East Midlands Rail Franchise

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 11th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Jones]

The answer is quite straightforward. Stagecoach bid for the east midlands franchise, it was not compliant and, as part of the feedback that it received, was told that it was not compliant, which it knew, on the other bids as well.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

The rail industry, through the Rail Delivery Group and with the support of the trade unions, wrote to the Government some weeks ago with alternative proposals to deal with the issues around the pension scheme. Will the Minister tell us his response to those proposals and say whether they were considered in this important decision?

[Andrew Jones]

I received a letter last week from the rail industry on that matter. That is still being considered and we will respond in due course, but that is not part of this award. The franchise has been awarded on merit to the strongest bidder, and we should be looking forward to the passenger benefits that will flow from that award.

Oral Answers to Questions

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Andrew Jones)]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. Through the next east midlands franchise, passenger services on the Derby to Crewe corridor will benefit from increased capacity, which means that trains will operate with at least one extra carriage to help satisfy local demand. This will be supplemented by additional early and late services, and improved Sunday services. The bids for the next east midlands franchise are currently being considered. Ministers just do not see those bids during that stage of the process, but as soon as there is news, I will share it with him. Of course, we will be delighted to meet him, as I always am. I cannot promise to bring my cheque book just at the moment, but I look forward to discussing the issue further with him.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

Dockless bike hire schemes could have been transformative, but too many of those schemes have crashed and burned, leaving a trail of destruction behind them. Despite repeated calls from across this House, the Government have not regulated. Will they soon act?

[Jesse Norman]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that question. Of course dockless bikes are a source of interesting innovation, and it has been important to see how that innovation is playing out. They can be regulated under a variety of local government powers. As we see further developments, we will continue to look at this. They will also potentially be subject to the discussion in respect of the micro-mobility review we are doing at the moment, through the future mobility strategy.

Regional Transport Infrastructure

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Ryan, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) on securing the debate.

I chair the all-party group on the east of England. Although I fully understand the arguments made by colleagues about disparities in regional funding, and I know that some will argue that the south in general does well, I ask people to look a little deeper, particularly at the east. The east of England region has enjoyed significant growth over the years and is a net contributor to the Treasury, with great innovation hubs, but there are substantial challenges, almost all based around transport and housing. Despite considerable effort in different parts of the region, that continues to be a struggle. I pay tribute to those who developed the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough independent economic review, but still the answers often depend on unlocking the investment levers that sit in the Treasury.

I want to flag up a couple of positive suggestions that might help. Since coming to the House, I have strongly supported the London Stansted Cambridge Consortium and the West Anglia Taskforce, which has made a powerful case for rail improvements in the corridor, including sections of four-tracking. The case remains strong, but there are still considerable challenges to achieving it, so it is worth looking at other options.

I have been told that digital signalling across the eastern region could make a huge difference. The cost is £1 billion—a lot of money—and this does not necessarily make old, unreliable infrastructure any more reliable, but it can make better use of what we have. I am told that it could increase reliability and frequency, such that it could take up to 10 to 12 minutes off the Stansted to Liverpool Street journey: completely transformative in terms of our transport connections within the region.

For understandable reasons, I take Cambridge to be the centre of our transport hubs within the region, and I want to see better connectivity to the east. I also want to look west, having already looked south. There is much debate about the Cambridge-Milton Keynes-Oxford corridor, or CaMKOx, as it is likely to be called. To make the best use of it we will need much better regional co-ordination, but observers as esteemed as Sir John Armitt have pointed out that the plethora of organisations along the arc makes that extremely difficult.

I am grateful to England’s Economic Heartland, which has suggested that a geographically-specific national policy statement might be considered. Such statements were established by the Planning Act 2008 and are introduced for major projects. It might be innovative to use a geographically-specific NPS to bring together infrastructure requirements, but that is not without precedent and there is a sound legal basis. As a member of the Transport Committee that looked in detail at the Heathrow NPS, I really can see the value of such a process. I would welcome the Minister’s comments on that suggestion.

As we see the northern powerhouse, the midlands engine and other regions of the country come together to campaign on these issues, it is clear that this is a question not just of investment, but of how the investment is made. I do not want to see the south and the east get left behind in this new world.

Rail Infrastructure Investment

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 17th January 2019 Westminster Hall

[Lilian Greenwood]

The hon. Gentleman is a very valued member of the Select Committee. While new traction, hydrogen and battery potentially have a place on our railway, it is clear that they are not sufficiently developed to be a proper replacement for electrification. There is some doubt about whether they will ever be a suitable replacement for electric trains, particularly on inter-city journeys operating at higher speeds. He is right to raise concerns about the time that might be taken for parts of the country to see improvements to their services, particularly if there is a continued aspiration to use bi-mode technology. While that can provide some benefits, it undoubtedly also has a significant impact on operating costs. When passengers are very concerned about their fares raising, building in long-term costs seems a wise approach.

While it is now clear that the electrification schemes that had been planned were undeliverable, the Railway Industry Association and others were convinced that, for now, electrification remained the optimal solution to train traction. The case for electrification is particularly strong on heavily used routes, balancing significant benefits to passengers with the wider environmental benefits and long-term cost efficiency. Our report called for electrification to be delivered through a long-term rolling programme in which the Department, Network Rail and the wider industry learn the lessons of earlier schemes and strive to reduce costs. Do not throw the baby out with the bath water.

A key driver of Government investment in the rail network is their commitment to reduce carbon emissions. In February 2018, the Government called on the industry to produce a vision for how it will decarbonise with an initial response due in September last year. The Government response to our report confirmed that an industry taskforce, led by Malcolm Brown, is taking this forward. Have the Government received this taskforce’s report on how to decarbonise the rail system? If so, what does it say and what are the Government doing with it? David Clarke, technical director of the Railway Industry Association, has said that to achieve the Government’s aim of decarbonising UK railways by 2040,

“electrification must be one of the prime options for intensively used routes”.

The Government accepted our recommendation that it should engage with RIA’s electrification cost challenge initiative. The Department committed to producing a report on cost-effective electrification by this summer, but has said that it will remain agnostic about the best means of securing rail enhancement and that it does not expect proposals for new enhancement to begin with a predefined solution such as electrification. I am afraid it is clear that the Government have no plans for the future electrification of the railways.

