Oral Answers to Questions

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Maclean]

I commend my hon. Friend for his sterling efforts over a long period to support investment in a key part of the local road network in his area, which, as he says, is vital for jobs and the local economy. I understand that West Northamptonshire Council is exploring options to secure funding, and discussions will take place in the spending review.

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

19. What steps he is taking to encourage people to use public transport after the covid-19 outbreak.

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

The Department is working closely with operators to support measures to increase passenger confidence and encourage a return to the network. On the two trains that I took this morning, I could see that it is working.

[Lee Rowley]

Buses are a clear manifestation of community across the country. Even for small-state Conservatives like me, there is a role for subsidy. Will the Secretary of State commit to a cautious approach to subsidy that balances the opportunity for communities to make services viable with encouraging them over the long term to become self-sufficient?

[Grant Shapps]

I agree that buses are essential to communities: they connect people, enable people to get to jobs and education, and drive growth. That is why we are investing £3 billion of new money during this Parliament outside London for English buses, with consequentials, and why over the pandemic we provided £1.4 billion to support the sector.

Dronfield Station:150th Anniversary

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Monday 29th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to be able to speak this evening. It is a pleasure to be able to spend a few minutes celebrating a recent success story, and a real success story, of recent decades in North East Derbyshire: the rejuvenation and rebirth of Dronfield train station, which this year celebrates its 150th year of operation. Much of what we debate here in this place is understandably, and perhaps rightly, challenging and difficult: the impossible resolution of an intractable problem; the distribution of finite resources against infinite demand; and the challenge of remorseless change—wanted or not, planned or otherwise, progressive or ill-advised—in the communities that we seek to serve. That is exactly what we are placed here to do in this, the crucible for national debate, and it is what we must focus on most of the time. Yet even in these troubled times, much is left unsaid here of the quiet successes, the unnoticed achievements and the abilities of communities to thrive, rejuvenate and transform. These are just as, if not more, important in the long term. Each of us sitting here sees this on a daily basis in our own constituencies, the places we have the privilege to represent.

That is very true of me in North East Derbyshire, which is a constituency of rebirth and rejuvenation if ever there was one. It is my home, and it is a place that has picked itself up over the past 40 years and transformed itself into an aspirational success story: a can-do, go-getting, keen-to-progress part of the world that looks forward with hope while still celebrating our proud past. That can be seen in each of the 41 communities I represent and in countless individual successes, but none is more obvious than the rebirth of Dronfield station, a once-thriving rail terminus that had been left to decline over the later part of the 20th century and that has sprung back into life since the new millennium. This has happened through a combination of transformative spirit, civic pride and the hard work of countless volunteers who had a vision for what Dronfield could be and, more importantly, who were determined to see it through.

Before I talk about the important anniversary we are celebrating this year, first, a word on Dronfield. A small number of Members may not be familiar with North East Derbyshire’s largest community, although I think all Members here today other than you, Mr Speaker, are either somewhat familiar with or have heard of Dronfield because I have talked to them about it. I happily know that the Minister knows about the town.

I hope the House will permit me to offer a brief introduction. A historic market town nestled in the beautiful Drone valley, Dronfield is first mentioned in the Domesday Book and is home today to more than 20,000 people, a stunning 12th-century church and the world’s oldest football club. Presiding over its high street is a distinctive stone memorial erected in the 19th century to celebrate Robert Peel, as a gesture of Dronfield’s thanks for the repeal of the corn laws and to celebrate free trade. We whisper it quietly, because we do not want too many people to know it, but just a few years ago it was named one of the top 10 places to live in Britain, not least because of its fantastic location, its great civic pride and its tremendous community spirit.

For hundreds of years, Dronfield was a hub for the lead trade, for coal mining and for industry, and it was that business and industry that first attracted the Midland Railway in the 1860s to consider it for a new station on a new railway line it was constructing between Chesterfield and Sheffield. Rail had come to the north midlands a few decades earlier with the opening of the North Midland Line almost 180 years ago to this very day in May 1840. It was constructed quickly, and the line, which has been known for much of the time since as the old road, missed out both Dronfield and Sheffield because of the topographical challenges and the steepness of the hills around the town, preferring instead to go through the easier Moss valley to the east towards Rotherham.

