Railways: Investment

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Thursday 25th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the noble Lord referred to electrification past Oxford. He will have to be patient for our determination on the IEP project, but he will not have to wait too long. He asked where the coaches would be constructed. He will know that EU procurement rules prevent us from guaranteeing that coaches will be built in the UK. Personally, I hope that they will be built in the UK, but we will have to see what happens.

[Lord Bradshaw]

I congratulate the Minister on the Statement, which, over the whole country, will be gladly accepted by most railwaymen. I deplore the sentiments expressed on the other side of the House, as this seems to be a great day for railways.

I have a few questions, however. The Statement refers to electrification in the north-west. It is important that Leeds is also included, because services across the Pennines are much slower than they would be and electrification between the west and east coasts makes an enormous amount of sense. The overcrowding of existing services, particularly around Manchester, is a blot on the record of the previous Government, because the crowding standards there are totally unacceptable.

Will the Minister confirm my arithmetic that something like 2,450 extra carriages are included? Reference is made to investments on the east coast main line and the Midland main line. I should like to know the nature of those improvements, because it is not very clear from the Statement. I was concerned about the Secretary of State ruling out the option of a wholesale refurbishment of the Intercity 125 fleet, some of which dates back to the 1970s. I am reliably informed by people in the rolling stock industry that those vehicles and the Mark IV vehicles on the east coast main line are quite capable of being turned into new vehicles, as has already been done for the Wrexham and Shropshire railway. We ought to be quite certain that we cannot use them, because their owners—the rolling stock companies—may lease them to a large number of open-access operators. I believe that any big increase in open-access operations will undermine the franchising process.

The noble Lord talked about bringing the journey time from Cardiff to London to under two hours, but it was under two hours in the 1980s, so that does not amount to much of an improvement. It is the timetable that needs altering—it has been packed with stops here, there and everywhere, making the journey to south Wales much longer than it need be. While we are on the subject of south Wales, my most anxious concerns are about the Severn Tunnel, which is the only way in and out of south Wales. I know that my noble friend in another place will be seeing the Minister on Monday to talk to her about the urgent necessity of doubling the line from Swindon to Kemble, so that there is a viable route between south Wales and London.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, my noble friend makes several important points. I shall just touch on some of the more important ones. He talked about the future of the HST 125 trains, the possibility of refurbishing them and the possible undesirable effects of those trains staying in the market. There are uses for that rolling stock in the future. One difficulty about that rolling stock is that its operating costs would be higher, while there might be a reliability question. The noble Lord knows how damaging breakdowns are on the system.

The noble Lord talked about the redoubling of the Swindon to Kemble line. That is a good scheme but it is not in CP4. I am making absolutely no commitment, but it could be a CP5 issue. He also talked about the time saving that arises from electrification. He needs to remember that that route is much more intensively used but that electric trains will give greater acceleration, so there will be a big benefit. However, we will keep the timetabling issues under review and make sure that we are not losing any benefits that we could gain.