I ask the Minister to update us on the Government’s work to produce a report with the industry on cost-effective electrification. When we conducted our inquiry, we heard that there was considerable interest in third-party-funded electrification schemes on the midland main line. We recommended that those proposals should be fully considered as an alternative to the proposed bi-mode solution.

The Government accepted our recommendation and said that they would fully consider

“Any proposals made to government or Network Rail about private sector solutions on the Midland Mainline that could provide benefits in addition to the passenger benefits that are being secured by the Government.”

What discussions have the Government had with third parties about proposals for electrifying the midland main line, and how will the improvements for passengers of the enhancements that will be going ahead compare with the improvements that would be delivered by electrification?

Some hon. Members present represent areas of the north covered by the transpennine route. The upgrade of that route is expected to include some electrification, but those enhancements have been considerably reduced since the then Chancellor announced in 2016 that the Government were

“giving the green light to High Speed 3 between Manchester and Leeds”.—[Official Report, 16 March 2016; Vol. 607, c. 961.]

There are serious concerns that the upgrade will not be fit for purpose for freight trains, and that because only part of the line will be electrified, the route will need bi-mode trains, which will build in higher operating costs for years to come. Are the current proposals for the transpennine route upgrade in line with the advice from Transport for the North? If not, why not? I note the letter to the Secretary of State for Transport from the operator of Humber, Mersey and Tees ports on 7 January, which says:

“It is of increasing concern that the Department for Transport and Network Rail are undervaluing our industry in the North and undermining the economic goal and objectives of the Northern Powerhouse; it will only make the productivity gap between the North and South of England even greater and devalues further the role of Transport for the North.”

It is concerning when the industry feels that the transpennine route upgrade, as it is currently considered, will lead

“to an utter dependence upon the M62 for Transpennine freight traffic for at least another generation.”

We have talked about some of the problems experienced as a result of planned railway improvements in the past five years, which have triggered successive reviews of the planning and delivery of enhancements and led to a substantial change in the way future investment in the railways will be considered and delivered. The next five-year control period will focus on operations, maintenance and renewals, the volume of which will increase substantially, not least because of the number of renewals that have been postponed from the current control period.

Following those postponements, the greater focus on maintenance and renewals in control period 6, which starts in April, is necessary and welcome, but there are long-standing concerns in the industry that investment in renewals has been lumpy, stop-start and boom and bust. We have heard that the level of uncertainty about upcoming spending could have knock-on effects on the wider industry’s confidence to invest in its workforce, skills and innovation.

In our report, we called on the Government to work with Network Rail, the regulator and the industry to look at the ways in which investment could be smoothed out from the start of control period 6, throughout that period and beyond. The Government accepted that recommendation, so I ask the Minister, how has the Department worked with the industry to smooth out investment for the upcoming control period?

Instead of forming part of the five-year control periods for Network Rail investment, future enhancements of the rail network are now subject to a separate process. The new rail network enhancements pipeline is intended to support a continuous planning approach and move away from the overly rigid five-year cycle that was linked to railway control periods.

The Government have signalled that they expect more railway enhancements to be market-led proposals brought forward by third parties. We heard that there was likely to be interest from third parties in bringing forward such proposals, but it was not clear to us that Network Rail had the structures or culture in place to support such third parties to engage and participate in the planning, delivery, funding or financing of the railway.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

I echo the earlier comments of my colleague on the Transport Committee, the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), about my hon. Friend’s skill in presenting her arguments and chairing the Committee. Does she share my concerns about the market-led proposals? In my part of the world, we have had some major proposals for east west rail, which has been promoted by the National Infrastructure Commission, but there is considerable confusion about whether that railway will be privately run, as the Secretary of State has suggested, or whether there is a plan B. I am not convinced that there is and I am interested in my hon. Friend’s views on that.

[Lilian Greenwood]

It is wonderful to see so many members of the Select Committee here. My hon. Friend raises an important point about what will happen if market-led proposals do not provide the opportunities that the Department hopes. I will touch on that in a moment.

In November, the Government said that they had received 30 responses to their call for ideas for market-led proposals to enhance the railway, but that they could not make an announcement about individual schemes because the proposals had been submitted in confidence. How have those market-led proposals progressed since November, and do the Government expect any of them to be delivered, including the one referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner)?

There was significant support for moving enhancements planning away from the control period process, and we support the intention behind the rail network enhancements pipeline, which should ensure that the planning mistakes made over the past five years are not repeated. However, we also found a substantial risk that the rush to deliver poorly planned and scoped schemes in the current period could be replaced by a different problem—a slowdown or interregnum in new enhancement projects.

That is why we called on the Government to provide a clear set of strategic priorities for rail infrastructure investment in each region, and to outline the specific projects likely to be available for third-party investment. The Government refused to set priorities for each region, so I ask the Minister today to set out the Government’s priorities for rail enhancements over the next five years.

We were also concerned that the process outlined by the Government did not provide the reassurance and certainty on future investment that the rail industry is looking for. We said that more transparency about the enhancements pipeline and decision-making processes in the Department was needed. That is particularly true if the potential for a substantial increase in third-party investment is to be realised. The Government accepted that recommendation and said that they are

“committed to transparent policy making and intend to make clear public statements”

as investment decisions are taken at each stage of the pipeline. So far, however, we have seen no such statements.

The Railway Industry Association has said:

“The visibility of enhancements remains a major concern for rail suppliers. There is now a lack of an obvious enhancements pipeline, with no construction-ready schemes in the Rail Network Enhancements Pipeline…published in 2018.”

Last week, I asked the Department how many rail enhancement schemes were being considered as part of the rail network enhancements pipeline, and what stage each proposal was at. Again, the Minister told me that the Government

“are committed to transparent policy making”,

but failed to answer any points of my question. That means that, almost a year after it was set up, the Department has yet to reveal a single proposal being considered as part of the pipeline. We are none the wiser about what, if any, future enhancements the Department is considering, let alone planning.

In response to my question, the Minister also said:

“Network Rail…will continue to provide public updates on the progress of enhancements in the portfolio”,

but it is not clear at what stage of the pipeline proposals will enter the portfolio. Can the Minister confirm at what stage enhancements will be included in Network Rail’s enhancements delivery plan? It seems to me that it is only those that have reached the delivery section of the pipeline that will be exposed in that way, and we will not know what is in the development and design parts. Will there be any transparency of proposals before the decision to deliver them?

