Railway 200

Lord McLoughlin Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

The Leamside line is one of many projects—I have already had a question about the Midlands Rail Hub—that are part of the review commissioned by the Secretary of State for Transport. We need to allocate the funding we have for railways in the best possible way. The comprehensive review she has commissioned will seek to do just that.

[Lord McLoughlin (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome the department’s contribution to the 200-year anniversary. Will the Minister acknowledge that we have seen massive growth on the railways over the past 20 years, with passenger journeys going up from 700 million to 1.8 billion before the Covid pandemic? What is the Government’s plan to see them continue to grow? That growth has been brought about by bringing in the private sector.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

We all recognise the growth in passenger traffic on the railways in the past 20 years. There are many reasons for it. Sadly, post Covid, the railway has less patronage than it did and certainly less income than it did, so the Government’s proposals for a reformed railway have to address the issues on the railway as they are now, not what happened in the past.