First Great Western Rail Franchise

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2011 Westminster Hall

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton) on securing the debate. I share the commitment of the hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck) that the Members of Parliament for the region covered by First Great Western will not be caught out in the franchise renewal, because that was certainly the experience of my constituents, in particular in Melksham, albeit before my constituency was created. Under the current franchise, a popular and well used service was cut to only two trains each way a day, and those trains run at times that are totally impractical for anyone hoping to use them for a sensible commute for a humane working week. I am determined that that should not be allowed to happen under the new franchise, but that instead we will see the franchise get Wiltshire moving and help people in my constituency to use the railways to get to work.

Three key, interrelated factors make a difference to the railway experience and to the potential of the railways to serve my constituents: service frequency, capacity and connections. Connections are an important solution to the conundrum, because they create the opportunity to relieve capacity and overcrowding in capacity bottlenecks and to increase the journey options, thereby disproportionately increasing service frequency for communities. In Wiltshire, we could have a few particular opportunities under the new franchise.

The railways Minister is more than familiar with the TransWilts rail service, which I have raised with her on countless occasions in the past 18 months. I am sure that she was as pleased as I at the success over the summer of the TransWilts rail partnership trial of extra Sunday services between Westbury and Swindon via Melksham. The take-up and the feedback on the service were good, and next year the partnership hopes to extend the trial to between May and mid-September. The TransWilts campaign group has comprehensive research behind it, demonstrating not only the need for more services but their cost-effectiveness and the strong support from the business community in our area for improved services through Melksham. The franchise specification process is an ideal opportunity to build upon that work; no line in the south-west region is better prepared for an expansion in services, having enjoyed them so recently, until the current franchise.

I was encouraged by the Government’s willingness to listen to us about the problems of overcrowding in my area, and chiefly by the prospect of additional capacity on the Cardiff to Portsmouth line which runs through Bradford-on-Avon in my constituency. There was certainly progress last Monday, when First Great Western announced two extra carriages on the 07.30 from Cardiff to Portsmouth, but only as far as Bristol Temple Meads. Unfortunately, that will not benefit Bradford-on-Avon passengers, who are still frequently unable to board trains or, even when they get on a train, to get a seat. That problem is not unique to Bradford-on-Avon or to my constituency; I often travel on First Great Western on Sundays and it is astonishing that even on Sunday afternoons it is not uncommon to find that one cannot get a seat on a First Great Western service into Paddington. Demand locally has risen well above the national level of growth, and I implore the Minister to consider overcrowding once more in further franchise specifications. I would appreciate her reassurance that in the Great Western franchise renewal process, bidders’ proposed efficiency measures will not be looked upon favourably if they involve cutting carriages and reducing seats. Franchisees should be required to deal with overcrowding not by pushing down demand with increased fares but by increasing capacity. Central Government can help by simplifying the rolling stock allocation system.

I have corresponded with the Minister about the opportunities presented by the new franchise, in particular on the prospect of services between Oxford and Bristol. I welcome the Chancellor’s support in the autumn statement for services between Oxford and Bedford, which will improve connections between west and east as far as Cambridge. There is a wonderful opportunity, on existing railway infrastructure, to extend the potential of such services with an Oxford to Bristol service under the Great Western franchise. Quite aside from the benefits of linking such high value-added university economies, there is also the opportunity of the reopening of Corsham station, which would be served by trains on that route.

Moneys have been set aside under section 106 agreements for redeveloping Corsham station, but progress has been slow and a real risk is that the developments seeking to contribute to improved railway infrastructure will have happened too long ago to draw upon. A commitment on Corsham station early in the course of the new franchise would be welcome. It should be noted that the road infrastructure often benefits from section 106 agreements. Substantial development of housing and employment sites around Melksham in my constituency has included funding for distributor roads and even a small bypass but, in that time, not a penny has been contributed to the rail infrastructure on which those same homes and businesses will depend.

I want to touch on the role of local authorities in the franchise renewal process. For a Government who believe in localism, it is important to ensure that the democratic voice of local areas is heard when determining the new specifications for the franchise. Liberal Democrat councillors in Wiltshire recently tabled a motion noting the opportunities that the stakeholder consultation presents for improving the county’s rail network. They welcomed the Minister’s encouragement to the council to

“discuss the potential for a Corsham station and a new Oxford-Bristol service with all bidders for the franchise”.