The old road, designed by George Stephenson, brought jobs, industry and growth to settlements such as Clay Cross, Killamarsh, Eckington and Renishaw, yet Dronfield just a few miles to the west was forced to wait until it was linked to the network. Fast forward 20 years, and with improved technology, Midland Rail decided it wanted to build a direct railway to Sheffield. In 1864, Sir Joseph Paxton, the MP for the decidedly non-Derbyshire constituency of Coventry, but otherwise better known as the head gardener at Chatsworth, laid a petition before the House of Commons. That resulted in the Midland Railway (New Lines and Additional Powers) Act 1864 and the start of the construction of the new road line, which would finally link Sheffield, and with it Dronfield, properly to the network.

Six years later, on Monday 1 February 1870, the new station in the centre of Dronfield welcomed its first service at 4.55 am to the sound of church bells and a brass band. For much of the next century, Dronfield station was at the heart of a burgeoning and growing town. Through boom and bust, war and peace, goods transitioned to the market yard, the commuter went off to work in Sheffield, and, in times of crisis, it saw the sight of a soldier waved off to war.

The station became indelibly linked with the town, its people, its industry and its ambition, yet mirroring the national story of rail, the station fell on tough times in the post-war period, and Dr Beeching’s axe swung as viciously through north Derbyshire as it did elsewhere in the country. Over on the old road, the original railway line through north Derbyshire, the entire line was closed to passengers, eliminating dozens of stations at a stroke. While the new road was reprieved and continued operations, Dronfield itself was determined surplus to requirements and deleted from the timetable. The last passenger service left at 21.41 on Saturday 31 December 1966, with the goods station closing a few years later.

While trains would still thunder through Dronfield on their way to Sheffield, Chesterfield or London, none would ever stop. Dronfield station became a ghost, and that was how it remained for over a decade, until a snowstorm in 1979, combined in true 1970s style with a union strike by the gritters from South Yorkshire, meant that the roads to Sheffield became impassable. For just a short period, British Rail opened the station out of necessity, to literally allow people in and out of the town. Out of nowhere, the platform stations were reported full, overwhelmed by demand from those wanting to use the train for 20p each way to Chesterfield or Sheffield.

Two years later, a local service was reinstated, but services again waxed and waned over the years without any clear plan and perhaps what we would charitably call an eccentric timetable. By the early 2000s, the station served only about 30,000 passengers a year on just a few services a day, without the ability, for example, to travel southbound until 1 o’clock in the afternoon.

The true modern renaissance of Dronfield station began 16 years ago, in 2004. Frustrated by a highly intermittent service and a lack of strategic planning, a group of residents led by Dr Peter Hayward came together to push for the restoration of a functioning and regular train service for the town. The first opportunity was via the announcement of the restoration of the Nottingham to Leeds service, which was warmly welcomed throughout the midlands and Yorkshire but which, inexplicably, left Dronfield out of its initial timetable and all its route maps.

The Dronfield Station Action Group was born, and, ably supported by the hard work of previous Member for North-East Derbyshire Natascha Engel, determined to restore services. Natascha told me of a concerted campaign in the town and down here in Westminster, including on the Terrace, to restore Dronfield to the train map, so that a proper service could finally be offered. One of the enduring features of Dronfield is its civic pride and immense community spirit, and the action group had all that in spades, along with a clear objective to improve the service for the long term. That is exactly what happened.

In December 2008, a new modern era was ushered in, with Dronfield receiving regular services once again. In a fitting tribute to its original opening, the first service was welcomed back with a brass band. Over the past 12 years, the station has not looked back. Passenger numbers have climbed from just a few thousand to a quarter of a million a year. Dozens of trains stop each day, rather than thunder through—almost 300 a week now—serving Chesterfield and Sheffield locally, along with the more distant destinations of Liverpool, Norwich, Leeds and Nottingham.

An active and hugely respected Friends of Dronfield Station, supported by local businesses, Dronfield Civic Society, Dronfield Rotary Club and the Dronfield Eye, among many others, lovingly supports, tends and promotes the station, and keeps pushing to take advantage of the opportunities that remain. We are all particularly proud and grateful for all the hard work that FODS volunteers put in around the year to keep the station looking so nice and well kept. The cleaning of the station, the tending of the flower beds and the improving of the facilities are done behind the scenes week in, week out. For the past decade or so, FODS has also run an art competition for local schools, proudly displaying that art in the waiting areas for travellers to see and admire.

