Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Moynihan Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 7th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, as a fellow gnarled veteran, speaking in this debate with so many maiden speeches vividly brings back the nerves of some 27 years ago. I have to say that the standard of those maiden speeches has improved significantly, as have those of the responders, and I congratulate them all.

I congratulate the Members of this House who have engaged in this Bill, particularly my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham, who made the powerful point about access to the capital markets for privatised industries and the challenges, both political and commercial, of no longer being able to access those markets. However, my interest in this debate looks at how public/private sector partnerships can and must work in this sector. My intention is to share my experience and try to inform the debate, and particularly to respond to the challenge of how we improve rail services in the devolved areas and cities, as was put forward to us by the noble Lord, Lord McLoughlin.

I declare my interest as chair of Amey, a provider of full life-cycle engineering, operations and decarbonisation solutions for transport infrastructure and complex facilities. Amey, as many in this House know, has a major involvement in the rail sector in the UK.

I thought it would be helpful to show what it takes for public ownership, when engaged with private sector infrastructure management, to work effectively, creating a classic example of future models in line with the consequences of this Bill. So I have chosen an example in Wales, where arrangements will not change from those that worked effectively under the last Government.

In October 2020, the Welsh Government announced that a franchise was to be transferred to a publicly owned Transport for Wales Rail, following significant falls in passenger numbers and revenue due to the Covid-19 pandemic. All staff, rolling stock and services operated by KeolisAmey Wales were taken over by the nationalised operator on 7 February 2021.

However, as part of the original agreement, Amey continued to be responsible for infrastructure on the core valley lines, where the South Wales Metro upgrade is taking place. In addition, Keolis and Amey continue to assist and work with the nationalised operator to provide improvement services on the franchise, such as rolling stock and ticketing services. The contract aimed to deliver much-needed investment in the Welsh network, including investment in trains, the modernisation of 247 stations, and the new build of five new metro stations, along with hundreds of extra services from Monday to Friday and a major push for extra Sunday services.

As stated by the Government, the Bill will extend to Wales and Scotland while recognising that cross-border rail services are a reserved matter. To provide more information on the project, the core valley lines network, which radiates out from Cardiff up the valleys and accounts for 155 train miles in Wales, carries 56% of all Welsh and Borders Transport for Wales passage services each day, where commuting into the Cardiff capital region is set to grow by 144% by 2043. To be busier—as the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, said—is the objective of all concerned. It is a working example of how the public sector can run the rail services and achieve the objectives of the Welsh Government through engaging the private sector as a delivery partner.

This summer, I was invited to address a meeting of the directors of the Office of Rail and Road. I am pleased members of that board will be visiting the Cardiff-based core valley lines project later this month to see how the model can bring sufficient benefits to passengers and all the parties involved in the running of this service; above all, how it can be safe and well regulated.

The starting point lies with the Welsh Government. They have created a clear political structure to embed their vision of a customer-centred, high-quality, safe, integrated, affordable and accessible transport network to meet the aspirations of the Welsh people, for it is they who will benefit. Transport for Wales, therefore, had to set out a clear remit, which it did; it adopted the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act. The objectives of the national strategy Prosperity for All were embedded into the project, and the principles set out in the Active Travel (Wales) Act created the operating framework within which the infrastructure manager of the CVL network operates.

Transport for Wales has devolved franchising powers from the Department for Transport. The TfW procurement process for the operator of the Wales and Borders rail franchise work included the transfer of the CVL network from Network Rail to the Welsh Government. The project is interesting and unusual. It is most interesting, because it can become a case study for what the Government intend to achieve in the future.

The procurement brief is critical to the success of these projects, but it was structured around output and underpinned by the legal status of the future generations Act in Wales. Rather than a technical specification, the brief was

“better access to jobs and services, more frequent and faster services, better quality, and environmental improvements”.

It was pioneering work with Transport for Wales that required moving the core valley lines from an ageing network to a contemporary, electrified, metro-style service. Acting as an end-to-end infrastructure deliverer, manager and operator, we had to design the innovation solution, and manage and operate the new and existing assets on a day-by-day basis. The Welsh Government wanted much more than an infrastructure project. They identified the need to provide a catalyst for transforming the economic and social prospects of south-east Wales.