Welcoming the motion, the holder of the council’s public transport portfolio noted that, traditionally, the council has had nothing to do with the railways but that it now had clear objectives to include in the new franchise a number of the local schemes which I have mentioned this morning.

We could make the improved TransWilts service permanent. The council is bidding for £5 million from the local sustainable transport fund. I hope that the Department will look favourably on the innovation of that bid, and its value in connecting three mainline services across the county and therefore dramatically improving the options for journey planning for my constituents by linking services calling at Westbury, Trowbridge, Melksham, Chippenham and Swindon on existing railway infrastructure. The council is certainly determined to support an Oxford-Bristol service, which would allow new stations at Corsham and—I am sure this will interest hon. Members from Swindon who are present—Royal Wootton Bassett, which would be more accessible for some of their constituents than existing services at Swindon.

I am encouraged by the council’s willingness to engage with the Government, and I am keen to hear from the Minister how she plans to reciprocate that willingness to engage, and what mechanisms she is considering to incorporate in the specification process the views and recommendations of local authorities, and of the hon. Members who have come to this debate. I look forward to hearing her thoughts on that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Thursday 10th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Norman Baker]

I am happy to confirm, as I mentioned a moment ago, that we are continuing with the Access for All programme. The hon. Gentleman will be interested to know that Stalybridge station in his constituency is part of that programme and that construction work is expected to start on site in June 2013 as part of a £1.8 million project.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

As you know, Mr Speaker, last night I presented a petition signed by 1,200 residents of Bradford-on-Avon hoping to keep their station’s ticket office, where footfall was over 400,000 last year. In the light of the McNulty report, will the Minister review category E stations for possible upgrade to category D, so that they would at least retain their ticket offices for part-time hours?

[Norman Baker]

As my hon. Friend will know, the Minister of State is involved in a fares and ticketing review. We are determined to ensure that people are able to buy tickets and access the railway network in a fair way, which might include ticket offices, better arrangements for automatic sales and access through the internet. The point he has made is a valid one and I will pass it on to the Minister of State.

Public Transport (Disabled Access)

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Wednesday 12th October 2011 Westminster Hall

[Dr Huppert]

Indeed. We need not only to build such facilities, but to ensure that they are open, accessible and functional. That is a very important point. There are too many instances in which that is not the case. We have a particular issue in Cambridge, although it does not involve transport. A developer wants to move the disabled toilet up a few floors in a shopping area. Of course, that would make it very hard to get to.

I will not say too much about the concerns over the reductions in relation to discretionary fares. That issue has been highlighted, and I share the concerns expressed. However, as well as the detailed changes and the infrastructure changes, which are extremely important—

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I know that my hon. Friend is keen to proceed, but infrastructure is certainly a concern of the Chippenham Accessible Rail Transport group. The group and I have thrown our weight behind Network Rail’s attempts to bring disabled access to Chippenham railway station, but Brunel’s railway is considered a heritage asset. I hope that my hon. Friend and the Minister would agree that when the council consults heritage groups about changes to achieve decent disabled access on our public transport, we need those groups to get behind such proposals and work with the industry to make them a reality—they should not be allowed to become a block to progress.

[Dr Huppert]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. From my role as co-chair of the Lib Dem transport group, I know that he campaigns very hard for his railways and I congratulate him on that. We have had a number of conversations on what is a real issue not just for his station, but for a number of others. There is a tendency for some heritage groups and people who work in that area to take the attitude that nothing must ever be changed, which is simply not what we want. Freezing all old buildings as they were in the ’70s is not always the right thing to do. The point of public transport is not to be a beautiful monument, but to enable people to travel, and travel easily. I hope that we see more movement, which is happening with much of the heritage sector, towards the idea that we need to come up with creative solutions that enable things to work, as well as, we hope, to look good and continue that heritage. That is a very important point, and there are a number of other points that one could talk about in relation to infrastructure.

As well as the piecemeal changes and infrastructure changes, which affect disabled people on a personal level, there is the issue of planning a long-distance journey. The sheer lack of information and the complexity involved in finding information make it very hard. If someone wants to travel between two places that they do not regularly travel between and that are a long way apart, rather than within a city, they have to check the accessibility of every service, or they risk taking a tube, a train and a bus and then finding that they cannot take the next bus. It is extremely hard to plan a long-distance journey. There is a huge need to ensure that there is linked-up availability of information, whether that is available online or in other ways—different people want to use different methods—so that people know that their entire route is accessible and they will not end up at the end of the line with the problems that have been identified.

