Transport

Laura Farris Excerpts

Thursday 19th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Laura Farris (Newbury) (Con)]

Last week I had the pleasure of joining the all-party parliamentary group on Crossrail for my first Crossrail trip across London’s city centre, and it is a triumph of engineering and creativity. From the cloud atlas ceiling as I descended into Paddington station to the pinstripes that inspired the entire construction of Liverpool Street station, the design tells the story of our city.

Crossrail’s construction also revealed more of the city’s history. Some of the construction workers told me of discovering more than 3,000 victims of the black death, buried at haste and without dignity, beneath the old Bethlem Hospital when they excavated the tunnel at Liverpool Street. Of course, Crossrail also plants a flagpole in our national story, having been unveiled in the year of the Queen’s platinum jubilee and been christened in her name.

Crossrail has not all been plain sailing. It is overbudget and overdue, and it would not have made it without significant Government intervention. I have repeatedly cursed it over the years for the chaos it caused at Reading station and, as I crawled through on the bus, for the way it carved up Tottenham Court Road. Despite that, I have had a Damascene conversion. Crossrail is an extraordinary new piece of infrastructure.

It is incredible that we can travel from Paddington to Liverpool Street in 10 minutes, and even more incredible that we can get from Newbury station in my constituency to Canary Wharf, in the heart of the London docklands, in exactly one hour. Everyone who worked on Crossrail should feel proud. It will change our city and transform rail transport across much of the south-east.

Crossrail comes at a bittersweet moment for west Berkshire, because it is only two months since we learned that Great Western Railway is withdrawing three intercity express trains between Bedwyn and Paddington, about which my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger), who is not in his place, and I have been talking to Ministers ever since it was decided.

I thank the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), who is also not in her place, for her help in reinstating the 19.07 route from Paddington to Bedwyn, which is popular with commuters. She will understand that my predecessor, who now sits in the other place, worked very hard on the route’s introduction, and it meant people moved to villages such as Kintbury and Hungerford because they believed those places were commutable from London. GWR is doing a great job of trying to improve connection times, and it has said its ambition is to reinstate the intercity express trains. I hope Ministers will understand if I keep up that conversation and keep knocking on their door in the months ahead.

Finally, and I will be brief, I strongly differ from the hon. Member for Ilford South (Sam Tarry) on Bus Back Better, as we have had generous indicative funding. It has perhaps not enabled us to realise all our plans—we have lots of creative ideas in west Berkshire—but it has enabled us to realise some of them. Bus funding is often siloed in individual counties, and it is rare for counties to correspond on securing bus routes that travel between them, so Ministers will understand why I raise it.

For close to 18 months, I have been campaigning for a bus that links Newbury to Oxford, with stops along the way, not just because these two great metropolises ought to be joined, although they should, but because I think it meets the Department’s BSIP criteria to maximise passenger growth. The A34 route between west Berkshire and south Oxfordshire is home to some of the most exciting technology and science enterprises in the country, if not the world.

The Harwell science park, just north of my constituency border, is creating 10,000 jobs over the next five years and is already heavily recruiting talented apprentices from Newbury College. The same can be said of the science parks at Culham and Oxford, and of the business park at Milton. They are all on the same route, but the only way one of my constituents can access these places, if they get a job, is by taking two trains and a bus, with a journey time of about an hour and a half for a distance of less than 20 miles. Of course, most of them get in their car, which is something we want to limit.

I am grateful for the energy and enthusiasm that Oxfordshire County Council, West Berkshire Council, the Thames Valley local enterprise partnership and many others have shown for my proposed direct bus route, recognising that we need to give people a cheaper, greener and faster way of getting to work in these important growth destinations. West Berks and Oxfordshire both made this request of the DFT in their BSIP proposals, but the decision ultimately rests with Ministers, and I strongly encourage them to approve it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

It is an absolute honour to respond on behalf of Her Majesty’s Opposition in this extremely important debate on transport. We have heard insightful contributions from so many Members. The shadow Transport Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford South (Sam Tarry), who opened the debate along with the Minister of State, Department for Transport, the hon. Member for Pendle (Andrew Stephenson), referred to transport deserts, the decimation of bus routes, especially for rural areas—indeed, many Conservative-controlled councils are complaining—and, despite the inadequate funding from Government, the incredible work being done by the Labour metro Mayors.

I fully agree with the Chairman of the Transport Committee, the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman), on the future-proofing of the aviation sector, especially after industry pleas for support during the pandemic were largely ignored by this Government. I also agree with him on the need for investment in sustainable fuels to decarbonise transport. I also agree—there is a lot of harmony breaking out—with the SNP spokesman, the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands), on the need for electric vehicle charging infrastructure, because the Government are missing out on their targets. Indeed, there is the anomaly of VAT at 20% for public charging points, compared with 5% for home-charging points like mine. In essence, that is a tax on the less well-off, because those who cannot install a point in their apartment or home miss out.

The former Rail Minister, the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Andrew Jones), spoke of the difficulty his constituents face in getting to work on time because of the cuts to rail services and the need to simplify fares. The hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) spoke about the importance of the Government supporting pioneering and innovative technology, such as that for hydrogen buses and, indeed, the need for regulation of e-scooters. The hon. Member for Newbury (Laura Farris) spoke of her damascene conversion after having experienced the Elizabeth line preview. Indeed, she does a great deal of excellent work as co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the western rail link to Heathrow, along with my good self, and the need for that infrastructure project to finally be realised.

