HS2

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Westminster Hall

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. When I became a candidate for Crewe and Nantwich in 2018, one of the big decisions for me was whether or not I supported HS2. It was not well-paid lobbyists or Government or business interests that convinced me of my position but knocking on doors and speaking to dozens of local men and women who worked on the local railways and told me how vital this project was. Although I recognise many of the concerns raised by Members, and I hope that HS2 representatives are listening to them, I support the project.

Crewe has a proud and close relationship with this country’s railways. It was a village until the locomotive works and the railway station were founded in the 1830s. It built on that industrial heritage to forge a new future as a home for a wide variety of businesses, but with the railway remaining at its heart. That future is at risk if we cannot deliver locally and improve links via the railway.

Members have raised the issue of reduced capacity as a result of covid. It is important to note that some travel routes are already back up to 70% of pre-pandemic levels. It would be unwise to make major, decades-long decisions about transport in this country on the basis of less than a few years of travel patterns, which I fully expect to return to normal.

I think that the west coast main line will return to being the busiest mixed-use railway line in Europe. For my local residents and businesses, that means no capacity for freight, congested timetables and fewer smaller local journeys, because inter-city journeys take priority. The answer for some is to just upgrade what we have, but I remind everybody that the last time we did that we faced similar cost overruns and delays to those currently being experienced by HS2. I have said before in the House that I do not think that arguments about our ability to deliver big infrastructure are valid. We have to become better at doing infrastructure. As we deliver projects, we have to listen to MPs in order to improve them. We should not say no. If we stand still, we are certainly not going to deliver or improve our local infrastructure.

I understand the concerns. I also want to flag up the context of the money we are spending. It is a lot of money but let us keep in mind that we already plan to spend £6 billion a year maintaining and making much smaller upgrades across the railway network, and £40 billion over the next five years on projects other than HS2. In the context of those figures, it is naive to think that we can build a major new railway line without substantial forms of public investment. Are we really saying that this country is never going to build a big, major new railway line? I do not think that that is wise or that it reflects the ambition in my part of the UK, all of the north and the rest of the country—an ambition that HS2 helps to deliver.

High Speed Rail (West Midlands – Crewe) Bill

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Ping Pong & Ping Pong: House of Commons
Tuesday 19th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con) [V]]

I wish to speak to Lords amendment 3, which I am delighted the Government are supporting. I also wish to outline why it is so important. HS2 will cut straight through Staffordshire, and we cannot be subject to all the pain without any gain. I am pleased that the Government have committed to classic-compatible HS2 services for Stoke-on-Trent—an area where levelling-up is essential. HS2 must truly be transformative.

The economic uplift in Stoke-on-Trent would be significant. It is an area with huge potential that has punched far below its weight. HS2 services must match our economic ambitions for jobs and housing growth. One service an hour terminating in Macclesfield, while extremely welcome, will be insufficient. Our services need to terminate at Manchester. We also want Birmingham HS2 services, to address overcrowding north of Birmingham. That might also resolve the lack of direct services to Liverpool and Manchester airport. Network Rail must undertake work to the classic network to facilitate new HS2 services and additional future local services.

We need better engagement from HS2 with Stoke-on-Trent City Council and local MPs to maximise the potential of HS2 and mitigate the impacts. It is vital that disruption to road and rail during construction be minimised, as recognised by subsection (2)(a) of the new clause inserted by Lords amendment 3. There are significant concerns about construction traffic at junction 15 of the M6, on the A500, and on the A34. Junction 15 is already desperately congested, and is included in Highways England’s road investment strategy 3 pipeline. Additional measures are also needed to mitigate impacts on the A34 and A500, particularly given the intense housing growth in the Hanford and Trentham area.

Improving local transport is vital to unlocking the true benefits of HS2; that is reflected in subsection 2(c) and (d) of the new clause inserted by Lords amendment 3. Public transport in north Staffordshire is inadequate, and the area is heavily car dependant. Around 80% of trips in Stoke-on-Trent are by car, yet around a third of people do not own one. HS2 needs to be plugged into all our communities if we are to deliver the full benefits. The start of that is the Transforming Cities fund, which has £36.4 million for local bus and rail, but we must go further. We need to reopen local stations, including Meir; that is progressing well, due to the Restoring Your Railway fund. There is also the Stoke to Leek line, which connects communities in the city with the Moorlands. We must reopen either Trentham or Wedgwood stations.