This has been a very useful debate and it has been good to see mostly cross-party consensus on what we need to do. I look forward to the Minister explaining what we will be doing to deliver on the hopes and aspirations that we all have. In some ways, the issue is simple: we need to ensure that the transport service that we provide as a nation is fit for everyone. I look forward to hearing how that will be achieved.

Oral Answers to Questions

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

The Prime Minister has agreed that the growth review should include a review of public procurement in the UK, and that work is now under way. We will look at what happens in other EU countries that are similarly constrained by EU procurement rules, and we will look at best procurement practice in large commercial companies to maintain long-term best value. We will certainly look at the opportunities provided by, and the appropriateness of, including socio-economic criteria, where appropriate.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I am sure that the Secretary of State will want to join me in congratulating Invensys, based in my Chippenham constituency, on winning a multi-million pound signalling contract on the Thameslink project. A world leader in train-signalling technology, Invensys has in the past experienced some difficulty in winning domestic contracts. What steps is the right hon. Gentleman taking to ensure that recognition of UK engineering talent is more commonly the rule rather than the exception?

[Mr Hammond]

The general rule is that we would expect to evaluate bids for contracts on their merits. Companies such as Invensys and, indeed, Bombardier have won many contracts on their merits, but we will look at whether we should, in appropriate cases, include wider socio-economic issues and factors, which some other EU member states routinely do in their public procurement processes.

Train-building Industry

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Tuesday 12th July 2011 Westminster Hall

[Nigel Mills]

I am grateful for that intervention. I suspect that part of my constituency is a bit nearer to Derby than my hon. Friend’s, but I accept that we are all in the same area and that we have people who commute to work at the Bombardier plant and work in the many support industries in the area and who are threatened by the decision.

It is worth starting by saying that the area has a proud history with the railway industry, ranging back to the beginning of the industry in the early 19th century—I believe that production began in Derby in about 1839. The Midland Railway Centre is in my constituency. It is a tremendous attraction and I urge everyone to come to visit it, but the last thing we want is for our whole railway industry to become a museum. We want a thriving and growing train-building industry. We have had a thriving and growing train-building industry. Passenger numbers have been up year on year for ages and we expect that growth to continue. There is no reason why we cannot have a viable industry in the UK if the Government support it.

I want to cover two areas in my speech. The way to help to preserve and enhance the train-building industry would have been to give Bombardier the Thameslink contract in the first place. I want to talk about whether there is any way that the Government can still reconsider that decision. We are only at the preferred-bidder status stage and have not signed on the dotted line for the whole contract, so I think there is still scope for that to happen. I also want to look at how we can go forward in a better way to procure such contracts more sensibly, so that there is a level playing field and our only UK train-building company has a fair chance of winning contracts. That may not be how we see the current process.

The award of preferred-bidder status on the Thameslink contracts to the Siemens consortium rather than the Bombardier one has led many of my constituents to think that the Government have taken leave of their senses. We have rightly spent the past year talking about the need to focus on the manufacturing sector to provide the skilled jobs we need and to rebalance the economy away from London and the south-east. My constituents have told me that they thought that that meant the midlands and the north, not Germany.

The industry is very skilled, with a huge number of skilled jobs of exactly the kind that we want to attract. The award of this huge £1.4 billion contract to Siemens rather than Bombardier means that we are talking the talk, but not walking the walk. Frankly, my constituents cannot understand why we do not spend taxpayers’ money in a way that produces the overall best benefit to the economy of the UK as a whole and the Derby area. We now risk losing not only the 1,000-plus jobs at Bombardier, but the jobs in the supply chain, which are much harder to quantify at this stage.

My first question for the Minister is this: can the Government reconsider the decision? If not, would she help us to understand exactly why not? We know from Government answers and statements that their view in simple terms is that all they could do was open the submitted bids, compare them to the tender specifications drawn up by the previous Government, work out which one was the most economically advantageous and award the contract. The Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills has commented that the specifications were very narrowly defined and there was almost no doubt who would win.