Dronfield is the very model of how a station can be reborn, and, as Natascha tells me, many in the early years came to see how it had been done. Dronfield is a proud town and proud of its station, the living embodiment of what is possible when residents put their mind to it. Notwithstanding the extremely difficult challenges of recent months, the future looks bright, and together the community is committed to building upon those recent successes. Further improvements to the station are in plan, and FODS continues to campaign for further links and improved frequencies. Together we are keen to safeguard existing services, to continue improvements in the co-ordination of public transport and to build up the opportunities of Northern Powerhouse Rail and the greater links with London planned for the coming years.

The renaissance of Dronfield station is a metaphor not just for a town on the up, but for an area that is keen to progress. I was born and grew up in north Derbyshire, and in my 40 years the transformation has been immense—a revitalised ambition to seek new opportunities, to grab the possibilities in front of us and to build on our advantages for the long term. As so often happens, history has the opportunity to repeat itself. The renaissance of the new road through Dronfield station now allows us to look at the old road once again.

Dronfield has shown the success of public transport in north Derbyshire in the past decade, and now the other Midland Railway Line closed by Dr Beeching may be stirring into life too. Just a few weeks ago, we won funding from the Government to explore the possibility of reopening stations closed 40 years ago in the next valley. I am extremely grateful to the Minister for his willingness to support us to look at whether we can do that. Dronfield has shown the way and the demand. Our determination is to build on it further in the coming years in Dronfield and elsewhere. History removed both 50 years ago, and it would be a fitting tribute if we could return both the old and the new road to their former glories. A few months ago, FODS kindly invited me, the mayor of Dronfield, local residents and supporters to unveil a plaque at Dronfield station celebrating this milestone birthday. The plaque reads: “The first 150 years.” It was a privilege to unveil that plaque and to celebrate the renaissance of a station led by people power and Natascha Engel, an MP who showed me the way in helping our local community.

--- Later in debate ---

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Maggie Throup.)

[Lee Rowley]

It was a privilege to celebrate Dronfield station, its supporters, their determination and their grit, and their sheer hard work to make a success of a microcosm of Dronfield as a town and North East Derbyshire as a whole.

To everyone who has been involved in the first 150 years, thank you, and here’s to the next 150. This is a brilliant example, for the Government and the Minister to take note of—a successful community aspiring to do more and coming together to forge a real and enduring success story.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Thursday 18th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I am clear that we need to deliver a much upgraded strategic road between Manchester and Sheffield—there is no doubt about that at all—as we do further north between east Lancashire and west Yorkshire, and further north still between Cumbria and Teesside, so I absolutely accept the hon. Lady’s point. She might, though, like to have a gentle word with her Front-Bench colleagues, who, of course, have committed to scrap the road improvement schemes that we have in the pipeline.

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

As someone whose constituency borders the city of Sheffield, I say to the Minister that we need to get economic productivity moving in our areas, as was outlined by the hon. Member for High Peak (Ruth George). Does he agree that, for communities such as Barrow Hill and Staveley, the Staveley bypass, which is 90 years in the asking, would be a great idea for Chesterfield and North East Derbyshire?

[Chris Grayling]

I know that my hon. Friend is seeking funding from the housing infrastructure fund for that scheme. I have been to the area and seen what is needed. I think that it is a very good scheme, and I hope that his application is successful. The reality is that, if we are to drive economic growth in the northern part of the country, we need road improvements. Those who argue against road improvements are letting down the north.

High Speed Rail (West Midlands - Crewe) Bill

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 15th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy]

I listened carefully to what my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) said, and in principle I support the proposal, but I also recognise the points made about the fact that a review is needed now rather than in a year’s time or a year after Royal Assent, which of course will not come until a few months after their lordships have considered the Bill.

I say to the Minister, for whom I have great regard, that there should be a proper business case for the west coast main line post the introduction of HS2. Although I do not know the east coast main line or the line out of King’s Cross nearly as well, similar questions about the loss of premium fares might apply to it, although I recognise that the geography and the areas served are slightly different.

