Rail Freight
Debate between Lisa Smart and Ben Maguire(1 week, 1 day ago)
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Lisa Smart
I very much agree with my hon. Friend. The way he lays out the scale of the impact of rail freight on his constituency and the neighbouring area shows its importance. I will come on to a couple of suggestions for the Government that I hope will address some of his point.
Rail freight provides clear environmental benefits compared with the alternatives. Even when diesel-hauled, a freight train produces around 76% lower carbon emissions per tonne-kilometre than a lorry on the road. That figure improves dramatically with electrification, as electrically hauled freight cuts emissions further still, while also consuming far less track capacity because electric locomotives accelerate significantly better than diesel ones.
Ben Maguire (North Cornwall) (LD)
I have been supporting a project called Kernow Connect alongside Cornwall council, and it looks to advance freight capacity to Cornwall significantly. We have Falmouth, one of the deepest ports in the world, and fantastic resources such as critical minerals, but we do not have the infrastructure to take the freight to the rest of the country. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Minister could start thinking about such projects, which are potentially ready to go, and get some feasibility study money to see if they are viable so that we can have the freight revolution the country needs?
Lisa Smart
My hon. Friend gives yet another tourist advert for the beautiful area he represents. He is right that long-term thinking about investing in our infrastructure for our environment, our communities and our economy is good and sensible. That work with Kernow Connect sounds interesting and worth further exploration.
As we continue to push towards net zero, as we must, that gap matters enormously. Moving freight off the roads and on to rail should be a core part of our decarbonisation programme, but we face several barriers to improving our rail freight network, and I am keen to hear from the Minister about the Government’s plans to address them.