We understand now that weighting for overall socio-economic considerations was not included in the specifications. Had that been included, it may have allowed the Government to take into account the overall impact of the job losses, the loss of tax revenues, the benefits they will need to pay out and the overall knock-on effect on the economy. We would all much rather that those things were included in the specifications. Can the Minister confirm that that weighting was not included in the contract?

Having realised that, did the Government consider restarting the whole process and saying, “We got the specifications wrong, and if we are to spend £1.4 billion of taxpayer and passenger money, let’s get it right and spend the money properly”? Did they look at doing that? Could they have done it? If not, why not? There is a lot of concern that we are going ahead with so significant a contract, with such significant implications, when the Government do not even seem to think that the procurement process has been handled properly or included all the conditions that ought to have been included.

One reason why Bombardier has concerns is its record with Department for Transport procurement processes. It can win contracts worldwide. It can even win contracts to build trains in Germany. It can win contracts with everybody else in the UK. Out of the 14 bids it made for contracts from operating or rolling stock companies, it has won 11, but out of five bids where the DFT was running the process, it has won none. Is that just bad luck or does it suggest that there is something wrong with how the DFT procures the contracts? Do the Government think that huge DFT contracts are the right way to go about train procurement or should we look at letting the operating or rolling stock companies, which have great experience running such things, be in charge of the process? There is a suggestion that the very structure of the tender process made it hard for Bombardier to win. The phrase used was “bundled design, build, maintenance and finance” commercial structure—I find it difficult to get my head around that mouthful.

It was not a case of looking for someone to build trains and sell them, but a case of awarding a contract for someone to build, provide and maintain trains and keep them on the tracks for the best part of 30 years. It is a hugely complex financing exercise. I am not sure whether we were looking for a train-builder or a bank. One suspects that it is much easier for a huge multinational, diversified conglomerate with a brilliant credit rating to produce the cheapest bid, rather than the group that can build the best trains. I do not know about other hon. Members, but I am not sure that I can predict where I will be in 2045. I will be 70 years old, and I hope I will be getting a state pension by then, but I am not totally convinced of that. It is scary to think that these train carriages will be retired after me, but that is how long we are talking about.

The contract is to maintain the trains and keep them on the rails until 2045 or thereafter, which is a hugely difficult thing to do. How many of us can predict what the currency of many EU nations will be even in a year’s time? How many of us can predict how many major banks will still be solvent in a year’s time? And yet, we are asking the train-builders to come up with a finance package that in effect runs for that long period. How can they do that cost-effectively? The process started in 2008 and the state of the banks was even worse then than it is now.

Many hon. Members are concerned that the private finance initiative resulted in taxpayers paying people to borrow far more expensively than the Government could, and we ended up having to pay for that for 30-odd years. Is there not a risk that that is what we are doing with this? We are in effect locking people into a hugely expensive way of financing something, but if we did it better there might be a cheaper way.

I looked at some of the original tender documents from 2008, and there was an interesting presentation to interested parties in the “Commercial and Financial Overview”. On the financing side, it states:

“Consistent with HMT best practice, the Department will reserve the right to hold a funding competition”.

Have the Government considered that? If the financing costs made it hard for Bombardier to compete in the award of preferred-bidder status, did the Government think, “Actually, financing is a very risky thing for anybody to try and do for this long period. Should we take that out of the process and tender it separately?”? That might have been worth considering.

The same presentation outlines that the accreditation process structure had a weighting of 40% for business excellence and approach, and 60% for technical capability and experience. I do not know whether those weightings were used in the final process, but if they were, it would be interesting to understand how. We would all like to understand exactly how close these bids were. Where was Siemens stronger and where was Bombardier stronger? I fear that the answer to that probably involves hugely sensitive commercial data that the Minister cannot release today. We want people to understand why we are spending taxpayers’ and passengers’ money in this way, but it is hard to explain the process when we cannot access the full details.

One matter that has been raised—it would be helpful to have some clarification on this—is the lightweight bogie that will be used in the contract. For a contract that Siemens won in Germany, it had to use Bombardier’s bogie, and there is a joint contract in place for that. I understand—I cannot find any evidence for this on the internet—that Siemens has not managed to produce, test or bring into operation anywhere a lightweight bogie. The German train industry was not desperately keen to have its trains experimented on and tested, and therefore Siemens has used the Bombardier-made bogie to ensure that it gets the reliability from scratch. Frankly, such a situation seems a little perverse. The Germans give a contract to a German train company but they are not willing to have their trains experimented on, and we end up awarding a contract to a German train company for our trains to be experimented on rather than awarding it to the UK company that could have used its bogie, which it knows works.