A major challenge was designing the project to meet the needs and challenges of the historic railways of Wales. This task was particularly demanding due to the ageing infrastructure, where historic structures along the route, such as bridges and tunnels, were too low for standard electrification methods. Traditional solutions, such as demolition or track lowering, were impractical, costly, environmentally demanding, and time-consuming. By working with Amey’s consulting division, we were strongly encouraged by the Welsh Government to develop new technologies to keep over 50 bridges in place by introducing non-live overhead cable sections to allow trains to switch to alternative multimode power capabilities, such as battery and OCS, to enable trains to transition through current-free sections, making discontinuous electrification possible. This current-free intermittent technology allowed over 50 bridges to stay in place.

This has changed how companies in the sector, such as ours, respond to public sector entities. It has led to stronger public/private partnerships. It means getting to know your client earlier, understanding the challenges better, responding to ESG issues as a priority, working closely with local communities, and putting the environment and the natural world in which we work at the top of the agenda, as in the trans-Pennine route upgrade, which the Minister mentioned in her opening speech and which will benefit our jointly beloved city of Leeds.

In response to the demand of the Welsh Government and public sector ownership, the private sector is capable of working within a contractual framework to reduce costs and carbon emissions, avoid the challenges of obtaining consents for listed structures, and provide a new model for UK railways, offering a framework for similar projects around the UK. The transfer of the CVL infrastructure from Network Rail’s ownership to being managed and operated by a private company is a UK first that combines the four key objectives of decarbonisation and energy efficiency, infrastructure resilience and safety, a nature-positive approach with full engagement with local communities, and net-zero priorities—a first which I hope will be carefully studied by the Minister and her department in the context of their plans for the future of passenger railway services in this country.

Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Lord Moynihan Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 23rd October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD)]

My Lords, I would like to say that it is a pleasure to follow the two noble Baronesses but actually it is not. It makes me so angry that, week after week, they come to this House and tell us about the problems they have. When they do that they are telling us about not just their problems but the problems being encountered by tens of thousands of people, day in, day out. My Amendment 39 is about the passenger standards authority. If anything demonstrates why we need a passenger standards authority, it is the experience that has just been outlined.

The passenger standards authority is part of a package that will come later and is not part of the Bill, but I want to raise it here because passenger standards are the reason for the Bill and why we are here. As we have been hearing over the past week or so, a combination of fragmentation within the industry, poor tendering and inadequate enforcement has led us to the situation that we are in now, but it seems to me that there is something about an organisational culture that is the complete reverse of being passenger-focused.

One of the problems we are facing is that the way that we measure the performance of train operating companies is legalistic and algorithmic; so on one side of it, you are all right and no action will be taken, but step a little further and action will be taken. For passengers, that feels arbitrary. I would like to hear from the Minister how the passenger standards authority is going to work. How will it hold the operator to account in a way that so demonstrably has not been done in the past? Will it be taking a similar, very measured approach, or can it really get into the nitty-gritty of what makes passenger journeys work?

Of course, that includes punctuality, reliability, ticketing and accessibility, but there is a bunch of other things, as we have heard from noble Lords, such as the provision of consistent, understandable information; trains that are clean and properly staffed and on which people feel safe; some sort of functioning wifi; and the ability to get a cup of tea on a long journey. These things are all part of the passenger experience and should not be that difficult.

Is the passenger standards authority going to have the ability to represent passengers right across the piece? Will it be genuinely about driving improvement, not just constantly having niggles with train operators about whether they are not quite good enough or not quite bad enough? I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interests as set out in the register.

I support Amendment 17, in the names of four eminent Members of your Lordships’ House. I hope that I will be forgiven if I also say that I declare the interest of having worked with the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, on these issues and duty of care and accessibility for many decades. In fact, we go back to the point when, as Minister for Sport, I approached the International Olympic Committee to ask it to consider ensuring that all the facilities used by a host city for the Olympic Games should immediately be used thereafter for the Paralympians. That was not just so that we could look at athletes and focus on their abilities rather than their disabilities, but to change the mindset of the population. A lot of what we have been talking about this evening is about changing that mindset. It is about changing attitudes: we cannot simply put in a statement of standards and allow it to gather dust; we must make sure that that statement of standards changes attitudes.