The city council has ambitious proposals for a light rail system to connect everything up, but we need a feasibility study that brings that together. I believe HS2 should consider contributing funding to such a study, to ensure that HS2 can be plugged into every part of north Staffordshire. Without investment in local transport, the benefits of HS2 will be severely constrained, and the last few miles could end up taking longer than the rest of the HS2 journey.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con) [V]]

I am speaking in support of Lords amendment 3, which I am glad the Minister has indicated he will accept. I thank him for the open and proactive way that he has engaged with me and other Members of the House. HS2 represents a huge opportunity, not just for Crewe, but for my constituents in the surrounding area. Crewe has a proud railway heritage as an original UK railway town that was once the site of the largest railway and locomotive works in the world, and it is a uniquely well-connected industrial town.

Like many post-industrial towns, Crewe has faced challenges forging a new future for itself, but businesses still come to Crewe because it remains a fantastic location from which to reach the rest of the country. It is home to nationally and internationally recognised manufacturing and engineering businesses that provide high-skilled, high-quality employment. We must build on this. The advantages that HS2 brings for residents are needed to deliver further high-paid, high-skilled work. Parts of Crewe still face high levels of deprivation, and well-paid jobs are at least part of the answer to that.

HS2 is already providing more opportunities; businesses are investing and growing in anticipation of its arrival. If local employer Bombardier is successful in its bid to help build the trains for HS2, the benefits to Crewe and the surrounding area will be even greater. The bid has my full support. HS2 will also unlock improved local transport connections, which I know are the priority for my residents over quicker travel to London.

For this reason, I support HS2, but that does not mean that I do not understand the very real concerns of residents in my constituency and others who will pay a high price. I pay tribute to various Members who have spoken before me and done their best to represent their residents in opposition to HS2. It is important that HS2 does everything possible to listen to people on whom it will have an impact to ensure that it can avoid or minimise that impact. I have already seen examples of HS2 altering its plans in response to feedback from residents, and we know that nationally other approaches are in place, such as the 7 million trees that are being planted to mitigate for lost woodland.

This is not just about minimising adverse impacts. Local voices are on top of local issues and challenges. In my submission in December to the most recent round of consultation on HS2, I was able to identify roads and routes planned for use during construction that I know will not be available because of local transport redevelopment. Being open and listening to local knowledge and expertise will improve the delivery of the project, which is why I welcome Lords amendment 3 and the Government’s support for it.

I finish by saying that I welcome this historic final step in the passage of the Bill through the House, and all the opportunity it will bring to my residents in Crewe and Nantwich.

[Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con) [V]]

It is a pleasure to follow so many hon. Friends and constituency neighbours, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Dr Mullan). I, too, support Lords amendment 3 and welcome the consultation that the Government have agreed to with people in Staffordshire, Shropshire and Cheshire. The railway skirts my constituency of Newcastle-under-Lyme and passes through the borough of Newcastle-under-Lyme in the ward of Maer and Whitmore, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash). I pay tribute to him for all he has done to stand up for his constituents, and to the local councillor, Graham Hutton, who has done a huge amount of work on this for his residents. He is my former office manager, but I pay tribute to him for what he has done as a representative.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton) said, it cannot be all pain and no gain for the residents of Staffordshire. We must see benefits from HS2. I am pleased that we have had commitments on services from Stoke-on-Trent, but they are not good enough, as my hon. Friend said. These trains need to run all the way through to Manchester or down to Birmingham or London. It will not be good enough if they terminate too early. He also mentioned some of the mitigation that affects his constituency and mine, particularly the mitigation relating to junction 15. I welcome the fact that that is already in road investment strategy 3, but HS2 will need to do a lot more to satisfy my local residents, given the impact that it will have on their lives.

This is perhaps a more tangential point, but it is one colleagues have made. Newcastle-under-Lyme town centre needs to be connected back to our mainline railway network, whether that is to Stoke-on-Trent to the east, to the HS2 main line in the west, or via a metro. Newcastle-under-Lyme is one of the largest towns in the country that does not have a railway station of its own. Yes, lots of people use Stoke-on-Trent, but that creates huge pressure on our local roads, particularly Basford Bank. We need much better public transport in north Staffordshire, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South said.

In conclusion, I welcome the stance that the Government have taken today. HS2 can be beneficial for north Staffordshire, but I am very conscious that the construction of HS2 poses a large amount of complications for my residents, and residents nearby. I welcome the fact that the Government are engaging with that. As the Minister said in his opening remarks, the cost of this consultation is not nothing, but it is minor compared with the cost of the project, and the cost of not listening to the people of Staffordshire, and to the people of Newcastle-under-Lyme—my constituents. Not having the consultation would have been a huge mistake, and I am pleased that the Government have chosen to accept the amendment. I am happy to support them.