Although the Government have accepted a number of our recommendations, as I have outlined, their response to our report was disappointing in several regards. It seemed to show an unwillingness to engage with some of our key conclusions and recommendations.

The Association for Consultancy and Engineering agreed with our assessment of the Government’s response, telling us that the Government had

“failed to meaningfully engage with the expertise provided by industry, and the practical recommendations outlined in the report”.

It told us:

“As evidence givers, it was disheartening for ACE to see the DfT and the ORR”—

that is, the Office of Rail and Road—

“pay such little attention to the solutions proposed by the committee, including dismissing some of them outright.”

I have asked the Minister to respond today on some of the points where we felt that the Government’s response to our report was less than satisfactory. I hope that he will take the opportunity to expand on the Government’s response, for the benefit of both this House and those in the rail industry who were as frustrated as we were by the Government’s response.

To conclude, although our report welcomed much about the Government’s—

--- Later in debate ---

[Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mr Evans. Out of courtesy, I must apologise to hon. Members in advance just in case—I emphasise “in case”—I need to leave before the conclusion of the debate, due to another commitment. I pay tribute to the Chair of the Transport Committee, the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), for the case that she has just put, and to all other members of the Committee for their work on “Rail infrastructure investment”. I have a copy of the report and have looked at it, and it is fair to say that it covers a wide range of issues, which the hon. Lady spoke about in her very good and detailed speech.

As the Minister will know, rail infrastructure is incredibly important, not only to my constituents in Witham but to the entire east of England region. I will start by paying tribute to him, because he has recently become the Rail Minister. I had the privilege of working with him previously, in his other incarnation in the Department for Transport, so it is great to see him back there. I thank him and his officials for giving me some time recently, to discuss not only some of the issues that I will raise today, but some of my concerns, as well as the developments that are taking place on the Great Eastern main line and some of the big investment opportunities that we would like to see for the region.

The Minister will know from our recent discussions about the work of the Great Eastern main line taskforce, which I currently chair and which is putting forward the case for strategic investment in rail infrastructure. Back in 2014 we submitted to the Government a business case for a package of investments—I have it here: “exhibit A”—which I have no doubt the Minister is fully versed in, because I know he has seen copies of it. This business case from 2014 discussed the potential to deliver over £4 billion of gross value added to the economy, to support thousands of new jobs, and to help meet the transport needs of the population and housing growth in the region.

Of course, this business case was put together in 2014 by all the Members of Parliament from Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk. It received a great deal of Government interest and time, with interest shown by the former Chancellor, the former Prime Minister and various Ministers, including the former Secretary of State for Transport, my right hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (Sir Patrick McLoughlin).

As we have seen in the east of England, and are still seeing, there is so much opportunity for economic growth in our area, with lower housing costs than in other areas. We are on a commuter line and we are accommodating a greater number of commuters and families who travel to London, and not only in Essex but across the eastern region. We are very proud of that. Families choose to enjoy the enormous benefits of living in the villages of my constituency and elsewhere in the region, while being able to work in London as well. I have to say that that is because of the Government’s wider investment in other sectors, including education—we have some amazing schools now—and quality of life is obviously a key feature too.

Of course, Essex and the east of England are fast-growing parts of the country, and they are strategically placed to deliver new jobs and economic growth. Look at what we have going on. We have world-leading businesses and centres of innovation: the Essex knowledge gateway, the University of East Anglia, Essex University and Cambridge University. They are all great hubs of intellect, innovation, jobs, economic growth and entrepreneurship. We have a diverse range of businesses, such as financial services, logistics, manufacturing, construction, modern bio-tech and science. We also have key international transport hubs, as my hon. Friend the Minister is well aware, including the key ports in London Gateway, Tilbury, Harwich and Felixstowe, and our airports at Stansted and Southend.

In Essex we have great business voices, which were instrumental in making the case for investment in our rail back in 2014. They include the Essex chamber of commerce, which made the business case, outlined the GVA of rail investment, combined the numbers and showed the economic growth that we can deliver outside London, and the new opportunities that will come our way. The Essex economy is already touching £40 billion in GVA, and obviously since 2010 the number of entrepreneurs has risen and we see business growth getting stronger and stronger. I see how much our businesses are already doing, and the jobs and prosperity they create. I am incredibly proud to see the enterprising spirit they have shown. Like me, they look forward to a future in which we can continue to build upon their contributions. They have a positive outlook for the future, not only for Essex but for the whole region.

We know that one of the key factors for growth is strategic investment in our roads and, in particular, our rail, so that we continue to grow and secure long-term investment. Of course, such investment means work on key roads and economic corridors, such as the A12 widening scheme and the dualling of the A120, but it also means investing in our rail network. Our rail network across the east of England has suffered from severe under-investment for many years. The Chair of the Transport Committee made some very important points today. She spoke about regional disparity with regard to the north of England, but of course my taskforce in the east of England has demonstrated that even notional calculations of regional finance mask regional disparities. Commuters on the Great Eastern main line, and particularly Greater Anglia commuters, are net contributors to the Treasury through their rail fares. Of course we want to see some of that money coming back out.

The Select Committee’s report quite rightly raised the whole issue of rebalancing rail investment to ensure that it is spread across the country, which I have consistently pushed for. I agree that we need to invest more widely and look at ways to support schemes in the regions and economic centres. Of course, our whole economy needs to become much more efficient, and investing in rail infrastructure across the country will help to deliver that.

However, I emphasise to the Minister that although it seems on paper that investment has been skewed towards London, partly because of the high cost of Crossrail, it is also important that we see a rebalancing exercise that does not come at the expense of excluding investment opportunities that would deliver high levels of value for money and help to drive billions of pounds back into the whole of the UK economy. Of course, we are set to benefit from approximately £2.2 billion of investment through the control period 6 process, but I stress that that investment is to cover maintenance, operations and renewal.

