Rail Links: South-west England

Gary Streeter Excerpts

Tuesday 24th October 2017 Westminster Hall

[Mr Gary Streeter (South West Devon) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your very experienced chairmanship, Mr Evans. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) for securing this debate and for the measured way in which he introduced it. I welcome the new energy he brings to this debate.

To my surprise and to the astonishment of my constituents, I have been here for 25 years: 13 under a Labour Government and 12 under a Conservative Government—I suppose in a year’s time it will be even steven. The reality is that in those 25 years we have not received the investment in the south-west rail link that we deserve. It is time that we put that right and our patience is wearing thin.

Although it is good news that the Government have announced another £400 million for the northern powerhouse—I am sure you have a smile on your face, Mr Evans, as it is just down the road from you—for those of us in other parts of the country, particularly when we feel undervalued and under-loved over the years, it is another slap in the face. They are getting so many millions of pounds in the midlands and the north and so on, but what about us? We are looking forward to hearing better news in the months and years ahead.

As the hon. Gentleman said, this did not begin in 2014 when the Dawlish line went down, but when we saw those images of the railway line swinging in mid-air, and when we were cut off from the rest of the country for six weeks—it seemed a lot longer—it released an outpouring of angst and anger from us in Devon and Cornwall. It was an icon of how we had been under-invested in for all those years. That was partly negative anger, but it did galvanise a lot of support in the west country, in the far south-west, in the great south-west. I agree that that is, as he said, a “snazzy moniker”: the great south-west—I like it; we should use it. That galvanised many things. We took the PRTF to see the then Prime Minister and the idea of a 20-year plan was born. He said, “I know it’s expensive, but we can do it bit by bit over 20 years. Put it all in one document, and we will deliver on it.” Now we have to deliver.

I think the Rail Minister is doing a fantastic job and I to pay tribute to him for the interest he has shown in our region. Whenever we have had meetings with him he is on the case, he knows his stuff and he has done his homework. However, I think it is disappointing that the Government are not going to respond formally. We thought they would respond to this 20-year report and I am sorry that they are not.

Things have not stood still since we submitted the report last November. More money has been spent on Dawlish. There has been extensive work east of Exeter—not as much as we want to see, but there has been work there. There are incremental upgrading works throughout the region. We are getting new trains—something we all look forward to—but that is not yet enough, far from it, to redress the imbalance of decades of under-investment, especially before privatisation, but perhaps that is something for another debate.

I want to row in behind those calling for specific responses from the Government. There are three things I want to say, but before I do, something we have not discussed but which is in the 20-year plan is the Government’s thinking about local services, for example, from Exeter to Okehampton and from Plymouth towards north Cornwall. It would be good to hear the Minister’s thoughts on that. It is not directly related to the inter-city movement from Penzance to Paddington, but it is very important for local services. It does the transmodal thing, and it will help move people around in the region. I strongly support the PRTF request for £600,000 for the study. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Many of us have written to the Minister about that and I hope he can give us some good news—if not today, soon.

I have long believed that spot, or discrete, electrification is a significant way forward. If we can model that on the Devon banks, we can put it into operation throughout the journey, and it will help to speed up journey times without the need to electrify rail all the way down—I understand that, but we have to start somewhere and I would love to start in the Devon banks over the next few months.

I will conclude, with some passion: on-board connectivity is absolutely critical. The local enterprise partnership did a survey of businesses last year: “What do you want? What’s your highest priority?” They did not say journey times, they did not talk about resilience, although all those things are important. They said, “When we are on the train, we want to be able to use our mobile phones and computers. We want to be able to plug into our offices and the world out there, as other people in other regions can.” We need to see investment and energy from the Government on that. I thought the answer would be to make the train operating companies do it in franchise renewal, but a new idea has emerged recently. I do not know where it has been hiding, but it is a great idea. If Network Rail is happy to allow the mobile phone companies to attach their transmitters— I do not know how the technology works—to send signals from existing Network Rail infrastructure alongside the track, which I gather rejoices under the name of GSM-R, and which they are piloting in Scotland, that could solve our problems. We do not want it in control period 6; we want it now, in 2018, and we want to see progress on that. It would transform the way in which the rail service is valued by men and women in the west country. The plan is clear, the ask is clear, and the need is obvious. We want no more excuses from Government. It is time to deliver.