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a very important point, although I am not convinced that the new clause is the right way forward. He talks about business cases, and my concern is that there are indirect impacts that should also be considered. For example in my constituency, on the midland main line, there will be an impact on the Chesterfield Canal Trust’s attempt to regenerate our area; that has been held up now for nearly six years because we cannot get a guarantee from HS2 that it will not be impacted. Those kinds of costs must also be considered.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I will come on to such matters in a moment. He makes a very important point about the eastern side of the network, which is absolutely vital; we are obviously concentrating today on the west midlands to Crewe line, but we will come to that area later this year or next year.

Finally on this matter, I ask for my point to be seriously taken into account, because at the moment large subsidies are paid into Network Rail by the operators of the west coast main line, and in my view that will no longer be the case after the introduction of HS2.

Turning to other matters, I have serious concerns about the way in which HS2 has handled two or three areas in my constituency. Ingestre Park golf club has given evidence to the Committee and has been listened to by the Committee; however, it has still not reached an agreement with HS2 over what is going to happen. It is seriously concerned about the impact on the club and its employees—is it still going to exist? I ask the Minister to urge HS2 to reach an agreement as soon as possible with the golf club, as it did with Whittington Health golf club in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield under phase 1.

I would also like to raise the village of Hopton, which will be grossly affected by HS2 in the phase we are currently considering. It has constantly asked for more mitigation of the impact of the line, which goes pretty much straight through the village. Because of the impact on Hopton it is the village with possibly the highest proportion of houses that HS2 has had to purchase, certainly in this phase. We are asking for more mitigation. I know that the villagers will attempt to petition their lordships about this, but I ask the Minister to instruct HS2 to be more sympathetic than it has been so far to the needs of the village of Hopton.

--- Later in debate ---

[Trudy Harrison]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention, but I refer him to the 11,000 pages of the environmental statement. We need less pen pushing and paper shuffling, and more progress and more connecting people to places.

We already have compensation schemes in abundance. A plethora of schemes are available: in a safeguarded area, the express purchase scheme and the need to sell scheme; in a rural support zone, we have the cash offer, voluntary purchase schemes and the need to sell scheme; and in the homeowner payment zone, we have the homeowner payment scheme and the need to sell scheme. Outside the zones, we also have the need to sell scheme. How many layers of payment schemes do we really need? Surely, we can recognise that the current compensation packages are sufficient for those affected by the project?

[Lee Rowley]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the complexity of the compensation schemes, and no compensation scheme is perfect, but in my part of the world, which is in phase 2b, there are problems with the compensation scheme in the town of Staveley because it does not adequately reflect what is happening on the ground. We have to accept that there are many issues on the ground. There are tenants who are renting from their parents. There are people in trusts to support their elderly parents living there. I hope that the Government will consider those kinds of nuances, on an ad hoc and case-by-case basis, in a way that I have not seen so far.

[Trudy Harrison]

I do not have HS2 or, indeed, any significant infrastructure projects in my constituency, but I look forward to doing so. In my constituency, we are looking forward to the Moorside development, which will have similar kinds of inconvenience and unintended consequences. I served the Minister in the past. I am confident that she will work with Members across the House and that, where there are issues, she will work with communities.

The independent peer review is another raft of bureaucracy and scrutiny that has been more than adequately covered by this House, its Committees and the Government. The four points addressed—environmental impact, economic impact, engineering and governance—have been reviewed time and again over the past five years. It is time we got on with this project and recognised that this country is crying out for greater north-south capacity.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Thursday 11th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call Mark Garnier. Not here.

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

T5. Chesterfield canal is part of the way through a restoration of its historical route, which is to be completed in time for its 250th anniversary a few years from now. However, the restoration of the last few miles has been stopped in recent years because confirmation cannot be obtained from HS2 that barges will still be able to get underneath it if the trains go ahead. Can my right hon. Friend assure me that that will be possible?

[Chris Grayling]

I should like to give my hon. Friend that assurance. It is a tragedy, in an era when canals are being reopened for leisure purposes, that when the M6 was built, so many parts of the Kendal canal were cut off and are no longer available. I do not wish, and I do not expect, to see HS2 do the same and culvert canals when the railway is being built.

