Accessibility of Railway Stations: Dulwich and West Norwood

Helen Hayes Excerpts

Tuesday 9th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to bring before the House the significant issues that affect my constituents across Dulwich and West Norwood because of the lack of accessibility at our local railway stations.

The Dulwich and West Norwood constituency covers part of Lambeth and part of Southwark. Unlike much of the north of those boroughs, we are poorly served by the London underground network; there is only Brixton tube station, just inside a corner of my constituency. Instead, my constituents rely on rail and buses to get to central and outer London, as well as for more local journeys. We have many stations—10 to be precise, with an 11th just outside the boundary. The stations in my constituency are Brixton, East Dulwich, Gipsy Hill, Herne Hill, Loughborough Junction, North Dulwich, Sydenham Hill, Tulse Hill, West Dulwich and West Norwood. Only three—Herne Hill, East Dulwich and West Norwood—are accessible, and only Herne Hill meets up-to-date standards of accessibility and has lifts to all platforms. The ramps at East Dulwich station are too steep, and West Norwood ticket office is not step-free, although the platforms are accessible from the street.

The lack of step-free access at our local railway stations causes major problems for many of my constituents. Wheelchair users are effectively locked out of rail travel entirely at inaccessible stations. Parents and carers for small children may or may not manage to carry or drag their buggy up and down flights of stairs at their station. Even if they can, it is neither safe nor comfortable. Frail and elderly passengers are confronted with impossibly difficult climbs; there are really long flights of stairs at several stations. Loughborough Junction and West Dulwich in particular have long, steep flights of stairs that can be difficult and daunting for many passengers.

The lack of accessibility at our local stations is counter to two of the Government’s strategic objectives. Inaccessible stations are a significant barrier to work for many physically disabled people, who cannot easily access employment in the wider London economy because they cannot get to work from Dulwich and West Norwood. Further, many people will not make the modal shift from private cars to public transport, as the Government want them to, while our stations remain inhospitable and inaccessible because the only way to access the platforms is via a steep flight of stairs.

During every round of Access for All funding since I was first elected more than a decade ago, I have pressed for stations in my constituency to be granted funding to increase the number of step-free stations, but the previous Government failed to prioritise investment in my constituency. Herne Hill was upgraded with the installation of lifts under the Access for All programme in 2013. That is more than a decade with no further advancement in the accessibility of local rail travel.

[Daniel Francis (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Lab)]

I welcome and support my hon. Friend’s campaign. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group for wheelchair users, I campaign a lot on these issues. Transport for London has an excellent app that shows which stations are wheelchair accessible and which have lift access, and I believe we should introduce that nationally. We should also introduce a campaign for accessible toilets, as well as for lifts and wheelchair access. Would my hon. Friend welcome expanding the app nationally, as it is currently available only in London?

[Helen Hayes]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention and for all his work on this important set of issues. He is absolutely right to say that full accessibility is about more than simply level access, and also that information about accessibility at different rail stations is vital to whether travellers will be able to travel, particularly if they are visiting somewhere outside their home area. I support his campaign for better information.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

rose—

[Jim Shannon]

The hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) is right to bring this topic forward; I spoke to her beforehand. I believe that the Government need to provide what she is trying to achieve for her constituency in every constituency, as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group, the hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis), clearly outlined. There is something wrong when rail staff cannot be in place to help with accessibility without people having to ring 24 hours ahead. Does the hon. Lady further agree that this has to form part of our rail obligations, wherever that may be in the United Kingdom? What is right for her constituents in Dulwich and West Norwood is right for everywhere else, including my constituency. Does she agree that the Government must focus on a strategy that gives equality to those who are disabled in our communities?

[Helen Hayes]

I am honoured to be intervened on in an Adjournment debate by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), and I thank him for his intervention. He is right that adequate staffing at railway stations is a really important part of making stations accessible. All too often, disabled passengers have to endure unacceptably long waits when there is a failure in communication. The railway operating companies need to continue to improve their service so that not only the stations but rail travel itself is fully accessible and disabled passengers can get the support to which they are entitled.

All our stations should be accessible, and it is therefore important that the Government work to increase the funding available and make changes to the criteria for Access for All funding. Currently, the Access for All programme prioritises stations with high levels of footfall and the availability of third-party funding—usually through local development—as well as proximity to a hospital or major interchange and non-specific rail industry priorities. The majority of the 10 stations in my constituency are busy but would not rank among the highest footfall locations in the country. They do not have significant development sites in close proximity or other third-party sources of funding available. They are not next to a hospital and we cannot account for non-specific rail industry priorities.

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall and Bloxwich) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend mentioned stations in her constituency, and I would like to mention Bescot Stadium station in my constituency. Does she agree that if a station is inaccessible, the figures that are quoted for its footfall will be much lower?

[Helen Hayes]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that the figures cannot account for passengers who cannot access a station, and I welcome her campaign for the station in her constituency. This is a national issue. The high number of stations in Dulwich and West Norwood makes it an acute issue in my constituency, but this is a problem everywhere.

