Road Humps and 20 mph Speed Limits

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2023 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) for securing this important debate. He has made some excellent points, particularly on local decision making, which I am also concerned about. I represent a number of villages in Meon Valley that are unsuitable for high-speed traffic. Some are on the A32, which is one of the worst roads in the country for people being killed and injured, but everywhere in our villages the problems of speeding traffic are a menace to the people living, working and going to school.

I was an MP in Portsmouth when it had recently become one of the first cities to introduce 20 mph zones. The evidence very quickly showed a reduction in the number of incidents because the average speed was brought down, and the change made drivers think more carefully about their behaviour. Everywhere that has done the same has seen a similar reduction in casualty figures. I am pleased that Hampshire County Council is now looking at allowing communities and parish councils to ask for 20 mph zones. I have been calling for that for a long time and residents have been asking for help, particularly along the A32. I hope that the council will allow communities to move forward when it takes a decision in January next year.

Hampshire County Council is considering a report mostly based on conditions in Winchester, as my right hon. Friend said, and other largely built-up areas. But in our rural Meon Valley communities, things are very different. Narrow roads pass right outside people’s front doors, and in many places there are narrow or even no pavements, including on the A32. Residents feel vulnerable because of the speed of traffic. Many notice the return to high-speed traffic after covid—if anything, they saw even more of it as people returned to the countryside. As my right hon. Friend mentioned, we have to recognise, too, that the average modern car is much bigger and heavier than those in the past. Pedestrians are feeling the squeeze, and so are cyclists, horse riders and even other motorists who might not feel so confident as the drivers barrelling along a village at above 40 mph in a 30 mph zone.

[Peter Dowd]

The hon. Lady will be aware that 60% of all road fatalities happen on rural roads. Would she agree that we must do something about that?

[Mrs Drummond]

Yes. That is exactly why I am so concerned, particularly about the A32. People have to walk along that road. There is no pavement and cars go very fast through villages. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right.

My constituents are delighted that we have recently installed average speed cameras on stretches of the A32 and the A272, which have been abused by speeding drivers for far too long. The cameras will save drivers’ lives and improve the lives of residents in the surrounding villages. They have already told me what a difference those have made.

Cutting speed saves lives. I welcome the support of the Hampshire police and crime commissioner, Donna Jones. She backed the calls that I and my right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) have made to her to fund the cameras. I will continue to support my constituents across Meon Valley who want safer roads and safer lives for their families, so I hope that Hampshire County Council will let us have the choice of having 20 mph zones in those areas where residents want them.

I also hope that Ministers will look at what the Government can do to empower people to take control of roads in their communities, including through the use of acoustic cameras and properly enforceable noise limits on motor vehicles. This has been a blight on many communities, and I hope that the pilot schemes will soon show that they work and we can roll them out across the country, but especially in Meon Valley.

Draft Hovercraft (Application of Enactments) and Merchant Shipping (Prevention of Pollution) (Law of the Sea Convention) Amendment Order 2022

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Tuesday 14th June 2022 General Committees

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)]

I beg to move,

That the Committee has considered the draft Hovercraft (Application of Enactments) and Merchant Shipping (Prevention of Pollution) (Law of the Sea Convention) Amendment Order 2022.

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Ms Rees. Hon. Members will be glad to know that the purpose of the order is to give the Government the powers they will need to apply the pollution prevention requirements in the international convention on standards of training, certification and watchkeeping for seafarers—which I will refer to as the STCW convention for brevity—to hovercraft, and to provide strengthened enforcement powers for breaches relating to the prevention of pollution. Those powers are needed as a result of the repeal of section 2(2) of the European Communities Act 1972, which provided the powers for the pollution prevention requirements in the regulations that currently implement the STCW convention, including the application of those requirements to hovercraft.

The order amends the Hovercraft (Application of Enactments) Order 1989 to apply the Merchant Shipping (Prevention of Pollution) (Law of the Sea Convention) Order 1996 and certain provisions of the Merchant Shipping Act 1995 relating to pollution prevention to hovercraft. In short, the order amends the 1989 order to apply the 1996 order and bits of the 1995 Act to hovercraft. I hope that makes sense to the Committee.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

Will the Minister say exactly how many hovercraft the order is going to affect, and whether it will affect the hovercraft service from Southsea to the Isle of Wight?

[Robert Courts]

Yes, I can answer that question. I was alarmed at the intervention—I wondered whether my explanation thus far had not been clear. The only hovercraft that are operational in the UK at the moment are those that operate from Southsea, near my hon. Friend’s constituency, to the Isle of Wight. Those are not covered by the order because they operate only in internal waters. The order applies to external waters, and there are not currently any hovercraft operating in the UK that would be caught by it. None the less, it is important that we make the order so that future hovercraft would be covered by pollution regulations, for reasons we all understand.

