Great Western Line: Electrification

Kevin Foster Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Charlotte Leslie]

I start my speech by saying that what happens in one area of the country affects another and then I go on to make an unapologetically biased—not biased, but strong—case for the south-west, but I hear exactly what the right hon. Lady says. Something happening in one region deeply affects another, but I continue to make a special case for the south-west, which has not, historically, had its merits duly considered by the Department.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one example of how the south-west does not benefit from investment is that at the moment it is impossible to get a train from Plymouth or Exeter to Bristol along the very great western network on which we rely?

[Charlotte Leslie]

I think that anyone who has travelled that route will echo, with gusto, what my hon. Friend has just said.

Moving on to macro-level concerns, I find the National Audit Office report into the functioning of Network Rail, and into the Department’s ability to project manage and to hold Network Rail to account, deeply concerning. I do not doubt the good intentions of all those involved, but we read in that report about over-optimism from Network Rail on significant elements of the electrification project and about inadequate project management. And the list goes on. The trouble is that it has become almost a matter of course over the years—I have to say, spanning various Governments—to expect any rail project to go way over budget and way over time, under Network Rail. If Britain is to stand a chance of competing globally, that simply is not good enough. I have to add that, from what I have seen, I do not think that Network Rail is a particularly good advert for those who still argue that the state should be running more of our railways. Given Network Rail’s performance, that idea fills me with absolute dread. I am not ideological on that point; I just like to see things work well.

It would be helpful if the Minister could outline what he sees as the main challenges for not just his Government but any Government delivering fit-for-purpose infrastructure projects under our current systems. I am particularly interested in knowing what levers he, as a Minister and an elected representative, has for holding Network Rail, which is, as I understand it, a state function, to account.

I have to confess to being a little confused on a matter of principle regarding the deferral of electrification. I know that the Government are saying that customers need not worry because we will get bigger and faster bi-mode trains delivering all the benefits of electrification without the need for that expensive “wire in the sky”, but if everything is so awesome without electrification, why are we still talking about it at all? If it is all so awesome, why would such improvements from bi-mode rolling stock, for a fraction of the cost, not make electrification a redundant technology? And if it is not redundant, will it not cost more in the long term to do it later rather than sooner? We need more clarity about the Government’s view of the merits of electrification.

I come now to more specific concerns. Have there been wasted works? It seems that significant investment has already been made in preparatory work for electrification that has now been deferred. Can the Minister give a figure for how much that has cost and can he provide a cast-iron guarantee that it is not now money wasted? I understand that Network Rail has suggested that the work to Bristol Temple Meads may now be completed by control period 6. Can the Minister clarify when during CP6 that might be?

Now that there has been a deferral of what was much vaunted electrification, questions are inevitably being asked about the other elements of the modernisation programme. The deferral announcement has dented confidence, and we really need that confidence to be rebuilt. Can the Minister assure us that the other core elements will be completed, such as the Filton bank capacity enhancement project, the new Hitachi hybrid intercity express trains and the two new services per hour between Bristol Temple Meads and London Paddington that those trains will enable?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, and to be back in this Chamber for the second time today talking about the desperately vital need for infrastructure investment in the south-west. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North West (Charlotte Leslie) on securing this debate.

It is not all bad news coming down the track for Great Western. We will soon have the first new set of Intercity Express trains ordered in my lifetime. I think the last set was ordered back in 1976. I suspect it is tempting for the Minister and the Department for Transport, given all the issues they have had with this renewal, not to order the next set until 2056, but hopefully they will soon be on the line.

It is right that this debate has focused on the electrification programme. I represent a constituency in the far south-west that was not initially part of the electrification process, and the coastal track at Dawlish is very unlikely to be part of it in the near future, given the obvious issues of mixing high levels of voltage and sea water. My concern is about the impact of the project and, in particular, how its cost has risen dramatically.

As the Minister knows, we talked earlier about the Peninsula Rail Task Force and a £280 million project to secure the Dawlish line. That is about 10% of the cost of the electrification project, and only a fraction of the increase in cost in the past couple of years. My concern is about the choices that the Government have when they make initial decisions and about the solidity of the information. As the hon. Member for Bristol South (Karin Smyth) said, we will certainly explore that at the Public Accounts Committee. My fear is always that projects look very attractive, and the price can look just about affordable, but they can require a much larger commitment that has not been predicted. In this case, we quickly found that the engineering required to put the masts in made it almost inevitable that the costs would rise significantly.

Given what the NAO report said, it is clear that in the future we need to plan how we deliver a whole railway, not just individual aspects. Passengers do not get on a train that has been heavily delayed due to flooding and say, “Great, I’ve got better wi-fi”; they look at their whole experience on the journey. That is why it is right that we ensure our investment projects are better managed. We must deliver projects without such issues and we must make our railway more resilient. As I said in an intervention, there is no train service between parts of Devon and Cornwall and Bristol, and there is a limited service between Devon and Cornwall and London. The well-known issues with the network are screaming out for investment.