National Policy Statement: Airports

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Monday 25th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this important debate. I support the proposed expansion of Heathrow and will vote accordingly. I will do so not because I do not accept there are many real and heartfelt reasons why Members feel, as they have explained today, they cannot support it, but ultimately because I believe that, on balance, it is in the national interest that we progress as a country by building a third runway at Heathrow. Frankly, as someone who can remember these debates growing up in the ’80s, we need to get on with it.

There are two points I want to talk about. A number of Members have referred to emissions and carbon reduction targets, outlining that they do not think we will be able to achieve those targets. I think it was the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) who asked for a plan on carbon reduction targets. Plans from this place or from Whitehall will not allow us to meet our carbon reduction targets. Those targets will be achieved due to the innovations that are occurring at Boeing, Airbus, Embraer and so on. It is the planes on which we travel on our holidays this summer that will ensure, through the use of carbon fibre and biofuels, that we start to meet those targets. A Boeing 737 that took us on holiday in the 1980s produced 36% more emissions than the Boeing 737s that will take us on holiday right now. The next generation of Boeing 737s will be 20% more efficient still. That is exactly how we deal with the emissions problem.

Members have rightly talked about economics. When I took my economics class, economics 101 was about monopolies. We have a clear monopoly in Heathrow. A small number of operators have, for whatever historical reasons, got hold of a number of slots and are using them. Less than 0.5% of new slots—taking off or coming down—have been given to new operators in the past few years. The situation is also seen in the frankly extortionate cost of the secondary market in the trading of those slots. Scandinavian Airlines System sold two slots to American Airlines for £75 million just so that American Airlines could take off and land twice a day. An old airline, GB Airways, was sold in 2008 for £100 million. It had 15 aircraft, 36 destinations and hundreds of people. It also had five slots at Heathrow, which went for another £100 million. If that is not the epitome of a monopoly and a market that does not work, I do not know what is. It is for that reason, and for the national interest, that I support Heathrow expansion. I look forward to voting for the motion.

Rail Franchising

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Wednesday 10th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate. I have only three minutes, so I will go as quickly as possible.

I am a new Member in the House, and regrettably I come to these debates and I hear the same stale and artificial arguments by Opposition Members. That has happened again today: we immediately reach a position where private is bad and public is good. That argument is totally stale and artificial, as the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) has just demonstrated for the past three minutes or so.

The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), who is no longer in the Chamber, said that the discussion had become entirely partisan very early on. I think that the partisanship of the discussion was demonstrated when the motion was tabled, critiquing franchising in both concept and totality. That is the ultimate problem, because the Labour party seeks to take some examples, which I acknowledge and accept are not good, from around the country, and extrapolate from them to say that there is a systemic problem forever with rail, which means that it needs to be changed.

The evidence from the system is that more people are travelling than ever before. We have 60 years of post-war history on the rail network. For 40 of those years the network was in public ownership and for 20 it was in private sector ownership. Much of those 40 years was uneconomic—the railways lost an incredible amount of money and the number of passengers who travelled on them reduced by a third.

[Ian Mearns]

rose—

[Lee Rowley]

No, I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman.

In the past 20 years, 13 of which Opposition Members stood up to defend and were under a Labour Government, there has been an increase in the number of passengers using the railway, more trains than ever and greater customer satisfaction about many parts of the line.

I want to make two points in the time I have left. Given that today is an Opposition day, I looked at an Opposition day debate in 1994, in which the former right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras, who was shadow Secretary of State for Transport, spoke. He said that privatisation would not get the necessary investment, secure the safety of the railway network or upgrade the lines. In the past 20 years, that has been shown to be wrong.

The franchise that serves my constituency, East Midlands Trains, is an example of one that works well. It is not perfect by any means, but in the past few years, it has worked well. Transport Focus says that it is performing well, especially on punctuality and reliability. In surveys, customer satisfaction is nearly 90%.

[Tom Tugendhat]

Does my hon. Friend recognise that the highly subsidised European models get much lower satisfaction rates? All they do is transfer the burden from the passenger to the entire taxpayer population. What we have in the United Kingdom is not perfect—no system is—but at least the people who use the service pay for it.