The 1996 order provides powers to give effect in secondary legislation to the pollution prevention obligations in the UN convention on the law of the sea, or UNCLOS, with which we should all be familiar. Those obligations are often found in other international conventions, including the STCW convention, which sets out the standards that must be met for seafarers to obtain the internationally recognised certificates that are required if they are to work on vessels that operate internationally. The Hovercraft Act 1968 confers power on Her Majesty to make an Order in Council that applies any enactment relating to ships to hovercraft. The 1989 order serves that purpose, but it needs to be updated to include provision relating to the prevention of pollution.

The 1989 order, which is best thought of as an enabling order, contains some provision for the application of pollution prevention measures made under the Merchant Shipping Act, but it does not include the 1996 order, which is the relevant one for the purposes of pollution prevention. This order will fix that. It will ensure that the pollution prevention obligations in UNCLOS can be applied in full to hovercraft in the way that they already apply to ships. It will also bring some other measures up to date and apply them to hovercraft.

Oral Answers to Questions

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Thursday 19th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con)]

11. What progress his Department has made on assessing the effectiveness of noise cameras since the completion of initial research into their use.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

17. What steps he is taking to tackle the use of loud engines and exhausts.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)]

Following encouraging initial research, further trials of the latest noise camera technologies have been announced to assess their effectiveness, and Members House are encouraged to submit applications for a trial in their local area.

[Robert Courts]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her interest in the scheme and for highlighting the nuisance of noisy vehicles in her constituency. We will be carefully reviewing all the applications received, and we will choose four sites that represent a wide range of urban and rural environments across England and Wales. We will then consider the results of those trials.

[Mrs Drummond]

Villages in Meon Valley, including those along the A32, are blighted by noise from illegally modified motorcycle exhausts, so I am pleased the Minister has explained that the noise camera trial will move forward. Will Meon Valley be included in the trial to put an end to this unacceptable blight on communities in my constituency?

[Robert Courts]

My hon. Friend is right to raise the blight on her constituents, and I entirely understand why she does so. The noise camera trials will demonstrate whether the technology can be an effective enforcement tool that enables the police and local authorities to tackle the excessively noisy and illegally modified vehicles to which she refers. I know she will work with her local authority to apply for a trial in the best way possible.

Hedge End Train Station: Accessibility

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Wednesday 21st October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Holmes]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. Many constituents have written to me to tell me how they have disabled children or that they have disabilities themselves, and that at the moment they cannot travel into London. The only way, which I will come on to later, they can get to London and have that mobility is by taking a journey in a car or by paying for a cab to go down the M27 and into Eastleigh town centre or Southampton. She is completely correct. Members across the House have stations where this is a problem and we need to get better at providing that solution for people with disabilities, so they can travel as well as those who are able-bodied. That is why I say to the Minister that the situation at Hedge End surely cannot be allowed to continue.

Southampton Airport and Eastleigh, which are the closest stations to Hedge End, are still over five miles away by car or taxi, which naturally come with additional costs and inconvenience. The lack of access to the station means that people from the southern half of my constituency are forced to travel to Southampton Airport Parkway, which has an annual usage of 1.7 million passengers, or Eastleigh, which has an annual usage of 1.6 million passengers, by driving through the towns of Fair Oak, Horton Heath or Bishopstoke, or down the M27. That creates another problem. Our towns and villages, such as Eastleigh, Bishopstoke and Fair Oak, are struggling with a lack of investment in road infra- structure caused by the overdevelopment of housing. This means that the roads around Eastleigh and Southampton Airport station are often blocked in rush hour and inaccessible, too. There is a wider point in that the Government quite rightly—I completely support them—argue that we need greener and more sustainable forms of travel. I agree, but the current facilities at Hedge End station do not facilitate that and in many respects actively discourage it. That is, of course, bad for passengers, bad for the environment and bad for our local transport networks.

The Minister will know that levelling up is not just about solving a geographical problem between north and south. It is about equal opportunity and better outcomes for those who are disadvantaged. I firmly believe that with the installation of either a lift or wheelchair accessible facilities at Hedge End station, we can achieve exactly the sort of results that are at the heart of this Government’s agenda.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech about a very important topic, which is equally important to the constituencies that neighbour his own. As he said, it is a very fast-growing station—with, I think, 138% growth since 2000—so it is important to my constituents. Has he considered that it is possible to get on the Fareham-bound platform along a footpath, which at the moment is very muddy? Has he looked at whether we can develop that side of the station to enable people with disabilities to access Fareham-bound trains?

[Paul Holmes]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. She knows the station as well as I do, and her constituents use it. There are options to improve the footbridge from that side of the train station. I share her sentiments and her aspiration, and think that that is an adequate step for the short term, but with the number of people who will use the station in the longer term with the increase in population from those moving into the constituency, we need to go further. That is why I secured the debate tonight and I thank her for her intervention.