Paragraph 80 of the excellent report, on page 28, focuses on the historic lumpiness of renewals investment. Investment that covers maintenance, renewals, and so on goes to patch things up, and the graph on page 28 shows that the lumpiness of expenditure goes across the various control periods. We want to ensure a consistent level of investment that covers maintenance, so that we are not simply patching things up. It is a welcome commitment. From our perspective, the new refurbishment —new trains, funds for renewal, and repairs to bridges, embankments and signalling to deal with level crossings—will of course be beneficial. However, that is no substitute for a clear strategy of strategic investments in new infrastructure so that we can have a high-performing railway to support our region. That is the right thing, and it is what our commuters all want.

[Daniel Zeichner]

The right hon. Lady is making an excellent contribution on behalf of the east of England. I wonder whether she agrees that there are significant possibilities for bringing forward digitalisation of the railways. I am told that a huge amount could be done through digitalisation to better address capacity constraints, and that a relatively modest investment in global terms could be transformational in the east. My concern is that, looking ahead over these very long periods, we may well find that technology has moved much more quickly and we have not taken best advantage of those technological changes. Does the right hon. Lady share that concern?

[Priti Patel]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I was planning to touch on the significance of digital railway. I mentioned efficiency, and the whole point is how we can use new technology to drive efficiency. Everything is part of a process, and new technology can trump things that have previously gone on. There are also new opportunities for digital signalling. For example, on the Great Eastern main line we are working with the Department for Transport and the Minister to continue to make the case for digital signalling, and part of the case that the GEML taskforce is putting forward is compelling. I know that the Minister is looking forward to receiving the business case that we are currently working on. In previous discussions and meetings he has heard me speak about the pipeline business case that we are working on, and how we will build on the 2014 business case and enhance the numbers, the financials and the key programmes that we should be putting in place. We will revise that business case based on the latest figures for growth, the economy and business, and we will demonstrate that investing in rail in the east of England will help the Government to reach their ambitious targets, not just for housing but for economic growth and regeneration.

Those projects are going to be vast. They will include the introduction of a passing loop in the vicinity of Witham town, right through the heart of the Witham constituency; the redoubling of Haughley junction; improvements to the Trowse swing bridge; re-signalling south of Chelmsford; and improvements to Liverpool Street station. Combined, those investments will increase capacity on the network and—importantly for rail users in my constituency—reduce delays. Through the new franchise to 2025, we will benefit from a new fleet of rolling stock, and the first of those trains are due to enter service very soon. We want to make sure that when they come in we do not have disruption and can get the benefits of efficiencies. Over £1 billion of new investment has been secured following the recommendations of the GEML taskforce, which were actioned by the Government. Of course, we want that infrastructure to complement new trains and maximise the benefits, as well as include those key infrastructure projects.

As the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) has said, service improvements on the Great Eastern main line can be delivered through digital railway technology, along with the long-awaited development of Beaulieu Park railway station—Chelmsford parkway, as some call it—with three or four tracks and platforms to facilitate future growth in service opportunities. MPs, councils, businesses and commuters across the region are united behind that vision for rail service across the east of England, and I hope that the Minister and the Department will continue to work with us and back us, working with friends in the Treasury, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to get that vision fully funded. It is about having an integrated approach across Government to delivering improvement in our rail service and our network, which matters when it comes to wider Government funding.

The Transport Committee’s report comments on the investment process and the enhancement pipeline, which was announced last year and which the hon. Member for Nottingham South spoke about. When the Minister replies, I hope that he will talk about how those schemes can go through that pipeline so that we can be efficient in getting the right kinds of decisions.

I will touch on a few other points very quickly. One—this will also interest the hon. Member for Cambridge—is investing in rail more widely in the region that covers Stansted. Stansted is the third busiest airport by passenger numbers in the country, and the second largest by freight. It has capacity for more flights, and given the capacity issues at Heathrow, we should be encouraging more travel to other airports. Of course, connectivity through the rail link from Stansted to London and further is a major barrier to growth, and our former colleague, the right hon. Sir Alan Haselhurst—now Lord Haselhurst, following his ascension to the other place—is working on proposals to improve connectivity through the West Anglia Taskforce. I commend his work on the issue. We often talk about Crossrail 2 presenting an opportunity for connectivity in that part of the eastern region, and I would like the Minister to provide any updates he can in his concluding remarks.

I thank the Chair of the Transport Committee for the opportunity to speak today off the back of the Committee’s excellent report. I also praise the Minister for his attention to rail, obviously from an east of England point of view. I ask him to bring together all the levers of Government—not just those in his Department—to catalyse funding across other Government Departments in order to unlock economic growth and opportunity across the regions of our country, so that we can use our rail much more strategically. Rail investments have been a catalyst for economic growth.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Jones]

My right hon. Friend is as wise as ever. Once a Treasury Minister, always a Treasury Minister, I suspect. The point about bringing things together was, I think, at the heart of such things as the national productivity investment fund, which is about making sure we have, and control, the levers to drive economic productivity—productivity being at the heart of the UK’s future economic success. I see rail working alongside Departments to open up opportunity—commercial, residential, trade and so on. I see that future of collaboration as the way we will take forward some of our projects across the network.

[Daniel Zeichner]

In the interests of transparency, I am trying to understand the pipeline process. The Minister knows of the huge frustration in my region about the delays with the Ely junction. How do we find out where in the pipeline such a project stands now?

[Andrew Jones]

One simple way, of course, is to ask the Minister concerned. I will find out exactly where we are with the Ely junction and respond to the hon. Gentleman. Significant works are planned around Ely, but there are a number of junctions around Ely—I have reviewed a map of them in the past few weeks—and I will need to remind myself specifically which one that might be.

Let me go back to the changes to CP6 from CP5, which create a direct contrast. I think it is fair to say that in CP5 we overcommitted to projects at too early a stage, meaning that later we had to change the scope or cancel altogether, increasing the uncertainty and the impact on the industry’s ability to plan for investment and delivery. The RNEP sets out the Secretary of State’s four priorities for rail enhancements across the country, and we will not progress any enhancement that cannot clearly demonstrate how it meets at least one of them. It is important that those priorities remain applicable to the whole country so that the network can be improved fairly and as a whole.

I welcome the fact that the Transport Committee’s report shared a similar approach to our own in promoting engagement with third-party proposals for rail schemes. On 20 March last year the Department published its guidance for market-led proposals and launched a call for ideas for the same. That call for ideas ran between 31 May and 31 July last year. We received 30 responses. DFT officials have assessed all of them and will now work with promoters to move their schemes forward, although I stress that they will still be market-led. We will be transparent about schemes as and when they progress into the pipeline.

