Sustainable Development Goals

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Mary Creagh

Wednesday 28th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

I appreciate the right hon. Lady’s frustration, but that was what Mr Speaker would call “not a point of order, but a point of frustration”. The content of the hon. Lady’s speech is not a matter for me, apart from the fact that she must stick to the title of the debate, which, so far, she has done.

[Mary Creagh]

I am grateful for that ruling, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I want to respond to the question asked by the hon. Member for The Cotswolds (Geoffrey Clifton-Brown) about the projects that I visited as a Back Bencher. There was the post-genocide work that DFID has been doing in Rwanda. I have visited a Save the Children project in Lubumbashi. I have visited artisanal miners in eastern Congo. I have visited Panzi hospital for the victims of sexual violence—a subject that I know is very close to the heart of the Secretary of State. I visited Burundi—a country that is no longer in receipt of DFID funding—in 2009 to look at the Save the Children hospital there. In 2012, I visited Rumbek in South Sudan to look at the work of the World Food Programme, and last week I was in Geneva talking to the World Health Organisation and the global fund, UNAIDS and UNITAID. So I do not need any lessons about visits.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mary Creagh]

I thank the right hon. Lady for giving way; she is being very generous. The point about Burundi and other post-conflict countries is that, having a DFID office—or in this case a combined Rwanda-Burundi office—in that country means that it acts not just as a development partner, but a political one in knocking heads together and in dealing with some of the post-conflict factions that still exist in that country. We are talking about withdrawing from that country and only entering it through multilateral assistance. There is nothing wrong with tax assistance. We did all that in Rwanda, and it is an excellent part of development assistance. The point is that if we do not have someone on the ground in the country, we do not have the early warning systems. What happened in Burundi—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. The hon. Lady has already made her speech.

Local Bus Services

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Mary Creagh

Wednesday 5th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh]

It was, and it included Conservative representation. [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman can see me afterwards if he wants the names, but I do not know whether—[Interruption.] Actually, I think that I am going to make sure that they are secret.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. It is unsuitable for the shadow Minister to answer sedentary interventions. If Members wish to ask questions of the hon. Lady, they can stand up and indicate their wish to do so, and then she can answer.

[Mary Creagh]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Perhaps we should have a bell that Members can ring.

I am not sure that I should say who attended the summit. Officers from Devon county council attended, as did one Conservative leader, but I am not sure that he would be pleased with me if I named him. [Hon. Members: “Name him!”] No, I will not. It is for me to know and for other Members to find out. [Interruption.] It was not a secret summit. All 105 city and county leaders were invited.

At the summit, we discussed how London-style powers could bring more small and medium-sized bus companies into a market in which five big companies take 70% of the business. We noted that those five operators all complain about a regulated market outside London, but are happy to operate in a regulated London bus market. We discussed how the voice of the passenger left waiting at a bus stop could be heard, how we could overcome the barriers to open data about buses, how ticketing could be linked with trams and trains, and how interchanges could be made easier. We also discussed the fact that communities can be isolated just a mile from a city centre if there is no bus, which is what happens on the Peacock estate in Wakefield.

On Monday, Stagecoach claimed that it could deliver multi-operator Oyster-style ticketing across the country by 2015, which came as a surprise to many Members. We know that unless the law is changed, it will not be able to deliver multi-operator tickets with a daily price cap. Stagecoach has also claimed that politicians are

“peddling the myth that London is best”

for buses. This morning, however, one councillor referred to London as the “magic kingdom” of buses. London has 7 million regular Oyster card users. In contrast, the Secretary of State this morning heaped praise on Centro in the west midlands for having just 3,000 smart card users.

I want to seize this opportunity to fix the broken bus market. The current problems stem from an over-centralised state, and the Government have done nothing to change that. All local authorities face different transport challenges. Only when public transport, cycling and walking become attractive options will they grow and improve.

I do not think it is fair that only London provides passengers with one ticket for every form of public transport, always guaranteeing the lowest fare and capping daily bus usage at £4.40.

High Speed Rail (London – West Midlands) Bill

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Mary Creagh

Monday 28th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh]

Absolutely. [Interruption.] I pay tribute to the Network Rail staff whom I visited out by Reading and who worked around the clock in difficult circumstances to open the route—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I hesitate to interrupt the hon. Lady, but there is a low level of conversation going on around the Chamber. This is an important debate. If Members wish to have conversations, by all means they can leave the Chamber to do so. If they are in the Chamber, they should allow the hon. Lady a fair crack of the whip.

[Mary Creagh]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Mr Bradshaw) who have continued, along with the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile), to raise the need for resilient transport links in the south-west. I gently say to the hon. Gentleman that his Government previously promised his community £31 million of funding for rail resilience works, including at Cowley bridge outside Exeter—money that failed to appear in last year’s autumn statement and which was brought forward only after the devastation at Dawlish in February this year. However, he makes the important point that today’s vote is not about choosing between HS2 and other rail projects, and his great western main line will be electrified over the next five years. The Government have repeatedly raised expectations in the south-west and said that money will be found to make the transport infrastructure more resilient. Perhaps in his closing remarks the Minister will tell the House when we can expect some of those scenario planning options, which I know Network Rail is acting on—I think there are three scenarios at the moment.