With the installation of either a lift or wheelchair-accessible facilities at Hedge End station, we can achieve the sort of results that are at the heart of the Government’s agenda. We can give disabled people the opportunity to easily travel for work and enjoyment, we can make life better for families and parents with young children, we can improve our environment by getting more cars off the road, and we can make sustainable travel alternatives a sensible, viable option for my constituents and the wider community.

With all those benefits, I hope the Minister will reflect on the strong case for upgrading the facilities at Hedge End station and make the station a priority for future funding allocations. I know that he will acknowledge that I have written to him and lobbied him before, in the Tea Room and other locations, and I will continue to lobby him to get the funding we need. However, if he would like to make our life in Eastleigh just a little bit easier, I look forward to him writing to me, or he could just give me and my constituents the good news that he is allocating the funding right now.

Southern Heathrow Rail Link

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Angela Richardson]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention, and I agree with her that now is the right time to look at the economic benefits and the skills and jobs that this will bring. It is exciting that this sort of project could have bids coming in from a range of providers, and the competition would be very beneficial. The Heathrow to Waterloo link could be looked at in the wider scope of the project, but I am sure she will understand that I am keen to see a line go to my constituents in Guildford. I will come on to the western link later in my speech.

Members from outside the south-east of England often, and understandably, criticise policymakers for taking a London-centric view of issues. I would like to reassure them that London-centricity can work to the detriment even of other towns and cities in the south-east. Access to Heathrow is just one example of this phenomenon. It is possible to reach the airport by train on a number of services, such as London Underground’s Piccadilly line, the Heathrow Express, Heathrow Connect services and hopefully, before too much longer, the hugely impressive Elizabeth line, which will bring direct trains to the airport from City and docklands. However, it is nigh on impossible to reach Heathrow by train from a whole number of boroughs in south-west London or substantial towns such as mine in Surrey and Hampshire, even though it is possible to see aircraft taking off and landing from some of them.

Transport authorities serving many of Heathrow’s competitor airports, such as Schiphol and Charles de Gaulle, have long since understood that a major hub for flights should also be a public transport hub. In Heathrow’s case, people can arrive by train if they like, as long as they are coming from the east. That gigantic airport, one of our drivers of economic growth, tourism and investment in normal times, and undoubtedly again after the pandemic, effectively sits at the end of a branch line.

Clearly, there are other public transport connections to Heathrow that are not based on railways. It is served by a variety of coach and bus connections that are valuable to airline passengers and the many thousands who work in the wide range of businesses located there. Those services include a direct hourly coach link from Guildford that opened in the last two years. Nevertheless, however many buses and coaches are available, they fail to attract the substantial number of users who otherwise default to their own cars or taxis and private hire vehicles. Those vehicles congest still further the greatly overloaded road network that serves the airport, cause damage to economic efficiency and reduce the attractiveness of the region south of Heathrow to investment.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech about an incredibly important topic. A direct rail link from Guildford to Heathrow would make a massive difference not only to her constituency but to mine in Meon Valley and beyond. At the moment, it takes up to two hours to get there by train and coach, as she has mentioned, but about 45 minutes or less—or half the time, anyway—by car. Does she agree that it will take cars off the road, which will have an incredible environmental impact on her constituency and the others surrounding Heathrow?

[Angela Richardson]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. I could not agree more. The time spent in the car on those journeys to Heathrow from constituencies that are further down the line than mine and further away from Heathrow has an impact on the environment. Those cars on the roads generate vast quantities of noxious gases and particulate matter that are harmful to the health and wellbeing of our citizens, along with substantial volumes of avoidable carbon dioxide.

In such circumstances, some might say, “Build more roads then,” but it was recognised by Highways England in 2016 that no amount of road building could overcome the problem. Its “M25 South West Quadrant Strategic Study” concluded that only a solution based on public transport investment could address congestion on this vital national motorway. Indeed, I understand that it is one of the most congested stretches of motorway in Europe.

With such a blindingly obvious need for rail access to Heathrow from the south, there have been a number of attempts to find an answer. The most significant of those was a scheme known as Airtrack devised by BAA, then owners of Heathrow, in the early years of this century. The fundamental, and ultimately fatal, flaw in the Airtrack proposal was that it was based on knitting together various sections of existing railway, with a few short additional stretches, and then greatly increasing the frequency of trains on those tracks.

The Victorian lines were built in an era when road traffic was horse-drawn, so they intersected at multiple locations with level crossings that now serve thousands of cars and lorries every day. The increased frequency of trains over those crossings would cause the level crossing barriers, and hence the roads, to be closed for unacceptably long periods. When the opposition of road users, communities, businesses and local authorities found voice through hon. Members of this House, the Airtrack project was doomed.

Airtrack had been conceived in part as an attempt to mitigate the major expansion of airline passenger numbers and employees at Heathrow associated with the opening of terminal 5. The one positive legacy of this story is that, beneath terminal 5, there sits in cavernous darkness a station awaiting the arrival of a railway from the south.

