Rail Connections to London: Rural Towns

James Naish Excerpts

Monday 23rd March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Amanda Hack]

I have every sympathy with the point that my hon. Friend is making. My train has been cancelled for six decades, which shows the impact in my constituency.

There is a real issue with connectivity. I would welcome the Minister setting out what assessment has been made of the economic benefits of previous lines in the restoring your railway project since the updates to the Green Book, particularly in the light of the recently opened Northumberland line service, which has smashed its projections on putting more passengers on to the network by 40%.

[James Naish (Rushcliffe) (Lab)]

I am sorry for intervening on my hon. Friend, but as my constituency neighbour, I am sure she will understand why I do so. Many of her constituents use East Midlands Parkway station in my constituency to get down to London, and we are fortunate to have that direct line, but it is not electrified, which means that it is not the quickest line and it creates pollution. The procurement of the next phase of the midland main line electrification was delayed by the 2024 general election and then the spending review, despite it being worth £400 million in socioeconomic benefits. Will she support me and other colleagues here this evening—I know that another Member will be raising this point later—in urging that that decision be looked at?

[Amanda Hack]

Electrification of that line is long overdue, and it is something that I worked on as a county councillor before I came to this place. It really will be important to the east midlands.

My constituents tell me that if they are getting into their car to drive to the nearest station, they may as well just keep driving, and that is what happens. It is therefore unsurprising that roughly 80% of east midlands commuters drive and that the average number of rail journeys per resident is just seven per year, which is half the rate of the west midlands and a third of that of the east of England. I would welcome the Minister’s views not only on the economic impacts of connecting rural towns to London but on the added advantage of connecting rural towns to each other, which was a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Shrewsbury.

At my Ivanhoe line debate in Westminster Hall at the start of the year, the Minister told me to keep holding the Department’s feet to the fire, and I will continue to do that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jonathan Davies (Mid Derbyshire) (Lab)]

I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Shrewsbury (Julia Buckley) has secured this debate about connections between London and rural towns by rail because many of the issues on which she touched apply to my own constituency in Derbyshire.

This morning I was at Broomfield Hall college, an agricultural college with a fantastic equestrian centre, to launch the findings of my survey of young people. Over 500 young people in Derbyshire contributed to the survey. It has given me some rich insights into issues that I must take forward in this place on their behalf. One of the issues that came through in that survey was a lack of good transport links for rural and semi-rural towns in Derbyshire. When I come to London every week, it never ceases to amaze me how extensive, resilient and cheap the transport is and how late it runs. That is not the experience of many people around this country, and we must address that so that opportunity is in the hands of people wherever they live and whatever their background, not concentrated in London and the south-east.

I know how serious this Government are about the railways. Great British Railways is a significant intervention, and we are pleased that it will be hosted in Derby, because although there is some contention about this, I contend that Derby is the home of the railways. We have the largest rail manufacturing cluster in Europe, and George Stephenson’s final resting place is in Derbyshire too. Despite its railway pedigree, there is no electrified line through Derbyshire—it stops in Leicestershire, and then that section of the Midland main line, all the way through Derbyshire up to Sheffield, remains unelectrified.

The benefits of introducing electrification are significant. We can reduce air pollution and journey times, and improve reliability. Studies indicate that there is potential to add £500 million to the regional economy by pursuing electrification. It is a project that has been kicked into the long grass too many times. I know that money is tight, and we do not have a golden inheritance as a Government, but I urge the Minister to consider the benefits of Midland main line electrification, because we could actually improve the connections to some of our smaller and more rural stations. There are three in my constituency: Belper, Duffield and Spondon.

[James Naish]

I just need to reinforce the point that my hon. Friend makes, because the east midlands already receives the lowest level of transport spending per head of any UK region or nation—just 56% of the UK average. Although I do not want to undermine the campaign of my hon. Friend the Member for Shrewsbury (Julia Buckley), which is extremely important and which I support, would my hon. Friend agree that the east midlands in particular has to be looked at, because places such as his constituency and mine have not had the money they deserve?

[Jonathan Davies]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I am glad that the Government have begun to address this shortfall. The investment of £2 billion into the East Midlands combined authority under Mayor Claire Ward specifically to be used for transport will go some way towards addressing that, but there is a lot more to do because the east midlands has historically been left behind.

The merits of electrification of the east midlands railway will benefit our rural and semi-rural towns. Belper is a town of nearly 25,000 people. It is in the heart of the east midlands and has the region’s only UNESCO world heritage site: the Derwent Valley mills. I very much hope that it will be England’s, or the UK’s, next town of culture —it makes a good case for that. But to help people get to Belper when it is the town of culture, as I am sure it will be, we need to ensure that the rail connections are there. At the moment, there is only one train in each direction on the Midland main line that stops. People have to go to Derby or change, or they drive to Derby and get on the express train from there. I plead with the Minister to please take forward the benefits of Midland main line electrification, because it would benefit rural and semi-rural stations too.