[Lee Rowley]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Time after time, I sit in the Chamber and listen to Opposition Members who really do not understand economics and where the money comes from, and do not get how we can pay for the railways and all the sweeties and goodies that they seek to give out.

If we consider the Midland Mainline franchise in 1996, a couple of years after franchising occurred, there were 14 trains a day between London and Sheffield and the average journey time was two hours and 26 minutes, with the fastest journeys taking two hours and 10 minutes. We now have more than double the number of trains on the midland main line between London and Sheffield and the average time is quicker than the fastest time was 20 years ago.

I do not want to claim that everything is perfect. Many things could be better about the midland main line and East Midlands Trains, but what I have heard today from the Opposition is, as the Secretary of State said, complete nonsense. We should recognise that much progress has been made in the past 20 years. There is much to do, but I will not sit here and listen to the sort of nonsense that has been expressed.

Transport in the North

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Monday 6th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for the opportunity to speak in this evening’s debate. I stand here as the MP for an east midlands constituency; I hope Members with constituencies further north will allow me to contribute tonight, particularly given that many of my constituents regularly use Sheffield and travel to the north by both rail and road.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) on securing this debate, which is important for ensuring that the north has the right level of investment and spending in transport over the long term. Everyone on both sides of the House would agree about the importance of that. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) that this can and should be a relatively non-partisan issue, and I am glad that most of the speeches so far today have been in that spirit.

We need to start by recognising the enormous amount spent and the improvements that have happened over the last few years. Some £13 billion is being spent at the moment. A couple of months ago, we had the commitment to northern powerhouse rail, and the mere setting-up of Transport for the North should be acknowledged as step forward, even accepting the governance issues that remain to be discussed. In my constituency and the associated nearby town of Chesterfield, however, we have significant transport issues and have done for several years. When I was growing up in Chesterfield in the 1980s, people did not want to go to the station. The rolling stock was grotty, and it was often difficult to get a train on time.

I am pleased that over the past 10 to 15 years, as a result of spending by successive Governments, there have been significant improvements for my constituents in North East Derbyshire and for people living in north Derbyshire as a whole. We have a relatively new station in Chesterfield that opened just a few years ago. We have a franchise that is clearly working well, which is testament to how the franchise system can work. The regular trains to London run on time and are clean and relatively efficient, although obviously more can be done.

We can see real progress in Chesterfield, but we should always seek improvements and developments, and I will draw attention to that in my remaining time. First, I recognise that a number of franchises are being retendered, particularly Northern and the midland main line. I hope some of that will have an impact on my constituency, particularly at Dronfield station, where passenger throughput has quintupled over the past 10 years. The station is a real success story in Derbyshire, and it shows how rail can help towns to prosper.

The service changes proposed in some of the franchise documents will not necessarily come to pass, particularly the splitting of the Liverpool to Norwich route at Sheffield, which would force a number of my constituents to change trains to go over the Pennines. Before I joined this place in June I was a regular train user, both over to Manchester on a daily basis in my immediately previous job and regularly to Liverpool in the job before that. I recognise some of the statements made by Members on both sides of the House today about how we need to improve rail infrastructure as a whole.

There is also an argument for talking more about roads. The vast majority of people in my constituency travel by road rather than rail, although I would encourage them to use the good rail links from Chesterfield, and we do need increased investment in roads. The A61 Derby Road at the bottom of Chesterfield cuts through my constituency. It is one of the most constrained and congested A roads in the east midlands, if not the country, and it needs urgent attention. A real solution is needed that will actually solve the problems we have had over a number of decades. There were problems when I was growing up, and I was there when there were problems 16 years ago. There are still problems, and I do not want people to have those problems in 16 years’ time.

This debate has been relatively good natured and very constructive, and I hope that continues. The reality is that we have to get the spending in the north correct. We have to recognise that there is a historical anomaly and a historical imbalance in that spending, but we cannot do it all at once. We need to welcome the progress that has been made, and we need to hope that there is more to come.

Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill

Lee Rowley Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Monday 23rd October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this debate. As many have outlined, the Bill has two parts, and, in the hope of brevity, I will contribute only on the automation side.