I understand that similar provision exists for a western rail link to Heathrow at terminal 5. The western scheme has been under development for as long as the southern route and would contribute to making Heathrow a public transport hub on the international model I described earlier. I know the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) has been an energetic supporter of a western link for the benefits it would bring to his constituents and I am delighted to see his interest in the debate this evening.

Returning to a new railway for my own area, the prospect of a southern rail link to Heathrow was raised once again as part of the consenting process for the expansion of the airport by means of constructing a third runway. Without revisiting all the many powerful arguments for and against Heathrow expansion, it was noted, as part of the scrutiny of the proposal by the Transport Committee, previously chaired by the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), that a southern rail link was urgently needed with even a two-runway airport, let alone with the third in place.

It was in that context that my right hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) announced, as Transport Secretary in March 2018, that a southern rail link to Heathrow would be the pathfinder scheme for a radical initiative to attract private sector investment and ideas into the design and construction of new railway infrastructure. That was a widely welcomed announcement, as it opened up the prospect of not just businesses but local authorities and local enterprise partnerships helping to accelerate the development of vitally needed new railways, rather than having to wait in a queue with many other existing schemes being devised within the traditional rail industry process. Now, more than ever, we need to allow the talent and expertise in the private sector to contribute to our levelling-up efforts across the country.

Covid-19: Aviation

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kelly Tolhurst]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. He is absolutely right about the scale and importance of the aviation sector in the UK compared with other parts of the world, and also about the level of employment that it creates in the UK. I am committed, as the Secretary of State is, to working with the Treasury and across Government—with all Government Departments—to find solutions for a sector that has been affected badly, and obviously may experience a slight lag in the restart due to the nature of the work it does. I am committed to working with my colleagues across Government to find solutions to those questions.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for her comments, particularly on BA, which is affecting a lot of employees in my constituency as well. Southampton airport is an important contributor to the economic prosperity of the wider region. It has already seen the loss of Flybe, which was 95% of its business, so it was already struggling before covid-19. What further support can the Government give regional airports, such as Southampton, which are relied on by a wide range of companies and are lifelines for business and other travel?

[Kelly Tolhurst]

I thank my hon. Friend for her question. I know very well the impact the coronavirus has on Southampton airport, which is a great asset on the south coast. We are engaged constantly with the airports. I am committed to doing that and to having such conversations about what we can do to help those regional airports, and that will continue. We fully understand their pressures, and where we can act, I will do my best to achieve that.

UK Maritime Industry

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2017 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Portsmouth South) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Walker. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) on securing this debate on such an important subject. I declare an interest as the honorary vice president of the Society of Maritime Industries.

It is not as widely recognised as it should be that maritime industries are a key sector in the United Kingdom. The maritime sector gets less attention and, arguably, less Government support than aerospace, despite being a bigger contributor to the UK economy and a sector that creates high-skilled jobs and employees. The right hon. Gentleman has already given us all of the figures.

I pay tribute to employers, such as BAE Systems in my constituency, whose trade union I meet regularly, and which is taking on a further 50 apprentices in 2017 in its maritime operations in Portsmouth, after taking on 82 last year. There are others nearby, such as Lockheed Martin, which is active in the naval defence sector and recruits from Portsmouth schools and colleges. A university technical college is opening in the area in September, which is heavily supported by leading local businesses and the Royal Navy, and will focus on maritime engineering. I hope that everyone in Portsmouth will back that great initiative and make it a big success.

I welcome the announcement to draw up the national shipbuilding strategy. I read Sir John Parker’s report with great interest and I am pleased with the amount of detail in it. He is right to recommend that we use the Type 31 programme to maintain capability away from the Clydeside, and so avoid putting all of our eggs in one basket. That will mean that the Type 31s can be built while the Type 26 programme is ongoing in Glasgow. I called for that in the House last year, and I hope that the Ministry of Defence will follow up on that suggestion. It is vital that we get this right when the Government respond to Sir John in the coming months.

Given the growing uncertainty in the world, it makes sense to get on now with the commitment in the 2015 strategic defence and security review to expand the basic number of ships available beyond the 19 at frigate and destroyer level, which is already a bare minimum. Of course, I would like some of the Type 31 work to come to Portsmouth, but whatever happens, I pay tribute to the staff in our naval base, who still carry out vital skilled work in ship repair. Minehunter refit work is going on in the ship hall, which HMS Quorn and HMS Atherstone have recently entered. Work is being completed on HMS Brocklesby before it returns to service later in the year. That work is less high profile than that which is being done to bring our new aircraft carriers into service, but it is no less important; every part of the Royal Navy, and the industrial sector that supports it, plays a vital role.