The question was whether this has stalled. No, it has not. We certainly want to see new entrants into the market and ideas being brought forward. I am absolutely clear that not all ideas to drive forward our network will come from SW1—that would be silly.

Oral Answers to Questions

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 22nd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ms Ghani]

The hon. Gentleman seems confused. When you wait for a bus, three come along at once: over £13 million of bus service operators grant has been made available to Manchester; the transforming cities fund has given the mayoral authority £312 million to drive up intercity connectivity; and, moreover, the Mayor has the authority to ask for franchising, but he has not—I suggest that the hon. Gentleman and his Mayor just jump on the bus and ask for it.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

Late-running and cancelled buses cause just as much misery for people as late-running and cancelled trains. We talk a lot in this Chamber about the trains, but it is also happening on the buses at the moment. The Transport Committee has heard about the problems in Bristol, and there is misery on the buses in Cambridge. What assessment has the Minister made of bus punctuality, particularly the effect of bus driver shortages?

Taxi and Private Hire Licensing

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 13th November 2018 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Task and finish group report on taxi and private hire licensing.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David, and to see the familiar faces of those who have been discussing the issue for a long time. I pay particular tribute to the former Transport Minister, the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes), who instigated the task and finish group’s review in this very Chamber some 18 months ago.

I will praise quite a few people in my speech, but the main praise must go to Professor Mohammed Abdel-Haq, who has brought together a diverse range of voices from the industry and users to produce what my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field) has called “a superb report”. Not everyone will agree with all of it—that is partly why we are here to debate it—but we all agree on our thanks to the professor for producing it.

Let me give a couple of quotations from the report that set the scene rather well. The professor’s introduction says that he trusts

“that Parliament and the Department will lead the cultural change which is necessary to ensure that passengers, workers, operators, and neighbouring authorities are treated fairly. I look forward to the Government’s prompt response to this report in order to maintain the momentum for improvement. Undue delay would risk public safety.”

If one message comes out of our debate, I hope that is it: undue delay would risk public safety.

We have only an hour and a half, so I will not go through the report line by line; that needs to be done on another day when legislation is introduced. However, perhaps there is a little to be said about how we got here, or possibly about how we did not get here. I am afraid that the Government have to take some responsibility.

In paragraph 3.7 on page 16, the professor refers to the Law Commission’s 2011 review and notes that

“it is deeply regrettable that the Government has not yet responded to the report and draft bill which the Commission subsequently published in 2014. Had the Government acted sooner the concerns that led to the formation of this Group may have been avoided.”

That seems to me quite a strong charge, and quite a strong point. However, we are where we are. Looking back tells us something, but we have to concentrate on looking forward. I very much hope that we will get a strong response from the Minister, whom I congratulate on his recent promotion; perhaps it was not in circumstances that he would have sought, but I commend his predecessor for her very principled decision.

Many thanks are owed to those who contributed strongly to the report, some of whom are in the Gallery today. I highlight the work of the Licensed Taxi Drivers Association, GMB, Unite the union, the Suzy Lamplugh Trust, Guide Dogs, Transport for London—Helen Chapman and Val Shawcross have both spoken personally to me about the issue—and the Local Government Association. I must also praise the cross-party approach that has been taken, and I have had good help and support from the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani), in promoting my private Member’s Bill.

I want to say a little about where my Bill has got to, how the report refers to it and how I hope it will go forward, and then pick up on one or two of the more controversial issues in the report that bear discussion. First, however, let me say how extraordinary the industry is and how dramatically it has changed, even since the Law Commission report—to be honest, if the Government ever finally responded to that report, I suspect that they would find it was way out of date.

We have seen huge changes in the past few years, with changing technologies and huge numbers of private hire vehicles and taxis on our streets. I do not think everyone quite realises the scale of the industry: there are now 285,400 licensed taxis and private hire vehicles and 361,500 driver licences, of which more than 137,000 are in London. The number of private hire vehicles in London has increased by 120% since 2005.

Behind the numbers, there are many different stories, and a point that I have consistently tried to make is that they are not always the same. The all-party parliamentary group on taxis, chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting), produced a report last year that stimulated the debate that I referred to earlier—an excellent report, but, as I said at the time, somewhat London-focused. That is not to say that London is not hugely important, but any solution that we suggest has to work not just for London, which operates under different legislation anyway, but for the rest of the country. That is part of the challenge.

[Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the reports published by the all-party group and by the task and finish group indicate that we need new primary legislation to adapt to the changes in the taxi and private hire sector that he is outlining? That legislation should include national minimum standards to ensure that we protect passenger safety and security.

[Daniel Zeichner]

I will come on to that point, because one of the headlines in the report is that we need consistent national standards; the question is the extent to which they can be tailored or lifted to suit appropriate local circumstances. First, however, let me say something about accessibility issues. Our London taxis have a fantastic record: all 21,000 are wheelchair-accessible, but the story is not the same across the country. I am told that in metropolitan areas outside London, 83% of taxis are wheelchair-accessible, but in some rural areas the figure falls as low as 15%. One of the challenges that we face is making our taxi and private hire fleet more accessible to people throughout the country.

There is a lot of variation in the approach to disability awareness training, which only 41% of local authorities require for taxi drivers and only 38% require for private hire vehicle drivers. Over the past few years, the percentage of local authorities that require taxi and private hire vehicle drivers to complete training on the subject of child sexual abuse or exploitation has risen to 70%, partly in response to some very sad incidents in some parts of the country. However, that leaves nearly 100 licensing authorities that still do not require drivers to undertake such training.

I became interested in the subject when I had the privilege of serving as a shadow Transport Minister for a couple of years. When I later had the opportunity to introduce a private Member’s Bill, I chose to try to do something about safety issues, on which there is cross-party consensus. Since I introduced my Bill—the Licensing of Taxis and Private Hire Vehicles (Safeguarding and Road Safety) Bill—some 18 months ago, I have had the opportunity to discuss the issue with enforcement officers and officials from Knowsley to London and with taxi and private hire firms from Brighton to Manchester.

[Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important and timely debate. The Select Committee on Transport recently visited Bristol, where we saw problems with traffic congestion, including the number of private hire vehicles from outside the city that were causing additional air pollution and congestion problems. He cited huge figures for the number of private hire vehicles—is there not an overwhelming case to cut the number outside London?

[Daniel Zeichner]

My hon. Friend and I had a fascinating trip to Bristol with the Transport Committee yesterday and, from that, I observe that the same kinds of issue crop up all around the country in different forms. For some years before I came to the House, and then as a constituency Member, I tried to understand the complexities of the taxi and private hire industry in my own constituency in and around Cambridge. Exactly the same issues arose, with licensing standards in a city often set at one level, but many private hire vehicles came in from an adjacent area. We heard that yesterday in Bristol, where the vast majority of private hire vehicles are actually registered in South Gloucestershire, creating a conundrum for the people and local council of Bristol. That goes to the heart of one of the questions, and to the point made earlier by the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers), which is that of national standards.

[Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. The point that he is making is very pertinent to South Yorkshire, where we had the terrible child sexual exploitation scandal in Rotherham. As a consequence, both Rotherham and Sheffield have very high licensing standards for our taxis, with CCTV required in Rotherham. However, operators and licensed drivers from other areas can come in and completely undercut those measures, as well as all the efforts to tackle the prevalence of grooming gangs and their ability to exploit young children in South Yorkshire. I add my voice to the cross-party call for national minimum standards, which are vital to prevent such exploitation.

[Daniel Zeichner]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That was one of the issues that I spent much of my time discussing with people—trying to get that balance, with very high standards that we should rightly expect where there are specific problems, but without damaging an industry in other areas by putting undue costs and burdens on it, which could leave people in some areas with no taxi or private hire vehicle service at all. It is a challenge, yes.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate on the report. Equally, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting), because he has done a lot of work on the matter, which I have discussed with him. At the same time, we should pay tribute to the ex-Minister, the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes). We have had a number of meetings and, in all fairness, as we are being cross-party, he was the man who initiated the report in the first place. He should get a lot of credit for that.

Having said that, we have a similar problem in Coventry, and there have been a number of incidents between the private hire taxis and drivers from Uber—let us be frank about that. To my way of thinking, the report should be implemented in full. People tend to forget that, originally, it was the coalition that weakened the legislation, but we are being cross-party, so I will not go too far down that road. Often, some of the drivers work 12 to 13 hours a day, just on a minimum. In fact, a documentary set in the west midlands was on a couple of weeks ago, in which someone had gone out and spent the day with a driver, who was just making ends meet. The situation is not fair on drivers, who should be given proper employment rights, like everyone else, and the zero-hours contracts should be stopped. I hope that the Minister will address that and put it right, whether it takes primary legislation or not.

In actual fact, the black cab is made in Coventry. Two years ago, everyone was paid off, but a new investor came in and the business is now thriving. But this situation threatens that, so lots of jobs are at stake as well.

[Daniel Zeichner]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. It is so valuable to hear the different stories from around the country. Some years ago, I visited Coventry and talked to some of the taxi drivers represented by Unite about exactly some of the issues he raises. However, although the issues and problems are similar, they are not the same everywhere and will not require exactly the same solutions. That is the conundrum we face. Nevertheless, I pay tribute to the report, because issues such as the ones he mentioned—a complex mix, especially in relation to rewards and employment protection for drivers, which I will come on to—are part of the package.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman is being very kind in giving way. There is a lot in the report about the influence of new technology on how the taxi fleet should operate. He might be coming on to this, but what impact does he think new technology will have on the taxi industry?

[Daniel Zeichner]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for mentioning that. I fear that were I to divert into a disquisition on the impact of new technology it would be very lengthy. I will say only that it has clearly had a huge impact over recent years and that, as so often with new technology, the impact is mixed. The new app-based technologies have, without doubt, not only created great opportunities for some but led to difficult working conditions for others. Some people, for example, question where some of the operators pay their taxes—no pun intended—and so on. A whole range of issues have come up, and the challenge for legislators and this place is to make some attempt to keep up. That, I am afraid, is one of my criticisms of the Government. As the years have passed, the legislative void has opened more and more problems, leaving local authorities and enforcement officers with considerable problems. We have seen people out there in the real world respond quite quickly to technological change whereas, quite frankly, we seem to struggle to set the right frameworks.

Going back to the report, one of its strengths is that in a relatively short document of 30 or 35 pages it has managed, in language that most of us—and probably the wider world—can understand, to summarise a range of issues in a readily understandable way, including sections on working practices and changes in technology. I suspect that if a Committee were to take it forward, or legislation was necessary, it would probably end up being a much longer document, as the Law Commission document of some years ago was. It is, however, welcome that we have a comprehensible and comprehensive account that deals with a number of the issues. One of the key recommendations is national minimum standards, and—this is the key point, in recommendation 2—we could build on them.

My Bill looked at the other side of the coin, which is enforcement. Anyone who goes out with taxi or private hire drivers, or with enforcement teams, will pretty quickly realise that the situation is very complicated and, indeed, it is made much more so by the examples that we have referred to—drivers might be licensed somewhere else, and enforcement officers can apply rules only in their own area. To put it simply, the system is clearly not working. My Bill would have made it possible for local enforcement officers to enforce in their area against drivers from another area plying their trade. I am pleased that recommendation 9 in the report makes a similar proposal.

My Bill also suggested a national database. In the existing situation, sadly—we have seen some notorious incidents—someone can lose their licence in one area but still apply to a different authority for another. Because a local authority has no way of knowing about any previous record, it can issue another licence to a driver who, because people work out of area, can be back on the same streets where the local authority had tried to protect the public against them, sometimes within a matter of weeks. The intention of my Bill was therefore to create a national database; local authorities would record their refusals, revocations and suspensions, and any authority issuing a new licence could check that database.

That might sound like a complicated process but, through the work of the Local Government Association, such a database has been established—not at a huge cost; at a fairly minor one—and it is run by the National Anti-Fraud Network. The problem at the moment, however, is that it is voluntary, which probably means that, as so often is the case, all the people who comply and do the right things take part, whereas the ones whom we seek to catch out, or to check up on, might not. One of the recommendations in the report is that that should become mandatory.