I welcome the Bill and its limited nature, which has been debated at length for the past few hours. We have a decision to make as a country. Automation is coming. The decision is whether we allow it to happen with us or to us. This has been a very constructive debate—I particularly welcomed the comments from the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner), who speaks for the Opposition—but I worry that some of the contributions tended towards trying to solve problems that we might not fully understand at this stage in the development of automation, when legislation is not always the immediate answer. One would naturally expect me, as a Conservative, to work from the basic principle that we should legislate and regulate only where necessary, rather than always trying to create a framework that aims to solve every problem that might arise. That is essentially my point today.

The hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones) and I were on a panel together in the summer, away from this place, when we debated this extensively. Although he has made many important points that definitely need to be debated within and without this place, I think there is a clear and consistent argument for limiting the activities in the Bill and how we regulate automation in order to allow people to innovate. Before he spoke, I was going to say I welcomed the fact that no one had used the B word in this debate, but obviously he referred to it. As important as Brexit is, and as important as it is to my constituents that it is delivered, there is a danger within the political discourse in this country that we are losing the capability and bandwidth to talk about much bigger and equally as existential issues, such as this one. Brexit will influence us for the next 18 months and beyond, but the likes of driverless vehicles and automated vehicle technology have the potential to influence our society for 18 years, or 36 years, or 54 years. We have been allocated time to talk about this issue, but the wider political discussion tends to be incredibly breathless about Brexit and, perhaps, to reduce the amount of time that we have to discuss such issues. So, in order to avoid falling into the trap that I have suggested others have fallen into, I will move on from Brexit immediately.

I welcome the Government’s approach to a rolling regulatory reform. While I entirely understand why Opposition Members such as the hon. Members for Eltham (Clive Efford) and for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine)—neither is present now—outlined the need for a vision and an expansive understanding of this issue, we are at an early stage in the development of automated vehicles, and regulation should accord with that. We must accept that we are currently seeking to guide a nascent industry from some very small-scale trials in semi-pedestrianised areas, often involving speed limits of just a few miles an hour, into a more large-scale set of trials. It is important for regulation to move, although not necessarily to expand in every area, but that needs to be done in a measured and controlled way.

We will arrive at the stage of early adoption relatively soon, and I think it appropriate to think about regulation again in the future. If the technology is successful, it will hopefully be adopted on a large scale, and will subsequently become the majority. Eventually, we will be dealing with the long tail with which we must always deal when deciding how to ensure that the adoption of technology is ubiquitous. The regulation at each of those stages will necessarily differ, and we should not seek to complicate the current position by trying to answer all the questions that are being asked now about developments that may not take place for a number of years. I welcome what the Government are doing in that connection.

I am pleased that the Government are doing some tidying up, and ensuring that the insurance framework around automated vehicles is appropriate. Clause 2, for instance, will ensure that there is clarity about what happens in the insurance market when the machine, rather than the driver, is in control of a vehicle. I also welcome clause 4, which makes some clear statements about the difference between product liability and the continuation of pooled insurance.

There may be a case—which we can debate both here and elsewhere—for saying that the point about pooled insurance versus product liability will be appropriate in the future, but product manufacturer liability will be appropriate only when nearly all drivers are in automated vehicles. Until that point, we must ensure that the framework is appropriate, which is why a pooled insurance system is itself appropriate. There will never be a silver bullet—there will never be a way in which to resolve all the conceptual and philosophical discussions about how pooled insurance can be applied to this kind of market, particularly in a transitional form—but I think that what the Government are trying to do here is very welcome.

Many Members have mentioned our wish to become a world leader in technology of this kind, and I support what they have said. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) spoke of the importance of putting money behind activities such as this, and I agree with him to an extent, but I also think it important to establish the right regulatory framework. Places like Silicon Valley are streets ahead of many parts of the world when it comes to automated vehicle technology, but it should be noted that only a handful of American states have taken up the opportunities that it has provided. We heard earlier about companies in China, such as Geely and Baidu, which are proceeding apace with automatic technology, and about Chinese-owned companies such as Volvo, which is doing the same on our own continent, but the country has a real opportunity, as an early adopter, to provide the frameworks that will allow such companies to innovate and thrive. That is why we should be careful about the regulatory framework, as the Government are being here.