Portsmouth is a vital civilian port, too. We import 70% of the UK’s bananas, which is no joking matter as it is a trade worth millions to our port. The long and difficult history of banana tariffs ought to be a warning sign of the complexity of trade deals post-Brexit; it might make life easier, but it might not. As a ferry port, we are the second busiest cross-channel port after Dover. When I hear news about disputes causing delays to people getting into Dover, which seems to be frequently, I often think that Portsmouth is open as a port, and that travellers could avoid a lot of heartache by travelling with us. Anyone who wants an easy, reliable and friendly way to the continent should look no further than Portsmouth.

While I am pleased to see initiatives, such as the national shipbuilding strategy and the maritime growth study, we have to make sure that Government support is sustained. This vital, strategic industry must be protected in the coming uncertain years. I look forward to the Government’s committing to that.

Road Traffic Accident Prevention

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Tuesday 6th December 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Portsmouth South) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I thank the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) for his passionate speech and for all his work over the years, which is good to see.

I welcome the opportunity to speak in this debate as a follow-up to national road safety week a couple of weeks ago. The debate is also timely, with the announcement of a consultation on sentencing for those who cause death or serious injury. Those are issues of vital concern to my constituents, because there is a worrying number of injuries each year in Portsmouth. The trend is downwards, but for one group in particular—cyclists—we have one of the worst records in the country. Portsmouth is a compact, flat city, and it should be a cyclist’s dream, but our congested roads, poor driving and, it must be said, bad cycling habits make it a much more dangerous place to ride in than it should be. The latest reported figures show that Portsmouth has by far the worst cyclist casualty rate outside London at almost 90 per 100,000 of population. The rate for the south-east region is just 36 per 100,000 of population.

I hope the Government’s progress on the cycling and walking strategy will continue, but it must be backed up by investment if my constituents are to feel safe on the streets. I am concerned that there may be some drift on the strategy as financial pressures change, and I look forward to hearing confirmation that cycling safety is still a Government priority.

I welcome the consultation on sentencing for dangerous and careless driving, because one of the biggest causes of public concern is that drivers can kill, wrecking the lives of victims and their families, but end up with sentences that feel like neither a punishment nor a deterrent. Although the number of deaths in accidents has fallen dramatically, we should recognise that that is largely down to the improved safety features built into modern vehicles and that driver behaviour has not necessarily improved at quite the same rate.

Far too often, we hear of people being killed or seriously injured by drivers distracted by mobile devices. Our always-online society can tempt drivers to fiddle with gadgets while they drive but, as we have seen recently, the consequences can be lethal. Although we have not recently had a fatality in Portsmouth because of such distractions, the risk is apparent to anyone standing on a busy road. It is not good enough for drivers to argue that they are stationary in a jam or in slow-moving traffic in a city centre. If they are not concentrating on what is happening around them, they are a danger to everyone.

The action that has been taken legally and socially against drink-driving has gradually driven down the incidence of such offences. In 1979, 1,600 people were killed in drink-driving accidents; by 2014, the figure had been reduced to 240. That is still 240 too many, but it is a good example of what can be done with determined enforcement and social pressure. We need to make it just as socially unacceptable to use a mobile phone while driving as it is to drink and drive.

In the long term, I would like us all to move to more sustainable modes of transport, because that is the best way to improve road safety. In modern cities, the use of diesel and petrol vehicles to get around is becoming unsustainable because of the hazards it imposes, the threat of pollution, the difficulty of parking and the gridlock caused by the sheer weight of traffic. Those are all particular threats in Portsmouth, a densely populated area with poor road access and public transport that is in serious need of investment—I am not shy about lobbying Ministers on that. In an urban environment, a change in travelling behaviour will get people from A to B quicker than sitting in a car.

Road safety is everyone’s business and, as we have seen in our efforts to address the drink-drive menace, it is important that social pressure against bad habits is constant and backed up by Government action.

Cycling: Government Investment

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd February 2016 Westminster Hall

On resuming—

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Portsmouth South) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Chris Green) for securing this debate.

As a cyclist myself, although I do not wear Lycra, I am fortunate to live in Portsmouth, a compact, flat city in a beautiful setting, with the sea, two harbours and the Hampshire downs behind it. Portsmouth should be a paradise for cyclists, but in fact its casualty rate for cyclists is one of the highest in the country; indeed, it was second only to London in 2014. During a five-year period, 157 cyclists were killed or seriously injured on our streets, and quite rightly local cyclists are lobbying strongly for improvements to our roads, and for cultural change to bring that terrible figure down.

We have some great national groups fighting for cyclists, such as the CTC, but the figure I have just quoted comes from our excellent local cyclists group, the Portsmouth Cycle Forum. It has produced a strategy document called “A City to Share”. The vision of that document, and mine, is to make Portsmouth the cycling capital of the UK, and given what I said a moment ago about the city’s geography, people will see why that makes sense. The strategy document identifies five goals: a safer city; improved health outcomes; a stronger local economy; a better environment; and a more liveable city for everyone, not just cyclists.

