Huw Irranca-Davies
Main Page: Huw Irranca-Davies (Labour - Ogmore)Department Debates - View all Huw Irranca-Davies's debates with the Department for Transport
(13 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hammond
I can assure my right hon. Friend that in re-designing the franchise arrangements, as we have committed to do, we will want to consider the opportunities for train operators to contribute to infrastructure improvements and to work more closely with Network Rail. We will also ensure that train operators’ financial interests are clearly aligned with passengers’ interests so that, under new franchises, when we have an overcrowding problem it will be in the train operator’s interest to deal with that problem with its own money rather than, as under the current system, having to come to the Government cap in hand to ask us to solve the problem.
Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore) (Lab)
I have a direct question for the right hon. Gentleman. Will the outcome of the further long-grass review that he is considering for south Wales, Bristol and the whole line to London deliver rail electrification all the way to Swansea—not to Bristol, but to Swansea? In the run-up to the election in May, all parties stood on a platform of delivering rail electrification all the way to Swansea. The Secretary of State for Wales, the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), has made a principled point on behalf of her constituents, saying that it is a resigning matter if a different link goes through her constituency. Will she apply the same principle if she fails to deliver rail electrification into Wales?
Mr Hammond
I can answer the hon. Gentleman’s question to me, but I cannot answer for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales; he will have to address his question to her in person. There has to be a business case for electrification. We will work with the Welsh Assembly Government to strengthen and build that business case over the next few weeks and I shall make an announcement to the House as soon as we have made a decision on the IEP procurement that will cover both IEP and further electrification on the great western main line.