Aviation Sector

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts), to his place. This is an incredibly important debate for my constituency, as Buckingham is conveniently commutable from Luton airport and Heathrow airport and not too far to commute from Birmingham airport. Many of my constituents who work for airlines and airports have written to me with horror stories about the way they have been treated, particularly by British Airways, but also easyJet.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman)—the Chairman of the Transport Committee, on which I serve—for securing the debate. With time being short, I will not repeat the arguments made, but I certainly agree with the central premise that, to get aeroplanes in the sky once more, to get people flying and to save this sector, we have to look at increased testing capability.

I very much welcome the £8.5 billion that the Government have already made available to the aviation sector. While we look to save jobs, which is the most important thing, we have to accept that no change is not an option. Anybody who argues for simply no change is probably not going to win that argument. Where we have to look most specifically is at how we are going to get British Airways, in particular, to change its mind and its attitude to its employees. I add my voice to those of right hon. and hon. Members who have spoken on that subject. Let us focus on the balance sheet of British Airways: the company made a £1.1 billion profit, after tax, last year; it has £2.6 billion in cash reserves; and it has £5.8 billion in shareholder equity. All those facts were detailed in the Select Committee report, and all that is before we get on to the parent company, IAG, and its reserves. So as BA takes a cold, hard look in the mirror, it could consider, having taken so much furlough money from the British taxpayer, being a little more like Barratt Homes in its approach to taxpayers’ money.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I hope that the new chief executive officer of IAG is listening today and has heard so many different voices from across the Chamber. Does my hon. Friend agree that now would be the time for the company to think again and come to a reasonable agreement with its workforce?

[Greg Smith]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend that British Airways has behaved appallingly throughout this crisis. Covid has brought challenges to every business, of every size, but when we look at some of those balance sheet numbers I just detailed, we see that British Airways really does need to take that cold, hard look in the mirror. In the minute I have remaining, I wish to talk about a particular issue that has come to my attention.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)]

1. What steps he is taking to improve bus services in (a) rural and (b) other areas.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

11. What steps his Department is taking to encourage more frequent bus services.

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)]

Our £220 million better deal for bus users includes measures to improve bus services in rural and urban areas. This is together with the new £5 billion fund for overhauling bus and cycle links throughout the country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Mullan]

My constituents tell me that very often buses come late or do not turn up at all. As we look to invest more in buses, what are we going to do to make sure that the companies delivering the services are doing a decent job for our residents?

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend is right: it is really important to make these bus services work in a manner where people can just rely on them and where they do not even have to look at a timetable because the frequency is there. As part of doing that, we will be opening up bus open data powers, which will ensure that that information is transferred and available to people at bus stops and in their apps, enabling a much more frequent service to run.

High Speed Rail (West Midlands - Crewe) Bill: Revival

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Carry-over motion & Bill reintroduced & Bill reintroduced: House of Commons & motion to revive Bill: House of Commons
Monday 2nd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak, because this matter is hugely important to my constituency. I welcome the revival of the Bill, and hopefully its imminent passage, as evidence of the Government backing Crewe and backing the north. If you will allow me, Madam Deputy Speaker, I want to explain why I support the revival of the Bill.

I was glad to have had the opportunity to host the Minister at Crewe station just last week, where he got to hear first-hand about what is already happening locally: businesses opening up in Crewe and the plans Cheshire East Council has to create a new economic hub around the station. The revival of the Bill will accelerate the positive changes we see locally.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my hon. Friend accept that originally the railhead was going to be in Crewe? It was only frustrated by decisions on housing grounds taken by the district council. In fact, it was dumped on Stone in my constituency without any notice.

[Dr Mullan]

I cannot pretend, as a new Member, to have my hon. Friend’s knowledge of the intricate detail and the history of the development of the railway line. However, whether we support or oppose it, we all have a duty, when decisions on individual stations are looked at in detail, always to be open-minded to change if things are undergoing scrutiny. Ultimately, as I will come on to say, if we are building a major new railway it is inevitable that some people will face a negative environmental impact and some will have some part of the railway deposited on their patch, which they are not happy with. If we allowed that to, in effect, put a moratorium on the development of major infrastructure, that would not be the right decision for this country, even if individual Members were unhappy with it.