Anecdotally, one of the attractions for Siemens was mentioned by the UK chief executive of Siemens rail industry operations, Steve Scrimshaw, in an interview with Rail Professional in March this year:

“A lot of the DfT’s scoring is around deliverability and our trains work straight out of the box.”

Interestingly, that same article goes on to talk about the problems that Siemens has had delivering trains into Scotland, where they have not worked straight from the box and their entry into service was delayed by ScotRail until it could resolve some of the technical issues. It is not the case that Siemens delivers and works perfectly every time, and that Bombardier does not. The fact that Bombardier can win contracts in the UK and around the world shows that it probably has a similar quality of delivery to Siemens.

In light of those issues, the key question for the Government is this: can they and will they reconsider this decision before the contract goes to final status? Some of the concerns about the procurement process that I have set out have led my hon. Friends the Members for Mid Derbyshire (Pauline Latham), for South Derbyshire (Heather Wheeler) and for Erewash (Jessica Lee)—she sadly cannot be here today—and I to ask the National Audit Office to review this procurement process and examine whether we are getting the most economically advantageous position for taxpayers and passengers.

There are doubts whether the DFT is very good at handling these processes based on its experiences with the intercity express programme contract and this one. Let us be honest: this project was originally called Thameslink 2000, but these carriages might hit the tracks in 2015. That is not a tremendous procurement record. Is it right for the DFT to be handling these contracts? My hon. Friends and I have fundamental concerns about whether the right requirements were in the tender specification and whether we can come to the right decision. Therefore, there seems to be a strong prima facie case to have another look at the matter and ensure that we are spending £1.4 billion of taxpayers’ money in the right way.

We can talk about the history of the process and this contract for as long as we like but, whatever happens on that, we need to get these things right in future. The fact that the past two major contracts have not gone to a UK manufacturer is bad enough but, if we are to sort this process out and keep the train-building industry in the UK, we need to start getting such things right and ensuring that there is a level playing field. Let us be clear that no one is suggesting that we want Bombardier in the UK to be a new British Leyland. Bombardier does not want that and absolutely no taxpayer would want that. We have a company that can build high-quality trains for the right price, and it should get the chance to do that. We want a process that creates a level playing field, and for a UK manufacturer to have a fair opportunity to win contracts to build UK trains in the same way that German manufacturers can build trains in Germany and French ones can build trains in France.

What kind of message are we giving to the people we want to invest and manufacture in the UK? It seems that if someone wants to win a contract to build trains for the German rail industry, they must build them in Germany, and that if someone wants to win a contract in France to build trains for the French rail industry, they must build them in France. However, if someone wants to win a contract to build trains for the UK rail industry, they can build them where they like. If an investor is short of money and considering which countries to invest in, what will their conclusion be? They cannot close the French or German plants because they know that they will not win contracts in those huge markets, but they could close the UK one.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. I hope he recognises that the issue goes beyond just rolling stock and that it relates to the whole of the rail supply chain. Does he agree that the key question is this: why does the German industry not have more penetration in the French market, and indeed, why does the French industry not have more penetration in the German market, if both those countries are interpreting EU procurement law in the same way as us?

[Nigel Mills]

I am sure that all our constituents are asking that question. If Germany and France do not open their markets, why do we open our markets so much? We all want a level playing field. If Germany and France are going to reward their industries, we may have little choice but to go the same way. The issue is not new, because the previous Government considered it in 2003. They commissioned a report on how the EU procurement processes were working to see whether there was unfairness or any inappropriate activity. As usual, the conclusion was that there was no clear illegality, but there appears to have been a slight distortion in the results. Interestingly, that report was written by the then UK chief executive of Siemens, Alan Wood. It is amazing how things come back round to bite.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)]

I shall preface my comments by saying that any job loss is a tragedy for the family of the person involved. The hon. Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson) made a point about the supply chain, which is hugely important. Every job lost in British manufacturing has a knock-on effect on three or four jobs in the supply chain.

I want to address three issues. First, did the UK make the best use of EU procurement rules? Secondly, I will speak about open competition because we must not lose sight of the fact that we do well on that in Europe. Thirdly, we must ask what we can do now and what the best way forward is.