I was extremely grateful to the Government and the Minister for supporting my Bill, and it was worked up very effectively. Sadly, as sometimes happens to a private Member’s Bill, it fell foul of one or two individuals, which is a great shame, because we might well see incidents over the next few months or years that could have been prevented had the legislation gone through with all-party support. But we are where we are and importantly, the recommendation is in this report. The question is whether the Minister can find a way of taking it forward.

Of the 34 recommendations, many of which I think we would all agree with, I would like to comment on one or two. We have already talked about the national minimum standards. The report retains the two-tier approach to private hire vehicle and taxi licensing that sometimes has been questioned. The cross-border issue, which has already been referred to, has been one of the most controversial in recent times. It is directly affected by new technologies that make the place-based legislation that we inherited and have been using for a long time seem woefully out of date. One of the strengths of the report is that the chairman was good enough to allow members of the committee to put their comments in the appendices at the end, so we can see the differing views.

The report comes down on the side of a recommendation that was also made by the all-party group last year—that journeys should start or end in the area in which the vehicle operator and driver are licensed. There are some downsides to that; in some places that could make life a little more difficult and complicated, but on balance it seems to be the right way to go. I am sure that others wish to comment on that. Some say to me that implementing that could create great difficulties, including unnecessary driving to and from destinations; potential damage; problems for chauffeur services, particularly to airports—that is a very extensive trade, although most of us hope it may be diminished to try to improve our air quality and surface access to airports. It does not seem to be beyond the bounds of possibility to find a way through those difficulties. A close reading of some of the comments in the appendices shows perhaps a growing consensus that that basis could be achieved without necessarily causing the complete set of problems that is claimed.

The other controversial proposal, recommendation 8, is a cap on private hire vehicle numbers. Those who have followed these debates for many years will know that there was an extensive period of discussion about whether there should be a cap on hackney carriages. My city is one that has been through both, and the cap has been widely considered to be for the best for everyone. The evidence in the report from Helen Chapman on behalf of Transport for London puts it very well, and my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame Morris), who is no longer in his place, made reference to it, following our visit to Bristol yesterday. The congestion levels in our cities are partly attributable to the significant rise in private hire vehicles, and to other issues as well. To tackle the air quality issues, local authorities need the opportunity to consider a cap. There is not a blanket suggestion that numbers will be capped everywhere; there would have to be a public interest test and it would have to be part of a wider strategy. It seems that that, too, is the way forward.

My final general comments are on workers’ rights. The report rightly says that there are bigger, wider issues that go beyond the taxi and private hire industry. Obviously, there are proposals from the Taylor review. This is a controversial and contested area, and I certainly would not suggest that the issues are simple. I fear there is growing evidence that some of the rates for drivers, even using the new technologies, are being forced downwards. There is not exactly an equal balance of power for potentially vulnerable workers.

Action should be taken; I want stronger support for drivers. The suggestions made in the report are driven by passenger safety, which is very important, but it has been pointed out to me by people who work in the industry—Unite, Steve McNamara and others from the LTDA—that some of them have been tried before. Having a tachograph in a cab is different from having it in a lorry or a bus—there is much more waiting time in a cab. We will have to find other ways of dealing with that issue, rather than those suggested in the report. I agree with Steve McNamara that if drivers were better recompensed and wages were not being driven so low, there would be less incentive to work long hours. We need evidence—that may require more work—to know exactly where long hours are leading to safety issues. In the end, the overriding issue has to be safety.

I return to where I began. In the introduction I quoted, the chairman clearly says that there must not be further delay and prevarication. He says:

“Undue delay would risk public safety.”

That is a strong message. There have been too many years of delay. This is a hugely important industry for many people, especially in areas where public transport can no longer provide the kind of 24-hour service that people need to get to work and to go about their business. It is a fantastic industry, with a proud tradition and an important future. The problem is that a few people sometimes abuse the licensing system and create some of the awful incidents that there have been in some parts of the country.

We owe it to the industry, to the people working hard in it and to passengers to ensure they are safe. In this report we have an opportunity to move swiftly to implement a range of things that are not contentious and to take some decisions—as Governments ought to do—on some of the things that may be more contentious. There would be widespread support for a Government who implemented this report pretty well in full. That would make our country safer and the industry much more secure, and would offer it a vibrant future.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Daniel Zeichner]

I am very grateful to the Minister for giving me the chance to wind up. I thank everyone who has contributed to a full debate. We have not been able to cover every single issue, and I want to raise a couple of things that were not touched on: the use of CCTV, and the anxieties, if we have larger licensing authorities, about potential clustering of vehicles in city centres.

I would like to finish by echoing the wise words of the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes). He said that he was not in favour of disruption. I think that I am more disruptive than he is, but one thing that we would not want to disrupt is things that are precious, and the most precious thing is safety. That is the theme that has come through the debate this afternoon, which is why I was pleased to hear the Minister promising action very shortly. We will keep him to that promise, because it is very important that we heed the messages coming through from this excellent report—we again thank the professor and his group for producing it—that safety is paramount and we need swift action.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the Task and finish group report on taxi and private hire licensing.

Oral Answers to Questions

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 11th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

Last week, the chief executive of Go-Ahead, one of our major private bus operators, called for a national bus strategy. We have strategies for everything else, so why not for buses?

[Ms Ghani]

I know that the hon. Gentleman is a passionate advocate for buses, and we have met to discuss this issue many times. I am keen to ensure that we are putting the right resources into this and that the people making decisions on bus services are given the right support. This is something that I am exploring and keen to do.

Cycling: Gilligan Report

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 4th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) for allowing me to use a couple of her precious minutes and congratulate her on securing this debate. It is really good that we have the opportunity to discuss cycling in our great cities, even though the debate was triggered by a curiously mixed bag of a report. Unfortunately for those of us in Cambridge, it contains a number of inaccuracies, is rather out of date and misses some key issues for our city. We absolutely agree with the headline—Cambridge is indeed the country’s cycling capital, where cycling is a key mode of transport—but of course more can be done and needs to be done.

The first of two obvious omissions in the report is that it contains nothing about the key issue of bike parking in the city centre. Like many people, I find that I spend as much time looking for a space to leave my bike as I do riding to the city centre. The report gives no consideration to some of the imaginative automated bike-parking systems that have been developed in other parts of the world, as well as in London. Secondly, the report also fails to mention the enormous and as yet largely untapped potential of electric bikes. I love my electric bike—I am a very a big fan of them—and there is much more that can be done.