On what does work for my constituents, they are not very interested in getting to London 30 minutes quicker; they really are not very interested in that. What they are interested in, and what we must remind them of in terms of what we get from HS2, is that it opens up capacity as we shift inter-city traffic on to HS2 so there are more routes and journeys available to them. Faster routes tend to push the local services off the track. They welcome HS2 because it means we can transport more freight by rail. Local businesses in my area cannot get freight on to rail. When they can do that, they will be more competitive and we will move congestion off the roads. If you drive around the A roads in Crewe at night, you will see lorry after lorry after lorry parked up. That is how things are moved around and we need to switch back to the railway.

[Michael Fabricant]

Does my hon. Friend not realise that there is a danger that for constituencies such as mine that are not directly served by HS2—of which there are many along the west coast main line—moving freight on to the west coast main line could result in a diminution of passenger services to cities such as Lichfield?

[Dr Mullan]

I go back to my original point: at the moment, those more local services are hampered by the use of the west coast main line for freight and inter-city services. We will see an opening up of local routes if we move ahead with HS2, not a diminution of them.

On passengers and peak-time travel, at the moment price control is used to control peak-time travel. People cannot come down to London at 8 o’clock because the tickets are extortionate, primarily because that is the only way that we can manage the over-capacity at peak times. If we move the inter-city journeys at peak times on to HS2, there will be more, cheaper, accessible peak-time travel on the west coast main line and it will still get people to London in an hour and a half.

Another thing that my constituents will welcome is the link to the northern regions through Northern Powerhouse Rail.

[Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)]

Many people have framed this argument as being between having only HS2 or Northern Powerhouse Rail. Does my hon. Friend agree that we can have both, and both can work together?

[Dr Mullan]

Absolutely. It is not either/or; it is about working together. High Speed North is a rebranding and a new way of organising this—we should firmly hammer that point home—and it is about making this project one that is led in the northern regions by the northern regions, for the northern regions. I welcome that change in the governance.

[Robert Largan (High Peak) (Con)]

Further to what my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) pointed out, people in London were not forced to choose between Crossrail and Crossrail 2. It is completely wrong to try to force people in the north to choose between HS2, Northern Powerhouse Rail and other key infrastructure projects.

[Dr Mullan]

Absolutely. Inevitably, projects overrun. That is unfortunate and not something that we welcome, but they do, and the fact that this has overrun should not mean that we therefore cancel it, because other people have not had to make the same choice in the south.

HS2 is a fantastic opportunity for Crewe. We have an amazing heritage and enormous local expertise in the rail industry. Crewe is and has always been a fantastic railway town. Passing the Bill and the delivery of the railway will create thousands of skilled jobs in Crewe for people helping to build the railway line.

I understand the concerns about the natural environment and I commend colleagues from constituencies where the impact will be greatest for speaking up on behalf of their residents. That is absolutely the right thing for them to do, but as I mentioned, any new major railway line connecting our cities and towns will have some degree of environmental impact. That is inevitable. We must be realistic about whether some of the strongest critics—they are not all in this House; some are outside this place—will ever really be satisfied. If we listen too closely to the voices of opposition in terms of trees and the environment, we will put a moratorium on creating major new rail and road infrastructure in this country, and that cannot be the right decision.

It is simply not feasible to suggest that we can deliver significant new capacity on our railway networks through a piecemeal approach. Network Rail estimates that it would take almost 30 years of weekend closures for even less of a result in terms of increased capacity. When this was last done on the west coast main line, the budget exploded. It might be harder to track and there might be fewer newspaper-worthy headline figures, but hundreds of smaller projects are at just as big a risk of overrunning and overspending. We need to get better at controlling costs when building infrastructure, full stop. The answer is not to halt the big-ticket items where the failings are most easily seen, because they are there on small projects, too. It is just not so easy for a journalist to add up the figures over 100 different projects and put that in a newspaper. We should not listen to that kind of criticism; it is not valid.

I recognise the significant costs involved, but this is being spent across two decades. It will work out as approximately £4.4 billion a year. The context of the timescales is too often lost when we use the headline figure. Network Rail spends around £6 billion a year on maintaining and making much smaller upgrades to our rail network, and we are planning to spend £40 billion over the next five years on other projects outside HS2. The idea that we could build a brand-new major railway line for much less than the £6 billion a year already being spent is fantasy. Let’s be ambitious for our nation. Let’s look forward, not down at our feet, get on with delivering this project and send the message to the world that the UK is open for business.