When I have inquired about how best to make the case for stations in my constituency, I am told to make representations to the Government and through the Access for All process. I have done so, but there is no process outside of public pressure and political lobbying prior to Access for All applications being submitted to support local communities with a more strategic approach. We need an approach that enables us to join up community views and aspirations with transport feasibility work to understand how to prioritise in a realistic way which of our stations are most likely to secure funding because of their footfall.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

If one of my hon. Friend’s constituents in Dulwich or West Norwood were to get a train to my constituency in Longton—there is a tenuous connection—they would also find that station to be entirely inaccessible. Unlike her case, funding was allocated to Longton train station through the transforming cities fund, but the local authority then decided to reallocate that funding to block paving outside one of the town halls for public realm improvements. Perhaps when she is successful in getting the funding that her station deserves, she will support a campaign to ringfence that funding and protect it so that it cannot be siphoned off for other local projects that often do not support the accessibility for which the funding was designed.

[Helen Hayes]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention, and I will come on to some of the points about the better co-ordination needed to solve some of these problems.

We need an approach that enables us to join things up to understand which of our stations are most likely to secure funding because of their footfall, because they link up with particular bus routes or because they are relatively lower cost and therefore easier to deliver. The process, as it stands, is not transparent, and there is no support available for communities to prepare for it. As an example, I have been approached by residents in Dulwich in recent weeks who would like my support in moving forward a proposal for step-free access at North Dulwich station. A feasibility study would be helpful so we can all understand where lifts could be installed and the broad costs of doing so. But Southwark council has no land interest in North Dulwich station, and there are no major development sites in the local area. At a time when local authority funding is constrained, it would be helpful to have the Minister’s advice on how to move such a proposal forward.

Another example of the urgent need for more joined-up preparatory support is Loughborough Junction station, currently being supported by a local community campaign called “Lift Up Loughborough Junction”. A tiny station occupying just half a railway arch, Loughborough Junction has a particularly long, steep flight of stairs up to its two platforms. It has seen an increase in passenger use compared with pre-covid levels, likely as a consequence of new nearby housing development. Through that development, some funding has been allocated towards improvements at the station, but there is at present no mechanism to decide how that is to be spent or to deliver the improvements.

Delivering step-free access at Loughborough Junction station is complicated. It cannot be done within the current station’s curtilage due to insufficient space, so the station would need to expand either into adjacent arches or on to a site to the rear of the current station. The ownership of those sites is complex, with the Arch Company responsible for neighbouring arches, Network Rail responsible for the structural integrity of the arches, the train operating company Southern responsible for the station, and private land ownership to the rear. If we are to solve the problem of accessibility at the station, there must be a way of joining up those interests, undertaking feasibility work, creating partnerships that can bid for funding together and moving the project forward. As residential development in the area continues to expand, a station that already feels unsafe at peak times due to the large number of passengers will become more and more dangerously overcrowded, and disabled residents, families with young children, and frail and elderly people will continue to be locked out of rail travel.

In 2018, the then Government’s inclusive transport strategy set out the aim of achieving equal access to the rail network by 2030. That is just a few years away, and we are very far away from realising that goal. In the meantime, Government policy has continued, quite rightly, to seek to deliver continued modal shift from private cars to public transport where possible, but modal shift does not happen by encouragement alone. It requires meaningful levels of Government investment to make public transport an accessible, convenient and attractive option, and accessibility is the basic minimum requirement. The Government can encourage people all they like, but if they are literally locked out of using public transport, it will not make a difference for residents with disabilities, parents who need to travel with young children, the less mobile and the elderly.

I secured this debate to seek help from my hon. Friend the Minister. Is he considering the criteria for future rounds of Access for All funding so that areas such as mine, with many inaccessible stations, will not continue to be overlooked by that funding stream because we do not have the highest levels of footfall, major transport interchanges or nearby development sites. What representations is he making to the Chancellor in relation to the Budget about the overall quantum of Access for All funding, so that future rounds of the scheme can start to deliver the step change in railway station accessibility that is needed across the whole country? Is he underlining to the Chancellor that Access for All funding should be part of the strategy to support disabled people who want to work to get to work?

Will the Minister consider a better approach to pre-bidding support for Access for All, on a locality basis, to help local communities and councils to understand how best to prioritise their stations for Access for All bids, and to create strong local partnerships in which multiple agencies need to be involved? May I ask for his support in relation specifically to the complex situation at Loughborough Junction station, and to the need for a feasibility study for North Dulwich station and feasibility work at Gipsy Hill station, which requires accessibility works to one platform only? Finally, can he tell disabled people in Dulwich and West Norwood, and across the country, when they can expect the equal access to the rail network that is their right?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

This is a very important debate. Minister, you may wish to take this opportunity to reflect on the accessibility funding application of Wadhurst station in my constituency of Sussex Weald.