?

[Mike Penning]

We welcome that project, and I understand that there are proposals for an extension, for which I am sure that the local authority will bid to the local sustainable transport fund for funding.

Portsmouth-London Railway Line

Damian Hinds Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt (Portsmouth North) (Con)]

I wonder, Mr Speaker, whether on your outreach trips up and down the country you travel by rail. If you do, I wonder whether you like to look at your speech en route and to travel with your elbows. These are pertinent questions should you intend to come to Portsmouth to give us the benefit of your wisdom, for it seems that South West Trains expects its passengers not only not to work while travelling in standard class but not to have elbows either. A report commissioned by South West Trains on the ergonomics of its class 450 carriages, which are now on half the Portsmouth-London line, found that 59% of people, when their elbows are taken into account, will not fit into the seats. My admittedly anecdotal evidence shows that most people prefer to travel with their elbows most of the time. The only sense that one can make of that bald admission by South West Trains is that it explains why there are no arm rests on those services.

Allow me to describe the conditions in the class 450 Desiro carriage. The seats are arranged in a two-plus-three formation, so there are five seats across the width of the train. Each seat is 43 cm wide, but, crucially, there is no space between them. They are hard, they have no arm rests and the seat closest to the window is compromised by the heating channel encroaching into the foot space. Earlier today, I took the liberty of measuring out, on this very Bench, 129 cm from the Gangway and invited three hon. Friends to attempt to squeeze themselves into the space they would have for a 90-minute journey on the London-Portsmouth line. I am sorry to say that if my hon. Friends had been in a class 450 carriage, my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage) would have been 90% in the aisle. I hardly need to remind the House that this is the usual seat of my hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Sir Peter Tapsell), who, as we all know, is not a man to be crowded. We are accustomed to regular games of sardines as we squeeze ourselves into a Chamber with too few seats; if we cannot do it, what hope do others have? Crucially, we are content with this arrangement; we approved of the decisions of our predecessors to create a Chamber deliberately short of seats, but Portsmouth commuters are not content to play sardines every day.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. Is she aware that this issue affects not only Portsmouth commuters but many of my constituents in Liss, Liphook and Petersfield, and that the same trains are used on the Alton line? Sometimes it is an issue not just of comfort but of health and safety—people with back trouble and so on.

[Penny Mordaunt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I know that he has done a tremendous amount of work liaising with his constituents, especially those who commute to London, on this issue. He might also be aware that in 2005, when the 550 operated from Waterloo to Basingstoke and Alton, the Rail Passengers Council—the forerunner of Passenger Focus—said that the 450’s seating arrangements were

“only reasonable for the route on which they were run”—

that is, not suitable for a mainline service. Why, then, were those unsuitable carriages introduced to the Portsmouth-London line on 65% of the services in October 2006, before being scaled back again to 49% late in 2007? South West Trains claims that it met an urgent need to address overcrowding on the route, based on the 2005-06 passenger figures—a full 12-carriage rake of 450s having 140 more seats than the 10-carriage 444 rakes. Those passengers-in-excess-of-capacity figures for peak times showed that of the 23 services operated with the 444 carriages, only five showed standing figures of almost 100 or more, the worst being 272.