Another source of inspiration for everyone is the Tour de France, which Portsmouth City Council hopes to bring back to our streets. We were lucky to be visited by the Tour over 20 years ago, and I know that the cyclists and organisers had a fantastic time touring our historic streets in Portsmouth and the beautiful Hampshire countryside. Since then, Portsmouth has seen a huge amount of renewal and the city would like to have le Grand Départ in 2019, to coincide with the 75th anniversary of the D-day landings. Any help the Minister can give to ensure that that event comes to Portsmouth would be helpful, not least to tourism. Any help—financial or otherwise—would be great.

I hope that, through the access fund, it will be possible to get support for a thorough survey in Portsmouth, so that we can match up the vision set out in “A City to Share” with the city council’s road strategy. We need to do that because the roads in Portsmouth are under growing pressure.

Finally, while we are debating cycling here in the context of what the UK Government can do, I want to remind everyone that there are all sorts of cycling schemes operating across the EU. Having recently pointed Portsmouth City Council in the direction of one such scheme, called FLOW, I want to make sure that everyone is getting the best out of the various programmes in Europe. We can learn a lot from best practice on the continent but, as with many other areas of policy, I am not sure that we are yet very good at ensuring that we tap into all the resources that are available through the European Union.

Rail Services: Portsmouth and the South-West

Flick Drummond Excerpts

Wednesday 21st October 2015 Westminster Hall

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Five Back-Bench Members wish to contribute to the debate. I will decide whether it is necessary to impose a time limit after the opening speech.

[Mrs Flick Drummond (Portsmouth South) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered rail services to Portsmouth and the South West.

It is such a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger.

We constantly hear about the northern powerhouse, but we hear little about the southern powerhouse. We hear how the Government are putting money into cities, businesses and infrastructure in the north, but where is the investment in the south? The south is an area of 3.6 million people that contributes 15% of the UK’s output, but when will we start hearing about investment in the southern powerhouse?

I represent Portsmouth, which is often referred to as a northern city in the south because of its background in heavy engineering, building and maintaining our Royal Navy. The immediate post-war decades took a heavy toll on our traditional industrial base, but the city has been transforming itself over the past 20 years—the Royal Navy is more technically advanced than ever before, we have diversified beyond defence and we have a brilliant entrepreneurial community, as well as new cutting-edge technological companies. However, we still have to fight hard for investment. Portsmouth suffers from the assumption in some quarters that all parts of the south and the south-east are prosperous and well provided with infrastructure. In fact, I represent a city with neighbourhoods that are among the very poorest in the country.

I secured this debate because of the poor rail service in Portsmouth, but anything that helps Portsmouth will help other cities on the Solent, the Isle of Wight, Hampshire, further west and points between that area and London. The train service from London to Portsmouth Harbour takes as long as it did in Victorian times: one hour and 40 minutes to travel just 70 miles. It is quicker for me to drive door-to-door to Westminster than it is for me to take the train. Compare that with Manchester, which is 217 miles from London and takes just a little over two hours on the train, as we all found out when we went to the Conservative party conference. Birmingham takes 85 minutes for a 125-mile journey, and it will take just 50 minutes when High Speed 2 has been completed.

The train between Portsmouth and Southampton, a journey of 20 miles, takes 65 minutes. Compare that with Nottingham to Derby, a journey of 15 miles, which takes just 23 minutes. Newcastle to Sunderland, 17 miles, takes just 18 minutes. The Solent local enterprise partnership, our local authorities and businesses do great work in trying to maximise the potential of the area around Portsmouth and Southampton, which is one of the most widely spread conurbations in the country, but the Solent has been left behind and will continue to be so unless we introduce new rail infrastructure.

[Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for securing this debate. As she says, this issue affects not only Hampshire and Portsmouth but our stations in Dorset. From London, it takes two hours and eight minutes to get to Poole, and two hours and 21 minutes to get to Wareham—the Minister has seen that station. Increased capacity and speeds would help to encourage people to use the railway, rather than the roads, thereby reducing congestion on roads such as the A351 in my constituency.

[Mrs Drummond]

My hon. Friend is right. As I continue, I hope that he will see some solutions. I am pleased that other places are behind me on this subject, because we must work together to show the Government why this is so important.

We often hear the area spoken of as the M27 corridor, but we need more than a motorway to make it a successful and competitive place to live and work in the 21st century. We need a sustainable transport policy that includes public transport and support for cycling provision, as well as making space for more cars. Other Members from along the route will highlight other areas affected by this debate, so I will concentrate on the Solent region, particularly Portsmouth.