Will the Minister tell us, if she can, who interpreted the EU procurement rules? Were the rules interpreted in a way that might inadvertently have favoured Siemens as opposed to Bombardier? Were the rules gold plated and was our interpretation of them too strict? Why did the procurement rules not take account of the socio-economic impact of the decision’s devastating results? I hope that the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee will conduct an inquiry into the matter. We were legally bound by the procurement rules established by the previous Government, and had we acted differently, we would have been open to legal challenge, although I take no pleasure whatsoever in saying that.

On open competition, the UK wins 17% of all EU contracts and comes second in Europe when it comes to winning European tenders. Protectionism is a harmful road down which to go for all countries in Europe.

[Duncan Hames]

My hon. Friend is right to make that point. Invensys Rail in my constituency produces world-class signalling technology and has worked on seven out of the eight most recent high-speed lines in Spain, and nine out of 12 of the metro lines in Beijing. When we have such exceptional engineering talent in our country that wins contracts abroad, some of us may wonder why we are not more successful at winning contracts at home.

[Lorely Burt]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent and important point that has also been raised by a several hon. Members. We must be savvier when setting procurement criteria. In Italy, specifications have been known to include the requirement that the same work has been done previously in the same area, although how it gets away with that I do not know. A study by Francesco Grillo concluded:

“In Britain, there are lower barriers to entry”

than elsewhere in the EU. We desperately need to look at that.

A balance must be struck, and there are some mitigating factors. Bombardier preannounced its intention to create 1,000 redundancies, regardless of the loss of the Thameslink bid. The growth review initiated by the Government will look at how business can be supported and at how UK manufacturing companies can meet our strategic needs, the importance of which was raised earlier. We must look at whether the UK makes the best use of our procurement strategy. On the bright side, the Business Secretary has announced a taskforce headed by Margaret Gildea OBE that will work with Bombardier to help to sustain a long-term manufacturing base in the UK—we are in this for the long term.

One or two hon. Members alluded to the fact that Bombardier is Canadian-owned rather than British-owned. Siemens will create 2,000 jobs as a result of being awarded the contract. Indeed, Bombardier has just won a £354 million contract to provide signalling for the London underground. It is therefore not all doom and gloom, but we must do everything possible in Derbyshire to help people to revitalise their manufacturing base.

Oral Answers to Questions

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Thursday 23rd June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Norman Baker]

That is an important and quite correct question, because the present franchise held by First Great Western was undoubtedly skewed towards the operator and away from the fare payer and the taxpayer. It is not a franchise that, frankly, the Government would want replicated. The whole process of franchise renewal is designed to eliminate that sort of unfair franchise.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I certainly endorse the Minister’s most recent remarks. Residents in Melksham in my constituency will want to do a lot better from the new franchise than they did from the last one. Will he tell us when the public will have an opportunity to contribute to a consultation on the draft specification for the new Great Western franchise?

[Norman Baker]

I assure my hon. Friend that that matter has been fully taken on board. There will be a full consultation, including with residents of his constituency.

McNulty Report and West Coast Rail

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Thursday 19th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

I am pleased to be able to tell the hon. Gentleman that franchising policy in Wales is a matter for the Welsh Assembly Government, so it will be for them to decide when the current Arriva Trains Wales franchise comes up for renewal, which—off the top of my head—is in 2016. However, I said something this morning that he will be interested in: I indicated that when we return to the House later this year with our proposals for broader rail reform, we will consider the greater devolution of regional railways and regional railway funding, both to the devolved Administrations and to local authorities and integrated transport authorities around the country. That will enable us to oversee the national strategic rail routes, but not manage the regional and local railways system, from the Department in London. That seems a sensible way of proceeding.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I welcome the greater autonomy for Network Rail route managers in the Wessex area, because rail passengers in my constituency are endlessly frustrated by the pass-the-parcel attitude to responsibility for performance on the railways. In the light of First Great Western’s recent announcement, will the timing for the letting of the Great Western franchise enable the Government fully to embrace the McNulty report proposals in setting out the future of rail travel for my constituents?

[Mr Hammond]

Yes, of course. The fact that the Great Western franchise will be re-let in 2013 will enable us to bring forward to that date the incorporation of the benefits of McNulty’s work. However, I would re-emphasise that one of Sir Roy’s key conclusions—one that I strongly share—is that our railway is not the same in every area. What is right for the west coast main line might not be right for the East Anglia franchise. What is right for the northern franchise might not be right for the south-eastern franchise. We will consider each franchise individually, and look at different models appropriate to the type of railway involved. We will proceed on that basis, and we will learn as we go.

