Railways: Dawlish

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Wednesday 6th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, the noble Lord is right to point to the issues we have had on that track: when there are high waves and sea spray close to the track the Voyager trains cannot run, as they have brake resistors on top. CrossCountry is working to assess whether there might be engineering solutions that would enable the Voyager class to operate through Dawlish in those challenging conditions. We are also looking into providing further additional rolling stock, but the Government and franchise operators are investing heavily in new, improved trains.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, the economies of west Devon, Plymouth and Cornwall rely very much on this line. Last autumn a six-foot hole appeared under the track in the Dawlish area, so this is far from solved. Yet, despite Devon and Cornwall—regrettably—being stuffed with Tory MPs there seems to be no real action at all. Can the Minister give us a date when the fundamental structure, whether it is the line that the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, refers to or the sea wall, will be completed? When will something be done?

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, this train line has been a long-standing problem ever since it was opened in 1846—that year trains failed to run along it. We are working closely on that and although I am not able to give the noble Lord a date, we are making significant progress. Network Rail has submitted a plan that we are looking at carefully and we hope to make an announcement on it very shortly.