Esther McVey
Main Page: Esther McVey (Conservative - Tatton)Department Debates - View all Esther McVey's debates with the Department for Transport
Ivanhoe Line: Restoration
Esther McVey Excerpts(1 day, 7 hours ago)
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Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I will call Amanda Hack to move the motion and I will then call the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with the prior permission of both the Member in charge of the debate and the Minister. There will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up, as is the convention with a 30-minute debate.
Amanda Hack (North West Leicestershire) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered restoration of the Ivanhoe Line.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey.
I am pleased that colleagues have joined me for what I believe is the first ever debate solely about the Ivanhoe line—a train line that would reopen a direct passenger link between Leicester and Burton upon Trent. The line has a long history. Before the 1830s, Coalville did not exist; it was known as Long Lane and included the four medieval parishes of Whitwick, Hugglescote, Snibston and Swannington. When William Stenson, the proprietor of coalmines in Whitwick, returned from a trip on the Stockton and Darlington railway, he carefully studied the land between Long Lane and Leicester. Taking into account the mines in Ibstock and Bagworth, he planned the line of a possible railway.
Stenson enlisted the help of George Stephenson, “the father of railways”, who delegated the construction of the Swannington-to-Leicester railway to his son, Robert. It became the sixth steam railway in the country, linking Leicester and Long Lane so that coal could easily be transported between the two. Some estimate that around the same time the town became known as Coalville. The line traditionally transported coal before it was opened to passengers.
Fast forward to the 1960s, when what was then called the Ivanhoe line was closed during the infamous Beeching cuts of 7 September 1964. Since then, there have been many campaigns to get it fully back up and running, especially as it remained open to freight traffic until only recently.