Why are rail services important? The Chancellor is keen to increase productivity across the country, as he says in “Fixing the Foundations: Creating a more prosperous nation,” published in July 2015. He acknowledges that improving infrastructure is one of the many steps that he can take to improve the economy’s productivity. The Solent local enterprise partnership extends from Havant in the east to Southampton in the west and includes Winchester, Eastleigh and Fareham. Local productivity in the area, as measured by output per job, lags behind the south-east average by 15%. Portsmouth has some of the country’s most deprived areas, with wages falling well below those of other cities in the south-east. We must improve connectivity if we are to improve productivity.

By improving the train service, we would help employers by providing a wider choice of potential employees and, conversely, we would help employees have a greater choice of potential employers. We would help businesses broaden their markets and their supplier base. We would provide greater access to social infrastructure such as universities and city centres. All of that would increase the region’s productivity and help to improve the UK’s overall productivity.

Congestion on the main motorway connecting the area, the M27, is legendary. It can take anything from 30 minutes to two hours to travel by road between Portsmouth and Southampton. Traffic into Fareham and Gosport moves very slowly during rush hour. Some £250 million-worth of investment is going into upgrading the M27 to smart motorway status. Data from the Department for Transport tell us that traffic in one direction on the M27 between junctions 8 and 9 has increased from 99,000 vehicles a day to more than 112,000 vehicles a day. Even with improvements, the road will always struggle to cope.

The Atkins study “Economic Costs of Congestion in the Regions” states that congestion in the Hampshire region costs £400 million per annum and a further £100 million for Portsmouth and another £100 million for Southampton. That is eroding our productivity potential, and, if not addressed, will equal a loss in gross value added of 1.3% by 2025. The south Hampshire strategy document shows that total road trips are expected to increase by 11% in the period 2010 to 2026, which will increase time spent in queues by 53%. Business costs will increase, including the direct costs of drive time and fuel, but there will also be the indirect costs of logistics scheduling and general competitiveness and other costs such as increased pollution.

If there is no worsening of congestion within the Solent LEP area, we expect that the number of jobs will climb by 44,000 from 435,000 in 2006 to nearly 480,000 in 2026. If there is no infrastructure investment, we expect an increase of just 36,000 new jobs, a loss of 8,000 jobs. Figures from the last census show a flow of workers into Portsmouth of more than 40,000 a day, with 20,000 people leaving the city to work elsewhere. More jobs have been created since then, and the labour market figures every month show that the number of jobs is going up and up.

We need sustainable transport solutions to cater for those workers, but we need to ensure that we create the conditions that foster more high-skill, high-pay jobs, which requires investment. We have to build 75,000 houses in the Solent region over the next 10 years, so the congestion and infrastructure problems will just get worse. If we improve the rail service, we will be able to take traffic off the roads. We can improve the rail service by improving the speed and frequency of the service.

I believe there is a solution that will help not only Portsmouth and Southampton but the south-west towards Weymouth, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson) has mentioned, by helping to alleviate the crowding on trains on all lines going from the area to London Waterloo. There are three routes from Portsmouth to London, but I will focus on just two of those routes, both operated by South West Trains at present. One route goes via Havant, Haslemere, Petersfield and Guildford to Woking and Waterloo, and the other goes via Eastleigh, Winchester and Basingstoke to Woking and Waterloo. Both routes suffer from overcrowding and capacity constraints. The rail system is unable to cope with existing demand.

Network Rail published the excellent “Wessex Route Study” in August 2015, and it describes the problem and proposes solutions. The report says that the system is experiencing demand that is 20% greater than it can cope with and that, within the planning period, the demand is expected to grow still further by another 20%. Network Rail’s solution is summarised as follows: junction improvements and platform capacity at Basingstoke; and, again, junction improvements and platform capacity at Woking. Those two projects will cost £175 million each.

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. I hope that the Minister has noted the A-team turnout from Hampshire MPs. It takes a lot to get this many Hampshire MPs in one room, so I congratulate my hon. Friend on doing that.

In the previous Parliament, nearly £4 million was spent in my constituency on an improvement scheme at the railway station, which included parking, a new footbridge and improved wi-fi facilities and staffing of the station. Those were all fantastic, but they were icing on the cake. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to turn our attention to the cake itself? Ultimately, it is about building a bigger railway. We can put on more trains and deal with the three-plus-two seating issue, but unless we build a bigger railway and deal with Clapham Junction and London Waterloo, the problems back down the line for us will never change.

[Mrs Drummond]

I thank my hon. Friend for that very good intervention. I completely agree with him, and was about to come on to that point.

We need a new line between Surbiton and Clapham Junction to relieve capacity, and we strongly support the development of Crossrail 2. Those measures will help Portsmouth by cutting 10 minutes from the journey during peak times, as the train would not have to take the slow route avoiding Woking. However, it will still take about 90 minutes, the same time as it takes during off-peak times. The Wessex route study also proposes building an overtaking loop along the Havant to Guildford line that would enable faster services to overtake the slow services. If that was implemented, Portsmouth would be well on the way to having the same sort of services it had in the 1970s, when it was possible to get from Portsmouth to London in 75 minutes by train.