It is surprising that the report contains no mention of dockless bike-sharing schemes, which have been very much in the news recently. Along with other colleagues, I have had discussions with the Minister about the opportunities and challenges of dockless bike sharing. Unfortunately, in the absence of legislation, councils lack legal powers and are left to clear up any mess made by damaged bikes or cycles left in dangerous situations. Many of the operators believe that we need a regulatory framework—something like a franchising agreement with the local authority—if dockless bike sharing is to become a long-term, sustainable transport solution. In Cambridge, we still have Ofo, although it does not serve the whole city now. In recent weeks, we have seen other such companies withdrawing from Norwich and Sheffield. That cannot be part of our long-term solution if there is no certainty.

Reflecting very briefly on the report, I do take issue with some of the negative comments made about current transport plans in and around Cambridge, where the Greater Cambridge Partnership is working very effectively, not least in developing the Greenways in and out of the city. The simplistic dismissal of a tunnelled metro, when new tunnelling and vehicle technologies finally make such ideas possible in small cities, is just crass. The report also completely fails to understand the needs of many city residents who absolutely rely on good bus services and are unlikely ever to turn to cycling, however good the facilities.

Let me conclude on a positive note. The Greater Cambridge area has invested £18 million of city deal funding on cycling infrastructure and a further £50 million is committed to 2021. Our Labour council has provided strong clear leadership and has supported the wonderful Camcycle, the excellent local cycling campaign which is organising the Cambridge Festival of Cycling this very month. I also hope that the combined authority mayor will put money where his mouth is and use some of the resources from the transforming cities fund on cycling infrastructure. His interim transport strategy statement, published in May 2018, speaks of

“creating new pedestrian and cycle-friendly infrastructure and facilities,”

but, sadly, its list of proposals includes no cycling or pedestrian schemes.

Cycling is already a key transport mode for Cambridge. We are an inspiration and exemplar to others. Now we need the Department for Transport and the combined authority to unlock the resources so that we really can get our wheels in motion and reach our full potential.

Confidence in the Secretary of State for Transport

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald]

My hon. Friend make the point wisely and accurately.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a good speech. Yesterday, members of the Transport Committee sat for many hours interrogating leaders of the industry, both train operating companies and Network Rail, trying to find out who runs the railways. After all those hours, answer came there none. Does my hon. Friend agree that there are two scenarios? First, the Secretary of State is in charge, in which case he should take responsibility; or even worse, he is not, in which case he should be sacked?

[Andy McDonald]

My hon. Friend makes the point very well. We are talking about a dysfunctional railway that is completely and utterly fractured, and that has to be resolved.

Airports National Policy Statement

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 7th June 2018 Westminster Hall

[Lilian Greenwood]

The hon. Gentleman is requiring me to remember all the evidence we heard over many months from many voices. Air quality is undoubtedly one of the key challenges that the Government face in bringing forward these proposals. That is why it formed one of the most important areas in our report; we wanted to have some certainty that the UK could indeed meet its air quality targets at the same time as addressing the need for people to travel by air.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way on that point?

[Lilian Greenwood]

I will have to continue at some point, but yes.

[Daniel Zeichner]

The element of risk in this whole process is an important point. The Committee identified many risks. In the event of a delay or the project not going forward, would it not make sense for the Government to consider using alternative provision where there is capacity at other airports, such as Gatwick and Stansted? There is a real risk with this project and we cannot end up in a situation in which nothing happens.

[Lilian Greenwood]

My hon. Friend made a fantastic contribution to the work of the Committee in developing this report. He is right. There are two issues in relation to his point. First, the NPS is scheme-specific, so if for any reason it does not go ahead, that limits the Government’s options. Having said that, even if it does go ahead in the best possible scenario, it would not be open until 2026. That is why one of our recommendations —I will come to this later—is about the better use we make of all our regional airports and what needs to be put in place.

We welcome the overall tone of the Government’s response to our report, which was published on Tuesday. It is clear that they have, in principle, taken on board much of our report and clearly acknowledged what we were trying to achieve. The Committee still needs to do more detailed analysis of the Government’s response—we want to be sure that the substance matches the rhetoric. I do not believe that accepting our recommendations in principle is enough. Hon. Members need to decide whether we can just rely on the planning process to provide these necessary safeguards and guarantees, to protect communities and passengers. The parliamentary approval stage of the planning process is designed specifically to set the criteria for approval. It should then be up to Heathrow to meet those requirements.

I want to take this opportunity to explain why the Committee made our recommendations. First, we wanted to ensure that the supporting evidence was robust and accurately reflected in the NPS. We wanted to ensure that MPs are well informed. It is impossible to know with absolute certainty what the exact impacts of this scheme will be but, given the political gravity of the issue, we wanted to ensure that MPs were fully informed of the potential scale of costs and benefits.

Although we accepted the Government’s high-level arguments in favour of their preferred scheme, our investigations revealed that the north-west runway’s advantage over the other schemes considered was not perhaps as wide as was set out. In some cases, the comparative advantage to not expanding at all was small. The strategic case for the north-west runway rests primarily on it delivering more routes to a greater number of destinations, and at greater frequencies, than the other schemes. Our detailed analysis of the Department for Transport’s forecasts revealed that the future passenger growth, destination and route offering at the UK level is broadly similar over the longer term, compared with the other schemes. Most of the passenger growth generated from the north-west runway scheme will be accounted for by outbound leisure passengers and transfer passengers, who offer fewer direct economic benefits to the UK economy. The Government’s own forecasts show that business passenger growth is negligible compared with no expansion.

The anticipated growth in connections to Heathrow is a key reason why the north-west runway scheme has garnered considerable support from regions away from London and the south-east, but there is a concern that the Government do not have the policy levers to guarantee that a proportion of the new slots created will be allocated to domestic routes into Heathrow. Given the costs currently anticipated for the north-west runway scheme, there is a possibility that domestic routes from Heathrow would not be commercially viable. It should also be acknowledged that an expanded Heathrow would abstract growth from non-London regions, with over 160,000 fewer direct international flights each year compared with a no-expansion scenario. This is a nationally significant infrastructure project. It must work for the whole nation and not just for London.