Washwood Heath Marshalling Yard

Khalid Mahmood Excerpts

Wednesday 18th June 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham, Perry Barr) (Lab)]

It is a great privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson.

I welcome the fact that my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) has secured this debate on an issue that is important to his constituency and the neighbouring constituencies of Birmingham, Erdington, Birmingham, Ladywood and my own constituency, Birmingham, Perry Barr—it is important across Birmingham. Birmingham has a huge history of engineering and manufacturing, as my right hon. Friend pointed out. It is a great place, and Washwood Heath is the perfect site to house what he proposes, rather than the HS2 marshalling yard.

My right hon. Friend was right to say that all the Opposition Members present have been great supporters of HS2. I had the great privilege to serve with my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) on the High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill, which was a step forward in securing the high-speed line. We believe it is important to secure that because it will create a new transport mechanism for the whole country. More importantly, it will allow us to create valuable jobs.

Like nowhere else, Birmingham has facilities available, and we are prepared. We have engineering capability in our city. In my constituency, we have an advanced manufacturing zone that currently supports a lot of the great work being done in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) by supplying Jaguar Land Rover. We want to see more people there because that would allow us to build more capacity to support the services that my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill mentioned. If a broad base were already set up, it would make that much easier. Birmingham would be far more advanced than any other city. That is why it is important that we do this.

I agree with my right hon. Friend that we need local job agreements, as such agreements are important to our constituents. As a nation, we are providing a huge infrastructure and, ultimately, our constituents and the people of this country should benefit more than anyone else. Most other places have such agreements, and we should seek to deal with that issue in our discussions on the European Union stipulations. It is important that we do that to move forward.

Just to prove a point about what we do in Birmingham, Perry Barr, I was hugely privileged earlier this year when we got a brand-new Engineering Employers Federation training facility, which the EEF paid for itself—the EEF received no grants for that at all. It is a fantastic new training centre off Holford drive in my constituency, and it regularly takes on more than 300 new trainees from companies that still serve our great city and the region. They are trained on a 34-week programme in proper engineering facilities. We need to get back to the days when we had proper manufacturing machinery: computer numerically controlled lathes and millers, normal milling machines, welding equipment and all those things that we tend to forget and walk past. They are the tools that provide engineering skills and capability. It is important for us to consider the way in which engineering has built Birmingham, and we need to get back to that.

Huge improvements have been made by Jaguar Land Rover. When it was said that we could not carry on with manufacturing, it was a complete fallacy, as has been proved by the new management at Jaguar Land Rover. Birmingham and the people of Birmingham can do it, as has been proved time and again. We have facilities and further education institutions in the city. We have South and City college, which serves both my constituency and the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill. Indeed, he also has a construction centre operated by South and City college in his constituency. I am sure that the college will be able to step up to the plate and provide more national vocational qualification level 3 training facilities, which are hugely needed.

We have facilities that will enable us to move forward and provide the support that an engineering base needs in Birmingham. We have done that, and Birmingham is far ahead of any other city. As my right hon. Friend said, it is important that we create jobs in Birmingham. It has been forgotten for too long nationally. Other cities have prospered that, with all due respect, do not have the facilities and skills that Birmingham has had traditionally. I can declare that because I trained at Delta Metals when I was a lot younger than I am now. I went through an apprenticeship, and it was a great place for manufacturing and engineering, which allowed me to progress.

It is important that we encourage the entrepreneurs of the future. As my colleagues have said, entrepreneurs such as James Watt developed the engineering skills that allowed this country, and at that time the empire, to move forward. If we are to move forward as a nation, we need to get back to the principles of making things that add value. Engineering and manufacturing do that, and we certainly have those capabilities. Birmingham has—excuse the pun—a huge track record of delivering engineering, and I support my right hon. Friend.