However, that is not all. That solution does not address the problem of connectivity within the Hampshire and Solent area. It is almost as fast to get from Portsmouth to Gatwick airport as it is to get from Portsmouth to Southampton airport, even though Gatwick is nearly five times the distance. To address the problem, all we need is the building of a chord at Eastleigh, or increasing the junction’s capacity to enable a train from Portsmouth to head south as well as north at the junction. That would enable a direct service from Portsmouth to Southampton airport and Southampton and save a lot of time.

The existing route to Eastleigh is made up of a number of single-track sections. Those have to be made into double-track sections, which together with upgraded signalling would enable service frequency to be improved, which would help to attract passengers. Network Rail estimated in its route utilisation strategy that that would cost £135 million. The improvements would not only help Portsmouth connect with its neighbours, but enormously improve the journey for passengers getting from Brighton to Bournemouth and Weymouth, and from Weymouth to Basingstoke, Winchester and London.

When high-voltage electrification of the main line takes place, train speed can increase and we can start getting the same level of service that the rest of the country enjoys. Overhead electrification in the region, as already partly allowed for in the electric spine proposals, would make a big difference to train speed, and I would like that included in any proposal. It would make technical sense. Modern rolling stock uses alternating current motors. Converting high-voltage AC from the national grid down to 750 V DC for the third rail and then converting it back to AC on the train to power it makes no sense at all. We already know that the South West Trains Desiro fleet is unable to operate on some parts of our lines at high speed because there is not the power capacity in the trackside equipment to permit it. High-voltage overhead electrification overcomes those problems.

Those measures would help improve productivity throughout the region. They would certainly help transform the economy in Portsmouth. In the “Rail Value for Money Study”, Sir Roy McNulty said that we should make best use of existing railways before considering new investment. The cost of the improvements as outlined is extremely small compared with that of new rail projects, such as High Speed 2 or Crossrail 2. There have been practically no major infrastructure rail projects on the line since 1967. The line from Portsmouth to Southampton was electrified only in 1989. In 2007, there was an expensive package of signal and power upgrades on the Portsmouth direct line. Not only did those works overrun, drawing a large fine for Network Rail, but we still have constant signal and power failures right from the point that the supposed upgrade was installed. That causes massive inconvenience for a large number of our constituents and damages our economic prospects.

Passenger satisfaction on routes from Portsmouth to London is among the lowest in the country. The latest national rail passenger survey shows that just 60% of passengers on the route think there is sufficient room. I am surprised it is that high, given the three-plus-two seating of the suburban stock on which my long-distance travelling constituents have to sit on their way to London. I am sure that some of my colleagues will talk about that. We now have no proper long-distance stock on peak services on the direct route from Portsmouth to London. Portsmouth passengers give a huge thumbs-down to the value for money of their ticket, with just 31% feeling satisfied.

Most of what I have covered is not new. It has been analysed, but nothing has been done. The measures would make journeys faster and have a major effect, taking people off the roads and making it easier to move around the whole area. The growth in passenger numbers on the Manchester to London line has increased by having services every 20 minutes. Increasing the number of trains an hour would be expected to help increase the numbers of passengers who travel by train in our area. The impact of faster trains on the economy along the Solent region, including a fast train from the south-west region and from Portsmouth to London, would be a massive boost to the southern powerhouse.

We must also remember our friends across the Solent. I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Mr Turner) is here. I know he will have a lot to say. There are commuters who travel from the Isle of Wight to London every day. The Isle of Wight is a vital part of the regional economy. Its trade passes through Portsmouth with Wightlink and Hovertravel, and through Southampton with Red Funnel. I am delighted that a new operator, Scoot, is coming on to the Portsmouth to Cowes route. Improving rail links to the ports will help the Isle of Wight develop as a place to visit and to do business, and it will help the ports, too.

The Chancellor, while looking at the opportunities that could make up the northern powerhouse, must not forget the goose that lays the golden eggs in the south. The south requires only incremental amounts of investment to continue increasing production.

Portsmouth would be transformed by having a fast train service to London and along the Solent region. Any investment in our infrastructure will have an immediate impact on the local area, not forgetting that South West Trains already contributes £374 million per annum to the Exchequer, which could be reinvested to make that investment happen. I know that other Members will be talking about the quality of trains and the impact on their areas, but I hope that this debate will put down a marker to ensure that our rail infrastructure is upgraded to the same level as the rest of the country.

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

Six Members have indicated that they wish to speak. Do the maths. If everyone is reasonably sensible, all colleagues should be able to get in.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Drummond]

I thank my hon. Friend for turning up. I think that there are solutions to the problem. I will be pursuing it, and I am sure that we will all work together on that. As part of that, I will write a report to the Chancellor to see whether we can get some funding as well. Thank you, Sir Roger, for your chairmanship of the debate.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered rail services to Portsmouth and the South West.