Rail Update

Lucy Powell Excerpts

Monday 5th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

Both my hon. Friend and the Kettering rail users group are powerful advocates for Kettering. I am sure they will be pleased by the investment going in. I was on the line the other day, and I could see all the engineering work taking place north and south of Kettering. There will be much better train links into London and, importantly, far more seats at peak times from Kettering, and we will be looking carefully at how we can ensure that passengers from Kettering have the best possible experience.

[Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

With the collapse of this contract and the collapse of Carillion recently, is this not a moment for us to be clear with the public that we are learning the lessons of these contracting exercises? People are coming in, overbidding or undercutting —or however one likes to put it—to kill off the competition and yet cannot afford to provide these public services. We need to be really clear with people that we have learnt the lessons and understand and that this will not happen going forward.

[Chris Grayling]

Actually, I absolutely agree with the hon. Lady. We do need to learn the lessons—that is absolutely clear. That is one reason why we have shifted much more clearly towards a different risk-based approach on current franchises and why we are moving towards a greater element of quality on current franchises. It is worth saying that the winning bid for the new south-western railway franchise was not the highest bid; it was the highest-quality bid. That is important. We can never militate against corporate failure. What has happened with Carillion has been tragic, but we took a lot of precautions on the rail network and HS2 to make sure there was not a significant impact if the worst happened, which it did; but, yes, of course lessons have to be learned.