I wish to make one final point, on which I concur with the hon. Member for Bristol North West. Discussions on these kinds of issues prompt important existential questions around how we as a society should adopt such technologies in the future. Change comes in three parts: technological change, regulatory and legal change, and cultural change. The technological change is coming forward, which is why we are talking about it tonight. We are also talking about the regulatory and legal framework that will be necessary, but cultural change is the responsibility not just of Members of this House, as it must be debated by wider society, and it will take many years to come forward.

We have talked about safety. As a politician, I am interested in polls, and a YouGov poll of a few months ago found that approximately 50% of drivers do not think driverless technology is safe at this point, and only 33% said they do think it is safe. We should beware of just one poll, as we have all learned in this place over the past year or so, but that poll is important in that it highlights that many people are unconvinced by this technology. However, if we do not take the opportunities that it presents, which have been outlined in the debate, we will be doing a disservice to the country.

I also accept the points of the hon. Members for Bristol North West and for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders), who is no longer in his place, about the disruption and dislocation this technology might bring in the very long term, but we must not get too far ahead ourselves.

I am now perhaps addressing far too existential questions for 9 o’clock on a Monday evening in this place. However, I welcome what the Government are doing here, and the deliberately limited nature of the Bill. I also welcome the opportunity to ask the wider questions it opens for society, which is why I am happy to support the Bill this evening.

HS2: Phase 2b Route (Manchester and Leeds)

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Wednesday 6th September 2017 Westminster Hall

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to this debate, Mr McCabe. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Antoinette Sandbach) on securing this debate, which is an important step in making sure residents and people across the country have confidence in this controversial and difficult project, but one that has the opportunity and potential to make some difference to our country if it is done in the right way. In the same way that HS2 is controversial in this House, HS2 is controversial in my constituency of North East Derbyshire as well. I genuinely welcomed the Secretary of State’s statement on 17 July, which helped to clarify matters in my constituency. The route has moved slightly further to the east, although that causes problems for the right hon. Member for Rother Valley (Sir Kevin Barron) in the constituency adjacent to mine.

I have three quick points on the change to the route. I hope the Minister will be willing to consider each of those. First, now that we are clearer about the route, following the statement on 17 July, my constituents’ thoughts and conversations over the summer have turned to what that actually means on a practical level. I recognise that, for all large infrastructure projects, a long period of design and development needs to take place so we understand what the implications are for the roads, the railway network, and the traffic and transport that is required to construct them. It would be very helpful if constituencies such as mine could obtain an understanding of the likely implications when the construction works begin. Which roads will be affected and how much is likely to come down them? That will enable people to start preparing and having discussions at this early stage. I fear that if we have yet more consultation meetings in North East Derbyshire and across the country in which such basic, practical questions cannot be answered, or are deferred for a couple of years, it will add to the weight of cynicism that is already in place in constituencies such as mine.

The second issue relates to where HS2 will link to existing track. In my constituency, given the changes that the right hon. Member for Rother Valley talked about—it will move into Sheffield directly—it is proposed that existing elements of the legacy track will be used. There will need to be significant changes to the legacy track, including electrification, one assumes. It would be useful to get more detail at the earliest possible stage, because residents who think that the track has moved elsewhere and are no longer quite as affected by it as they were still need to understand the great implications of the changes and upgrades to the lines on the existing network, and the implications for the midlands main line and the franchise that runs on the existing network.

Finally, villages in my constituency, including Killamarsh, Renishaw and Spinkhill, have previously faced the real challenge that many colleagues have talked about today. They were on the previously reserved route and have suffered the blight that has been described. Happily, most of the blight has been removed, at least for the villages in my constituency, because the route has moved elsewhere, but they have suffered for a number of years. We have had four and a half years of missed opportunities, economic consequences and decisions foregone. For example, for four and a half years the Chesterfield Canal Trust has not been able to make decisions about the restoration of a very important asset in north Derbyshire. I recognise that money is tight, and I promise the Government that, as a Back-Bench Conservative Member of Parliament, I will not make a habit of coming to ask for money, but I wonder whether consideration can be given to compensation schemes for those who were affected by the blight for several years. They may be no longer affected but their lives have been changed none the less. I hope the Minister will be willing to consider those issues.