Great Western Line: Electrification

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

I do not want to dispute the hon. Gentleman’s maths, but given that the decision to electrify the railway was made in 2009, which is less than 10 years ago, I beg to differ with what has just been said.

[Charlotte Leslie]

The hon. Lady also anticipates something that I will raise in my speech. Whichever Government want to make dramatic railway infrastructure improvements, they face challenges. Whether a Labour Minister or a Conservative Minister was sitting in the Minister’s chair here, I suspect that the challenges involved in delivering what they want to do could be very similar. I will come back to that point in my speech.

I am afraid that all south-west MPs might agree that, when we see the bills for HS2 soaring to £42 billon, the deferral of our meagre-by-comparison £5 billion project is particularly hard to swallow, especially since the south-west has consistently been among the bottom regions in the league tables for regional spend per capita.

The south-west is a region that boasts exciting opportunities, that is incredibly fast-growing, and that desperately needs the kind of focus on rail investment that we have seen with HS2 and Crossrail. So, forgive me, Minister, if I say for the south-west that, when it comes to seeing actual infrastructure—not promised but built—many people in the region feel that it is now our turn.

Nevertheless, returning to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr Gray), raised, there have been improvements and the Government are making efforts. I must also be fair about the context of this debate. I recognise that, this deferral notwithstanding, the region will still receive, which it might not have received otherwise, 5,000 extra seats on journeys into London at peak time. Most of us have made that journey, so we know that those seats will be welcome. We have been promised new trains, which will deliver faster journeys. We are told that there will be station improvements down the line. However, I hope that the Minister will forgive me for being honest and saying that, given the recent announcement of the deferral, we will believe these things when we see them. I would also appreciate a bit more clarity in the Minister’s response about the exact tangible benefits we will get in return for what has been a hard blow in the form of the announcement of deferral.

As I said, the improvements are welcome, and I do not want to be ungracious by denying that. However, major concerns remain about what the decision says about how we do big infrastructure projects and I will be asking the Minister specific questions. If he is not able to answer them today, I would deeply appreciate a detailed written response.

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[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Charlotte Leslie) on securing the debate. I will curtail my comments.

I speak for my Bristol South constituents, who also use Bedminster and Parson Street stations, when I say that the so-called deferral of this project has confused and outraged passengers in my constituency. We are confused because, despite the promises that we received and the significant disruption that we have tolerated, we have a half-finished project. We are outraged because the rail connections are such an important part of our economic development and our success. Bristol is key to the entire regional economy and that is why this is such a critical decision.

In 1835, an Act of Parliament created the Great Western Railway. In just six years, Brunel managed to build the entire thing from Paddington to Bristol—but in the last six years we have seen a complete lack of progress. Decisions have been delayed and deferred and now progress has been halted. At the Public Accounts Committee next month, we will consider the National Audit Office report and I would be grateful for comments from all Members. I suspect the hon. Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster) will also join that discussion. The report is very clear. Who is accountable now for the decision? Who is in charge of the plan to deliver benefits to passengers? Who lined up the key components of the new trains with the infrastructure and the operator? Who is managing the critical path alongside things such as the signalling works?

I have three asks of the Minister. If he does not have time to answer my questions, I would appreciate an answer in writing. First, is there still a case for electrification? What is now the Department’s analysis of the benefits for passengers in terms of journey times, frequency and capacity—dare I mention having a seat?—of bimodal trains versus electrification? We do not seem to know.

Secondly, Mr Brunel built the entire railway via an Act of Parliament, so why did the Department for Transport not at any point place an order under the Transport and Works Act 1992 for all the works? It might have taken longer to get to this point, but Network Rail would not have had to go through the myriad processes that it has had to, across the whole line.

Thirdly, what is the role of the regulator, the Office of Rail and Road? The Government have chosen to make it an arm’s-length body, but what is its responsibility in all of this? There is a political choice between enhancements and renewals or maintenance. The regulator has a clear role on renewal and maintenance, in light of its safety responsibility, but enhancement such as electrification is different. I am interested to know what the Minister thinks about that.