My hon. Friend the Member for Erith and Thamesmead (Abena Oppong-Asare) spoke about the need for ambition, such as Crossrail being conceived and pushed through by the last Labour Government. She also spoke about the need for more proactiveness on providing on-street vehicle charging points. The hon. Member for Hyndburn (Sara Britcliffe) spoke about restoring local railway lines, especially after the Beeching cuts. My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Rosie Duffield) spoke very eloquently about rural connectivity, or the lack of it, which then has a devastating impact on the mental health of those individuals who are cut off from other communities, about the cuts that have been inflicted on school buses and about the rising cost of school bus passes.

The hon. Member for Dover (Mrs Elphicke) spoke about HS1 and the issue that there are still no services from Kent to continental Europe. We all agree with her on the diabolical behaviour of P&O Ferries. The hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) spoke about the need for regulation of rickshaws and the failure of this Government on step-free access and levelling up, after having reneged on manifesto promises on the HS2 eastern leg and Northern Powerhouse Rail.

The hon. Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) spoke about the need to stop endless consultations on highway projects. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson), who is a champion on the need to clear the logjam to end the Hammersmith bridge closure, spoke about the work of the all-party parliamentary group for cycling and walking and the need to integrate cycling with rail. The hon. Member for Southend West (Anna Firth) spoke about the need for more investment in electric buses and mending potholes. The hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford (Julie Marson) spoke about the need for green solutions such as the local HERT scheme. The hon. Member for High Peak (Robert Largan) —we perhaps saved the best till last—lamented the reduced timetables.

Many Members have spoken about the upcoming transport Bill and the need for infrastructure investment in places such as Stockport and Bradford, as championed by my hon. Friends.

In my closing remarks, I will focus on rail, for which the backdrop to today’s debate is sadly bleak. The 2010s can only be described as a disastrous decade for rail, with fares rising twice as fast as wages, cuts to rail services up and down our country, and a Government set to miss their commitment to decarbonising the railways not by a few months or a few years, but by more than 40 years. Despite the Tory rhetoric of investment and expansion, the Government’s actions on rail speak far louder than their words.

Put simply, compared with 12 years ago, passengers travelling by rail pay twice as much for a lot less. Wages across the UK have stalled, with weekly median earnings increasing by just 23% since 2010, and households budgets have been squeezed by the pressing cost of living crisis, so how does the Minister expect people to be able to keep up with such brutal hikes? The Government’s solution appears to be the Great British rail sale, which was touted as offering huge savings on many off-peak inter-city routes. Unfortunately, however, even that is a sham, as Labour has found suggestions that those discounts would apply to a mere 1% of all journeys taken. It is nothing more than a gimmick, as rail unions, rail staff and passengers have pointed out, so no wonder it has been relabelled as the “Great British rail fail”. The future of our railways should not be short-term sales and political stunts but a permanent, affordable, efficient and green network.

Given the steep cost of travelling on our railways, passengers might have expected to experience an equally steep improvement in services. Sadly, that has not been the case. The Government are looking to make things worse with their plan to impose a 10% cut on operators, which is already being felt by communities across our country, with more than 19,000 pre-pandemic services yet to return. Last week, the shadow Transport Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh), was at a school in Bradford where the consequences are stark. Cuts to rail services will mean that hundreds of pupils will be forced to wait for hours after school or take an unreliable and lengthy rail replacement service on West Yorkshire’s already clogged-up roads. In Wakefield, too, there will be a staggering four-hour gap between 6 am and 10 am in some services, which will make it impossible for students and workers to travel.

In the midst of all that, the Transport Secretary is, frankly, missing in action. He jetted off to an overseas conference without notifying Mr Speaker rather than answer questions on the real disruption that families face. He and the Government should stop washing their hands of any responsibility in the middle of a climate crisis and a cost of living crisis. It is senseless to force people off public transport while simultaneously cutting them off from jobs and opportunities.

[Laura Farris]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Dhesi]

I would love to take an intervention, but Madam Deputy Speaker has said that I have only nine minutes, and I want to get all this off my chest.

It is time for the Government to step up and stand up for local communities with a commitment to restoring services to pre-pandemic levels and a genuine plan of how to get there. Right now, they are brazenly breaking the promises that they made to communities. Just three months ago, they claimed that they would protect and improve services on existing lines, that they would not neglect shorter-distance journeys and that levelling up could not wait, yet passengers are suffering the consequences of those broken promises. Ministers may claim that cuts have been made because there has been no increase in passenger numbers, but that is simply not true. In Yorkshire alone, we are told that passenger numbers have surged back to more than 90% of pre-pandemic levels, so cuts on that scale will force passengers on to crowded and congested services.

The truth is that under the Conservatives, passengers are paying more for less. When the Minister comes to the Dispatch Box, will she tell us what plans the Government have to bring back those lost services and provide passengers with a future in which rail travel is better value for money? I hope she will ensure that their manifesto commitments are upheld.