East Coast Main Line Investment

John Grogan Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[John Grogan (Keighley) (Lab)]

I had not intended to speak, Mr Owen, but I am inspired by the speeches and by the mover of the motion, my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell). She spoke with great passion and clarity about how much the line means to our national economy, our culture and our society.

It thrills the blood to be on an east coast main line train and to arrive, for example, at the tremendous station in the great historic city of York on race day, or at Leeds—I am sitting next to my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel)—with its shops and culture and its new cathedral of a station, with lots of investment to come. It will uniquely house the main line station, HS2 and HS3 as well. It will perhaps be the premier station in the whole of the country when that happens.

It is a great pleasure to speak in this debate and to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow (Mr Hepburn). Regardless of the ideology of privatisation, the line has had a sorry history. GNER, National Express and Virgin-Stagecoach all failed, despite the amount of money that went into the franchises and despite the lawyers. Then they were taken back. I have a few questions for the Minister, and just an appeal, really.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Before my hon. Friend goes on to ask questions, does he agree with me that it is important to remember that today is the anniversary of the accident at Hatfield, which occurred when the infrastructure was privatised under Railtrack? As a result of that accident, the infrastructure was brought back into the public sector under Network Rail. Should we not remember that on 17 October 2000, four people lost their lives and 70 were injured? We saw then the dangers of putting ideology and profits ahead of running a safe railway.

[John Grogan]

We should certainly remember that anniversary. Regardless of ideology, one achievement of Network Rail over the intervening period, under all parties, has been to put a much higher emphasis on safety on our railways, and we should never lose that again.

On my questions for the Minister, is there not a strong case for a period of stability on the east coast main line? As we have heard, we have a promise of some investment from the Government, but we really need a period of stability so that people know where they stand. Ministers have mentioned the east coast partnership, but have given very little detail. We have no idea who will be involved in that partnership. Will Network Rail be involved? Will it be a privatised operator?

For the period of this Parliament, should it last until 2022, it would be welcome if the Government were to say that the service will be run as it is now: a directly run state-operated company with Network Rail. The Minister should be very cautious about disrupting the system yet again. There are other operators on the east coast main line who write to me to ask whether they will be involved in the partnership; there are other franchisees and open-access operators and so on.

Civil servants might put the next possible option in front of the Minister when the best possible option is, as my hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow mentioned, what happened in the period between 2009 and 2015. During that sustained period, the line was run for public service in the public sector. The stats went up, reliability went up and £1 billion was paid into the public coffers. The line could be a public sector comparator. From the Government’s point of view, it would be a good thing over the next five years to look at evidence-based policy.

We have heard a little about extra trains to Harrogate and Lincoln. Are they happening or not? Extra trains to Middlesbrough were promised. Seven a day to Bradford from next May were promised. Will those trains definitely run? Can I put in my diary for 1 May next year that I shall be there watching as seven trains from Bradford, rather than the one, go on that line?

Can the Minister tell us a little more about the Azuma trains? We have heard about the problems of electromagnetic interference with signals—it sounds like science fiction. Are Ministers getting a grip of that? When will that problem be solved? Will the Minister be able to say a little more on that this side of Christmas or in the new year?

I do not want to speak for long, but I want to say that the Labour party looks forward to government. We look forward to the main franchisee, the east coast main line, being run in the public sector with Network Rail, with all the co-ordination and efficiency that that will bring. From time to time, I raise the question of open-access operators with shadow Ministers, because there are open-access operators on the east coast main line. Hull Trains and Grand Central have re-linked towns such as Halifax to the east coast main line, and First is planning to bring in an open-access operator in 2021 to Edinburgh.

We can afford to be magnanimous as a new Labour Government. We should also recognise that just as the BBC is a great public service broadcaster but benefits from challenge from Channel 4 and the commercial sector, at the margin we should be confident in our belief in public sector efficiency, and still allow challenge in a 98% or 99% publicly owned sector.

I used to represent Selby, where Hull Trains identified a gap in the market and provided a service. A big national operator will not always be quite as fleet of foot as we might want. In thinking about how to change the railways we must give more of a role to local authorities, for example. However, there should not just be one decision maker in Whitehall deciding on routes. I hope for assurances on that matter from the Labour Front Bench.

[Several hon. Members rose—]