Transport: Remote Island Communities in England

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Thursday 20th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, on getting this debate and particularly on allowing all of us a quarter of an hour to speak—a restriction which I hope I will get nowhere near.

Having said that, I have some criticism in that, although I live in Cornwall and often visit west Cornwall and Scilly, I was born in Essex and worked in east London. Of course the Isle of Dogs, Canvey Island and, across the water from us, the Isle of Sheppey and the Isle of Thanet, are also key islands in the realm of England, but I think probably on the Isle of Dogs, with Canary Wharf, the problem is not one of lack of public transport.

Last autumn I had the privilege to visit Scilly and to chair a conference on the transport needs there. I was asked over as I have a background in the transport industry and represented Scilly as an MEP some years ago. I was struck—not just from my own experience over many years of travelling to Scilly, but by that well-attended conference on islands with a population of some 2,000, not all of whom were there, by many means, but a significant number of whom were, including all the decision-makers—by how much the transport facilities and access to Scilly, and between it and west Cornwall, needed to be improved, and by their unsatisfactory nature.

During my period as an MEP in the late 1990s, the same arguments were there. The issues around the replacement of the “Scillonian III” and improving the robust nature of the sea route were most important. At that time, as well, we had a helicopter route, and the airframes of those vehicles were ageing very substantially. As we found out, the property value of the heliport at Penzance was going up and up and tempting redevelopment.

Since that time, the tourist economy of Scilly has been far more challenged. Scilly has benefited for many years from a stable type of visitor who goes back many times but is of a certain age. That type of tourism is more difficult and more challenging. There are fewer people who have a tradition of going there. At one time the islands’ hoteliers were known for enjoying a season on Scilly and then the winter in the Bahamas. Those days, I regret on their behalf, are long gone. There really is an issue now about transport to these important islands some 20 or 30 miles off the west coast of the mainland.

As the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, said, that area of monopoly is a real challenge. It was a great disappointment to me—having supported development and planning permission for a new heliport very near to the old one, to which there were very few local objections—that there was a judicial review to hold up the process. That meant that the aspiration of people not just in Scilly but in west Cornwall to take advantage of a quite risky—in the best sense—entrepreneurial attempt to greatly improve transport connections has been put back and potentially challenged. I will not go into the motives or reasons for the judicial review but I think that it was very regrettable and that an alternative method of travel is being threatened or prejudiced. These investments, if prolonged for too long, risk not happening. This whole issue of improving these connections, bringing competition, is key.

I want to make one other point which reinforces the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley: because connections to remote islands are not a great challenge in England and Cornwall, we do not really focus on them at all—unlike in Scotland, where huge care is taken to make sure that island communities are not prejudiced in their access to services and travel to the mainland.

In terms of the Isles of Scilly, we have to change that view in respect of England and Cornwall. That community, which is more under threat than it has been in the past, now needs to be given due attention in terms of accepting that principle, which I think is right for all citizens across the United Kingdom, which is that you should not be discriminated against because you live offshore. For that reason, I would like to see government initiatives to readdress that balance between Scotland and England and Cornwall, and I would very much like to see the monopoly in transport to the Isles of Scilly challenged, with competition coming in and encouragement of greater choice not only for the citizens of Scilly but for those many adventurers who wish to cross the Atlantic to our remote islands off our west coast. Those islands are great to visit and great to live on for those who have the privilege to be there but who need to come back to the mainland for their education, for their medical needs and for all the other services that we take for granted.