The core of the matter is passengers and our constituents. Whatever processes were undertaken to deliver the decision, it is true to say that as a result Bristol people feel we are being short-changed, and as we are the gateway to the region, the entire south-west region is being short-changed. Who is making these decisions on behalf of Bristol colleagues? Consider the make-up of the Government, the Cabinet and the Tory Front Bench. Apart from the Secretary of State for International Trade, the right hon. Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox), the south-west has no representation at the top table of Government. There are 51 Tory MPs in the south-west, out of 55. I congratulate them on their victory, but they have a small smattering of Ministers from their number to be able to deliver top decisions at the top table—

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Order. I call James Heappey.

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[Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Charlotte Leslie) for securing this debate. My constituents in Bristol West are as perplexed and as outraged as I am to learn that the much-needed and long-awaited electrification of the Great Western Railway is being postponed. The works were initiated by the last Labour Government, who rightly recognised that investing in infrastructure to support economic growth is a vital duty of government and that electrification helps to decrease air pollution, of which diesel engines are such a great cause.

Since then, the coalition and subsequent Tory Governments have paused, unpaused, and now paused the works again. As recently as June 2015, the then Secretary of State told the House:

“Electrification of the Great Western line is a top priority and I want Network Rail to concentrate its efforts on getting that right.”—[Official Report, 25 June 2015; Vol. 597, c. 1068.]

[Karin Smyth]

Would my hon. Friend also agree that there is deep concern in Bristol that money has been diverted from the west country to fund the so-called northern powerhouse—from the great western line to perhaps HS2 or other projects?

[Thangam Debbonaire]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. The HS2 project is of course hugely, vastly more expensive than this project. It is extraordinary that the electrification is being sacrificed for other projects.

Similar uncertainty has been meted out to other regions, such as the electric spine and midland main line. In fact, in June, when the Secretary of State was confirming his support for the great western line electrification, he was at the same time pausing midland electrification and that on the trans-Pennine route. That does not appear to me to signify a coherent, thought-through plan to invest in infrastructure.

I would like the Minister to respond to the following questions. Where is the Government’s commitment to a western powerhouse? Will the west of England devolution deal end up having to cover the cost of the electrification project? What answers do the Government have for passengers who are currently stuck with journey times that feel to them routinely longer than those in the 1970s, when it was apparently possible to travel from Bristol Temple Meads to London in 90 minutes without stopping? Where is the sense in suspending the work when so much of it has already taken place? How does the Minister answer the Bristolians who have been given the idea that we are not worth bothering about? How does the Minister square the postponement with improving air quality, something which my constituents in Bristol West so badly want to see? Finally, when will the Government sort out a coherent, reliable plan for investment in infrastructure, and will that plan include proper levels of investment in local train services inside Bristol as well as to Bristol?

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[Paul Maynard]

We certainly recognise a lot of what the National Audit Office report says, and I will set out what the Department is doing in response to that. As the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) pointed out, the Secretary of State was critical of progress on the project so far at Transport questions last week. I share those concerns; the project clearly has not gone well.

However, it is worth stressing that we are having to defer four elements. I have heard many words pass around the Chamber—“cancellation”, “pause” and all sorts of others—but “deferral” is quite a precise term. No work is being paused; if one considers the various elements that make up the scheme around Bristol, work is continually ongoing. We are raising bridges, improving line speeds and resignalling. That is all preparatory work before decisions can be taken on proceeding with further electrification. The only work that has been suspended in the greater Bristol area is the erection of the overhead line equipment. That is what has been deferred until a future control period. I cannot make precise statements about what control period 6 will contain, because that has to be part of a wider national package, but I want to make it clear that we are not stopping work on the electrification programme in the Bristol area. That work continues.

[Karin Smyth]

If that is the case, why do the Government continue to spend money doing something that they cannot at any point say when we will need? Is that not potentially wasting more taxpayers’ money? What is the purpose of electrification if it does not deliver benefits and we are going to spend more money at some unknown time in the future?

[Paul Maynard]

I have just said that we will be making announcements about what—[Interruption.] Is the hon. Lady going to listen to my reply or just mutter at me? I am happy to respond to her point if she wants to listen. We will take decisions about what control period 6 comprises and announce the whole of that control period at the appropriate time. As a member of the Public Accounts Committee, she will be more than aware that Sir Peter Hendy has already reprogrammed other projects across the country. As Rail Minister, I am not prepared to part-announce elements of control period 6 depending on what debate I happen to be in at any moment in time. That would not be a prudent way to go forward—nor, were I in her position on that Committee, would I think it a particularly prudent position for any Minister facing her queries to take.