The Government have a great opportunity to include a statement of standards in this legislation. No party has a greater interest in accessibility than any other party. We all passionately agree across the Chamber about the importance of responding to the proposers of the amendment we are debating. This Bill is an opportunity to recognise that and move forward to a new level of recognition and understanding about what should be in a statement of standards.

All train operating companies should be committed to providing infrastructure and rail services to the highest standard of accessibility—that is the starting position—and customer service for all customers and stakeholders. There should be accessible travel policies outlining their approach to providing assistance to customers with restricted mobility or who require assistance, including those with visual or auditory impairments, learning disabilities and non-visible disabilities. This policy should be placed in a statement of standards and should be aligned to other legislation, such as the Equality Act and the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 1998.

Passenger Assist is a national system supported by all train operating companies at the moment. I hope it will be supported in future, because it is vital that we arrange passenger assistance for disabled customers and those with restricted mobility. At present, national technical specifications for interoperability define technical and operational standards to ensure the interoperability of trains, not least into the European railway system, and must include accessibility standards for new stations or major work on existing stations. Let us embed that into a statement of standards. The Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations ensure that vehicles used as rail replacement services are accessible. All involved should implement these standards for all new infrastructure, in addition to adopting innovation and best practice.

Level boarding is an incredibly important issue. All new train fleets being introduced should have a slightly lowered floor height compared with typical trains in the UK and should be provided with a retractable step to close the gap between the train and the platform. This would mean that all passengers should be able to board and alight without assistance, at all platforms, once the long-running transformation in this country is complete and all platforms have been brought into alignment. Let us embed that into a statement of standards.

I shall touch on two other things. The first is persons with reduced mobility national technical specification notices. At present, NTSNs define the regulatory requirements for infrastructure and trains, to ensure accessibility for people with reduced mobility. They include standards for the design, construction and maintenance of railway systems to make them accessible. Braille and prismatic signage at our major stations should be an essential feature and should comply with the PRM NTSNs.

On braille signs, let us take the situation in Wales. Braille signs should be in both languages; they should be in Welsh as well as English, aligning, in that case, with the Welsh Language Act’s commitment to preserving the language. This initiative not only supports the ethos of that Act but enhances accessibility for individuals with impaired vision. I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, will agree with that.

Finally, there should be station design toolkits specialising in wayfinding requirements and colour schemes, to ensure consistency and accessibility. That includes principles for signage, fonts and colours, to create a high-quality station wayfinding system.

This Bill provides a unique opportunity to include a comprehensive suite of accessibility reforms and to introduce a standardised and consistent approach to accessibility standards across the railway network. All of us across the Chamber agree on the importance of the subject. Here we have a real opportunity to have a statement of standards of the highest possible quality enshrined in legislation. I look to the Minister and the Government to at least take that away and think about it as an important step forward that would gather support across the Chamber and respond to the worrying concerns that have been expressed by the noble Baronesses in Committee tonight.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been a very depressing debate—listening to the terrible problems that many noble Lords have had in using the rail network. It is wonderful that they have been able to expose them so widely. We have heard about them before, but it is depressing that we are in 2024 and they have not been solved already. All this could have been done years ago, without legislation and without any change. It just needs somebody to do it and to take responsibility for it. So the list of the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, is very good—all the lists are good. There are three things that I hope my noble friend will take forward.

There are three different elements to the GBR responsibility. One is the infrastructure—platforms. One is the trains—level boarding. The other is services—what people do or do not get at the stations. Most important is that the passenger standards authority, mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, must be not only comprehensive, strong and fast but independent.

We have to think about how you can be independent of the Government and the railways, and still have credibility. I hope everybody can, but the Government will have to accept something that is independent, rather than something which takes backdoor instructions from Ministers who say, “Don’t get too strong on this, because it’s too expensive”.

We will have to watch this for a long time, but I congratulate other noble Lords who have spoken in this debate and exposed this, which should have been exposed a very long time ago.