Oral Answers to Questions

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Thursday 5th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hammond]

I do not want to say, “Calm down”, but I would like to say that I am sorry if I have set a hare running. I was trying to say to the hon. Member for Halton that we are very much aware of the risk that making franchises less prescriptive could lead to reductions in train services, and we are not prepared to accept that, so I can assure the hon. Lady that under the new west coast franchise, the same number of station stops at Warrington Bank Quay will occur as under the present timetable.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I warmly welcome the creation of the sustainable local transport fund. I hope that the Minister is aware of the exciting trans-Wilts rail proposal, of which we heard earlier, developed by the community rail partnership, which has demonstrated the strong support of local businesses and MPs. Can he confirm that he would welcome a bid from Wiltshire council to that fund, and that it would be given serious consideration?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Norman Baker)]

I am pleased with the number of bids we have received so far for the first tranche of the local sustainable transport fund. A number of imaginative bids have come in. There is a further bidding round, however, and I would welcome any suggestions that could improve the co-ordination of transport across modes.

Railway Expansion

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Wednesday 27th April 2011 Westminster Hall

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I add my compliments to those already paid to my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (John Pugh) on securing the debate, and I apologise for missing the early part of his speech. Judging from the part that I caught, however, I am sure that reading his speech in the Official Report tomorrow will be instructive.

Given that the debate is about railway expansion and smaller schemes, the Minister will not be surprised that I wish to talk about several smaller schemes in my constituency about which I have spoken before. Although I support investment in the railway and some of the larger schemes that we have heard about this afternoon, part of the point I wish to make is that there are some very small schemes that do not require new infrastructure, nor even a mile of track, that would benefit the rail network. Decisions taken in previous decades have meant that the network has had to do without such schemes. My concern, and I think the concern of my hon. Friend the Member for Southport, is that in the old plans to which we still turn for our railways, we do not have a decision-making structure that is open to embracing such ideas.

The scheme in my constituency and county that I am keen to advocate first and foremost is the TransWilts project. I have been most encouraged for its prospects in the light of the Government’s announcement late last year on additional rolling stock. Given the correspondence and meetings that I have had with the Department, however, I have been on something of a rollercoaster about how optimistic I should be. On the day that the statement was made, I asked the Secretary of State if the determination on where the additional rolling stock would go would be entirely dependent on the commercial strength of the operator on any part of the network, or on wider economic benefits. I was told that it would not be exclusively about the commercial strength of the franchisee, but following further scrutiny, it has become apparent that getting additional rolling stock is a very competitive process, not least because of the strained public finances and concerns about the viability of the subsidy to what are termed the regional railways. The rolling stock will have to be paid for somehow, and without a source of support or the willingness to contemplate including these operations within existing franchise and support arrangements, it could prove very difficult to get additional rolling stock on to certain services without a franchisee in strong commercial health.

In my case, I am somewhat confident that there will be additional rolling stock on the Cardiff-Portsmouth line, which would address the congested trains on routes in and out of Bath and Bristol. However, it might be rather harder to make the argument—it is probably a much stronger argument from an economic point of view, but it is one that requires time for its case to be proved—for connecting the towns in western Wiltshire with Chippenham and Swindon through a TransWilts service. Given the excellent support that we have from the community rail partnership in Wiltshire and the enthusiasm of at least some of the councillors on Wiltshire council, however, I remain hopeful that between us we will be able to persuade decision makers in the industry about that.

Another long-standing campaign for a small but significant improvement to the railway in my constituency is for the reopening of Corsham station. That seemed very close at hand until around the time of the Hatfield train crash, when something of a retrenchment on the railways led to the withdrawal of plans for services that would have been able to serve Corsham station in a way that current high-speed services cannot. As we no longer have an Oxford-Bristol service passing over that piece of track, the campaign has been very hard to fight. However, moneys have been set aside—through section 106 agreements in relation to the substantial residential development that there has been—for redeveloping that station. We need a more joined-up approach between local government and the funds that it has available in this case, and decision making in the transport sector.

