Rising Cost of Transport

Debate between Iain Stewart and Mark Lazarowicz

Wednesday 9th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con)]

I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to the debate. This is an important issue; there is a serious debate to be had about how we finance investment in the rail industry in future and about the cost of transport today. Like hon. Friends who have spoken, I will have no problem in voting against the Opposition motion; with depressing predictability, it is rather opportunistic, denies their record and contains few concrete proposals for the future. I asked the House of Commons Library for figures on how much rail fares increased between 1997 and 2010. The answer was 56% for local and regional operators and 98% for long-distance trains. Rail fare increases did not begin in May 2010.

My first main point is that although the debate on rail fare increases is important, the reporting is not always helpful or accurate; the headline turn-up-and-go “Anytime” rail fares are often cited and from that it is extrapolated that Britain has the most expensive rail system in Europe. However, those tickets account for less than 20% of ticket sales. When we look at the whole series of available fares, the position is not as straightforward.

In preparing for this debate, I looked at the Virgin Trains website for a hypothetical journey from Manchester to London. Yes, if I wanted to travel in peak time, turn up and go, a single would cost £154—a large sum. However, a wide selection of other fares for the same journey, as low as £12.50, was available on a wide range of trains. The point is that we have to look at the whole mix of fares, not just the headline ones.

We do not have the same debate in the airline industry. The difference between the cheapest and most expensive air flights on the same route, say to New York, is enormous—from a couple of hundred pounds to £1,500 if someone wanted to turn up and go.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I am sure that it is possible to get a £12.50 fare from Manchester on Virgin Trains on some occasions. However, does the hon. Gentleman not accept that that £12.50 will be valid to London Euston, but if he wants to go to Brighton, Dover or the south-west of England with a different operator, he will not be able to get a through ticket at that rate? He will have to get two separate tickets, which might cost more than a single through ticket, because he will not be able to get a cheap through ticket.

[Iain Stewart]

I accept that there is an unnecessary complexity in the rail ticketing system. The Transport Committee has looked at that issue and will continue to do so. If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will not go too far down that path, as time is limited, but he has made a valid point.

The comparison with Europe is interesting. A very good website called “The Man in Seat Sixty-One” does an independent comparison of European rail fares. Yes, when you look at the “walk up and go any time” fares, the UK is substantially more expensive, but on other tickets, including buying the day before, Britain is either on a par with France, Germany or Italy or very often considerably cheaper.

I mention that because when we talk about rail fares, we need to differentiate between passengers compelled to travel at a particular time of day and the vast majority who have some flexibility over when they travel. The Opposition are right to highlight in the motion the issue of super-peak tickets, but they miss an important point. I completely accept that some passengers will not be able to change their time of travel, but others can. A super-peak ticket should not be designed to increase prices but to give rail operators the flexibility to discount other peak-time travel and encourage passengers to travel slightly later or earlier if possible.

Legislation (Territorial Extent) Bill

Debate between Iain Stewart and Mark Lazarowicz

Friday 9th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mark Lazarowicz]

The hon. Gentleman knows that the procedure to which he refers does not in any sense imply that Members outside Scotland cannot vote on the final stages of measures. The Bill is very much the thin end of the wedge and would create two classes of Members of Parliament. That is my fundamental concern.

A Government could have a majority that depends on votes in Scotland, Wales or northern England—people assume that that would be a Labour Government, but politics change, and what happens in 10, 20, 30 or 40 years may not be what people expect from today’s politics. After all, some 60 years ago, the Conservative party had a majority of seats and votes in Scotland, so we must think of the long-term consequences. If a Government had a UK majority in the House that depended on votes outside England, Bills that applied “only to England”, on which Members outside England could not vote, would need to be supported by the Opposition. The Government would therefore not be the Government for large parts of the legislative programme. Opposition spokespeople would be the de facto Ministers for Education, Health and so on for England, and the real UK Ministers could not perform their roles because they would effectively not command a majority in the House. That would move us towards a position whereby there were two Governments in the House: a UK Government and a second Government formed by the shadow Front Bench for those “English-only” matters where there was no majority for that Government. We would reach that position if we followed the route of not allowing Members of Parliament outside England to vote on specific matters.

My position is clear. If there is genuine concern among people in England—I accept that there may well be—it should be addressed through proper devolution, and perhaps a proper English Parliament, not by trying to tinker with arrangements in this House in such a way as to undermine its working.

[Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman was a strong advocate of Scottish devolution in the 1990s. One of the arguments of the pro-devolutionists was that, when there was a UK majority in the House but Scotland voted another way, there was a democratic deficit. If that was correct for Scotland, why does the same not apply to England?

[Mark Lazarowicz]

If I were to try to answer that question, I would go beyond the amendment. I might be able to address that point on Third Reading, if it is made again.

I am concerned that the Bill might lead to the creation of two Governments in the House. It is liable to lead to genuine disagreement, tension and political division between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. I do not want that to happen. I strongly support a Scottish Parliament and devolution elsewhere in the UK, but I want us to remain together as one UK. That is why there is a fundamental flaw in the concept of two classes of Member in the House. That was a preamble to considering amendment 6, which would at least improve the position.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Iain Stewart and Mark Lazarowicz

Tuesday 21st June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Iain Stewart]

The hon. Gentleman anticipates my next point exactly. It is too crude to look at the four constituent nations of the United Kingdom. In Scotland and in England we need to break that down further and look, as he says, at the different needs in the different parts of the kingdom. I will give a constituency example. My constituency, Milton Keynes South, is in the affluent south-east of England, yet I have very deprived wards in my constituency. Taking health spending as an example, what Milton Keynes is allocated as its formula share of health spending in England is capped because there is a transfer to other parts of England. I contend that that is not fair and it disregards some of the areas of need in my constituency, but it illustrates the problem that arises if the formula for analysing spending is too crude.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, spending per head in London is almost 50% higher than in the south-east region of England. No one disputes that there are parts of London where there is great need, but other parts which do not fall into that category still benefit from Government spending which is 40% higher than in his constituency.

Scotland Bill

Debate between Iain Stewart and Mark Lazarowicz

Thursday 27th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Iain Stewart]

My right hon. Friend makes a powerful point.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

Perhaps I should add that the Basque country and Catalonia have always had higher gross national product rates than the rest of Spain, so I do not think that the point made by the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) has much weight.

[Iain Stewart]

I am grateful for that intervention. I think it is unhelpful to make an exact analogy with a particular model. Spain has a very curious multi-speed system of devolution between its different constituent parts.

I promised to discuss why I do not believe, certainly at this point, that fiscal autonomy is feasible or desirable for the Scottish Parliament. There are huge unknowns in the fiscal relationship between Scotland and England, for the simple reason that we have never assigned tax revenues or allocated public spending on a straight territorial basis—that just has not happened. As part of our research for the book, I spent many hours enjoying and analysing the various forecasts and documents that the Scottish National party had published over the years giving its view on what Scotland’s net contribution to or net borrowing from the United Kingdom had been.

Part of the SNP’s criticism was that the official Government figures, as published in the annual Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland survey, were based on assumptions about what Scotland’s share of corporation tax or income tax should be. However, the SNP’s own figures are based on assumptions and projections. They disagree with the assumptions made, but they could not analyse particularly and exactly what the Scottish revenues were.

--- Later in debate ---

[Iain Stewart]

I believe that it would be a difficulty, and I have seen no evidence from the Scottish National party that properly costs this or assesses what the split would be.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

Are not the economies of England, Scotland and the rest of the UK so closely integrated and dependent on each other that the consequences would not be the same as might be the case for, say, Germany and France? On the hon. Gentleman’s point about Standard Life, I am not normally someone who tries to air scare tactics about what might happen to the financial services sector under independence, but would there not be a danger that some companies, faced with the choices and difficulties that he has outlined, might choose to move their headquarters out of Scotland precisely because of the consequences of a differential in corporation tax rates?

[Iain Stewart]

That is exactly the point. The relationship between Scotland and England is so interwoven that to start to unpick it now would be hugely complicated and difficult. On the point about pensions, I have mentioned the potential difficulties under the current proposals that would need to be clarified. If there were full fiscal autonomy, those problems would be magnified many times over. People might have made national insurance contributions all through their lives. How would all that be untangled to sort out the different rights and contributions? The process would be enormously complicated. I am not saying that it would be impossible, but I do not believe that it is practical at this point in time. I hope that my right hon. Friends on the Front Bench will take up my point that we should move towards assigning revenues and spending on a straight territorial basis, so that in time we might be able to move to a system involving much greater devolution of fiscal power down to the Scottish Parliament.