Rail Fares

Debate between Henry Smith and Heidi Alexander

Wednesday 11th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Heidi Alexander]

Energy was just one of the things that I mentioned. Most people would recognise that the cost of living is going up considerably. However, I agree with the hon. Gentleman when he says that, with fares going up, our constituents—the public—expect to see an improvement in service, getting some bang for their buck. When the trains roll into stations in my constituency, they are rammed full of people. This morning I tried to get on the 8.32 train from Lewisham and had to wait for the next one to come along. The previous Government put in place a number of measures to increase capacity on some of the suburban lines coming into London.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Heidi Alexander]

I am afraid I will not give way; I have limited time. With the railways Minister present, I would like to make the point that that increase in capacity, lengthening trains to 12 cars, is incredibly important. Also, the new rolling stock on the suburban lines is critical. The new rolling stock has much more standing room, which my constituents are calling out for.

My problem with the increase in train fares is that it is making it much more difficult for my constituents to find work. A single man on low pay working in central London came to my surgery recently. He said that he was gravely worried about whether he could afford to get to work. If people are not able to stay in work or have to look for other jobs, that will add to the bill that the Government are paying out in jobseeker’s allowance. I have fundamental concerns about the impact of rising fares on people’s ability to stay in work. The Campaign for Better Transport has estimated that in London, if two parents are working and have two children in child care, that can swallow up 40% of the household’s income. Hundreds of pounds added each year to the cost of getting about in London will make a significant difference to household budgets.

Not only is it important that train fares are affordable so that people can go about their daily lives, get to work and stay in jobs, but everyone in the Chamber would recognise that ultimately we need to do more to get people on to public transport. The environmental benefits of getting people out of their cars, reducing congestion and pollution by getting them on to the trains and buses, are key. If people do not believe that public transport is affordable to them, we will not see the change in behaviour that all of us in the Chamber want.

In the few minutes remaining to me, I shall pick up on some of the remarks made earlier by the Secretary of State about the proposals put forward by Labour’s candidate for Mayor, Ken Livingstone, on fares policy. She suggested that in some way the 7% cut in fares that Ken Livingstone is promising for October this year would fundamentally destabilise Transport for London budgets. TfL has costed the proposal at £215 million. At present TfL works with an operating surplus of £727 million. It is possible and it can be done. That is why it is the right policy for Ken Livingstone to pursue.

I conclude by saying that it has always interested me that we view public money spent on roads as an investment, yet public money spent on railways as a subsidy. For me, the sooner that changes, the better.

National Planning Policy Framework

Debate between Henry Smith and Heidi Alexander

Thursday 20th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

I speak today as someone who has spent four years of my life dealing with the planning system in London. Before becoming an MP, I was a councillor in Lewisham and had responsibility for regeneration. I worked with planners, with developers and with the community, and I can say that in some ways it was the best job of my life and in others the worst.

I know how controversial planning applications can be, and I know how fiercely people will defend their own interests. There is nothing wrong with that, but someone, somewhere has to take a decision about the wider interests of the community, and indeed the wider interests of the country. Sometimes that will fall to councillors, but sometimes the responsibility will stop at the door of the Government. I have a real concern that on the evidence of the past 18 months this Government are not up to the task. They want to wash their hands of the task of setting out a vision of where in the country new homes will be built and where new jobs will be created. They talk about sustainable development but fail to provide an adequate definition. They hide behind a smokescreen of empowering communities through neighbourhood plans, but then use the planning system as a political football to justify the lack of economic growth.

In my view, the planning system is a vital tool in helping to create places where people want to live.

[Henry Smith]

Will not the hon. Lady concede that during the last decade and a bit of the previous Government, despite the massive top-down, centrally planned housing targets, house building fell to its lowest level since the 1920s? How does she reconcile those two things?

[Heidi Alexander]

I know that the hon. Gentleman has not been here for the whole debate. We have heard convincing evidence from a number of hon. Members about how house building and, most importantly, the building of affordable houses increased over the last decade.

I was setting out why I believe the planning system is so important. It is one of the only ways in which we can determine where to locate the things that we all need but perhaps do not like, such as places to deal with our rubbish and noisy hospitals with lots of traffic. It is also one of the only ways in which we can start to change how we live in the future. It is a simple fact that we need fewer cars on our roads. That will happen only if the jobs of tomorrow are located in places where public transport is good and if new homes are built in places where people can walk to the shops. That is what sustainable development is about. It is not just about shiny bits of eco kit on buildings; it is about how we live our lives. It is about investment in our town centres, making the most of brownfield land in our cities and protecting those parts of the countryside that we all hold dear.

The Government tell us that the planning system is a brake on economic growth and that planners are the enemies of enterprise. That is rubbish. In 2010-11, 86% of planning applications were approved, and 90% of commercial applications were approved. In London, planning permission exists for 170,000 homes on which work has yet to start. It is not the planning system that is stopping those homes being built; it is the availability of developer and mortgage finance.