My final example is an extreme case that makes the point about the value that smaller schemes can provide. I am referring to the northern curve at Bradford junction, north of Trowbridge. That is an area where, essentially, tracks heading in three directions meet. At the moment, there is an east-to-south curve and a west-to-south curve. We have a railway line that forks in a Y shape, but traditionally there was a northern curve, which in effect created a triangle at that point. It does not take long to realise the flexibility that that would provide for the diversion of trains. People will know, especially if they travel on a Sunday, as I often do, that there are a lot of engineering works on the Great Western main line, which often mean that trains are not able to travel the full route, such as the one that I take into London from Wiltshire. We might be much better able to deal with that in our rail network if we had the option to divert trains in the way that we could if they were able to travel from Bath and then back up to Chippenham having taken that curve, even if work was being done on the intervening track.

The amount of track that we are talking about is very small. The land is still available for the railway—it has not been developed. I believe that that piece of track was not maintained because of the costs of improving the reliability of the electricity supply to the signalling infrastructure. Now that residential development goes right the way up to the railway line on the eastern side, the costs of improving the electricity infrastructure for that piece of track and the signalling used there would be rather less than they were at the time it was abandoned. I offer that scheme as an example of something that is very small and simple that would not make an enormous difference, but could prove to be of wider benefit to the resilience and flexibility of our rail infrastructure, especially if we are looking to the future following the Government’s decisions on electrifying the Great Western line, given the likely need to divert trains during the engineering works that will be required.

Time and again when I sought to make the case for many of these improvements, I found that if they did not make it into the Great Western route utilisation strategy produced under the previous Government, my hopes of being able to make the case for them were much diminished. However, the current Government have made some very enlightened decisions about the railways in the past 12 months that were not envisaged at the time of that strategy, whether we are talking about the decision that has already been made about the high-speed fleet for the Great Western line, the decision about electrifying the route from London beyond Bristol into Wales, and the decision that I referred to earlier about additional rolling stock that could be available for my part of the country. I hope that those hon. Members representing northern constituencies will forgive me for saying that my area is not part of the blessed London network that they have described and we have struggled to secure additional rolling stock under previous decisions. The fact that those recent decisions have been made calls into question some of the assumptions in that strategy, but they still exist and underpin the problems that campaigners encounter when trying to have decisions revisited.

I shall conclude shortly because I want to leave sufficient time for the Front Benchers to respond to the debate. If we really want to support and embrace smaller rail schemes, which can provide excellent value for money if we have a little confidence in the potential of our railways, we will need to loosen the straitjacket that I have described. We need a little more joined-up thinking between local government and the rail sector, more enlightened allocations of funding streams—be they from parking or from economic development—and perhaps even the ability for local authorities to take more of an equity stake so that it is not simply a matter of responding to a begging bowl.

I hope that some of these ideas will give us the ability to break the current cycle. Those of us who are campaigners in Wiltshire find that if we want to make an improvement to our railways, the Department says that local government should be able to promote those schemes, but local government says that operators need to be able to pay for them themselves, and operators then say that they will need support from the Department—a subsidy—if they are to be able to support a scheme. We therefore all go round in circles and progress cannot be made on our railways. I hope that we can build on the early decisions that the Government have taken and take full advantage of all opportunities, and not just those presented by the big projects of which we hear so much.

Intercity Express and Rail Electrification

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

I understand that Hitachi will issue a press release broadly simultaneously with my statement that will set out more details of its plans, but clearly, it will be unable to start building factories until financial close occurs later this year. There will then be a factory to build, which will create hundreds of temporary jobs in the area. I have heard that the owners of the industrial estate on which the factory will be built have also indicated that they will expect to build other units simultaneously on a speculative basis in anticipation of suppliers to Hitachi wanting to locate around the factory. I therefore hope that there will be significant construction job creation quite early in the programme. Then, of course, Hitachi will begin recruiting for the permanent jobs for the actual building of the trains—my guess is that this will happen later next year, but it is for the company to confirm.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I welcome the Secretary of State’s clarification that electrification to Bristol will also take in the line through Bath and Chippenham. Can he confirm my estimation that this proposal might even bring down journey times from London Paddington to Chippenham to less than one hour?

[Mr Hammond]

It may surprise the hon. Gentleman to know that among the many destinations for which I have journey time savings, Chippenham does not appear, I am afraid. However, I will be very happy to get back to him immediately after this statement.