Rail Links: South-west England

Neil Parish Excerpts

Tuesday 24th October 2017 Westminster Hall

[Luke Pollard]

More new stations in our region can only be a good thing. Continued investment in repairing and renewing existing stations, such as the efforts being undertaken at Plymouth, is also much appreciated. The peninsula rail taskforce produced a fine set of reports. One year since hon. Members who are here today presented it to Ministers, there has still been no formal response. In answer to a written question that I tabled on 20 July, the Minister confirmed that the DFT would not formally respond to the PRTF’s report at all. That is disappointing, and I encourage the Minister to look at it again. It is a fine piece of work, setting out what signals, track, curves and junctions need upgrading to achieve quicker and more resilient journeys. It is a costed plan of some £9 billion in total, with £2.5 billion of immediate asks.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

I very much agree with the hon. Gentleman that much more could be done to the track to get the trains faster. I want to get faster trains to Plymouth, but I also want to make sure they stop at Tiverton Parkway on the way. I very much back what my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow) said about a station in Cullompton as well as Wellington, and we must not forget the southern line from Waterloo to Exeter, which a great deal more could be done with.

[Luke Pollard]

The hon. Gentleman makes the point well.

In the general election, I was pleased that my party leader was so persuaded by the case for rail investment in the south-west that he backed spending £2.5 billion on the following immediate asks in the PRTF report: track straightening, signal upgrades, speed improvements and resilience at Dawlish in preparation for the Dawlish avoiding line. I fear I am getting a similar reputation to the Leader of the Opposition for liking trains. If Labour can do that, will the Minister look at spending that is as yet unallocated in control period 6 for funding the PRTF projects?

The Secretary of State recently announced £48 billion of maintenance and repair funding, with investment in infrastructure to follow in the so-called SoFA—statement of funds available—documents. My ask, which I am sure is that of other Members, is for the far south-west to gain its fair share of that funding. I do not believe voters or Members would accept or support yet more money going to other regions without the far south-west getting our fair share. I am sure that the irony is not lost on the Minister or members of his party present today that a plan put together largely by Tory councils and backed by Tory MPs is not yet being backed by a Conservative Government but is backed by the Labour Opposition. I am sure the Minister and all those with an eye on the region’s many marginal seats would like to address that.

We need a railway we can be proud of, and the autumn Budget is the Government’s chance to give us exactly that. Our rail travel should take two hours 15 minutes to London, not three and a half. We need to ensure we are investing in reducing the journey times at every opportunity. The PRTF’s “Speed to the West” study has identified an opportunity in the autumn Budget to allocate £30 million of new money and shave three minutes off the journey between Plymouth and Exeter. To complete the work, £600,000 is required for Network Rail to finalise the technical details and re-model the track plans. The work itself would cost £25 million to £30 million. That is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, because according to the chair of the PRTF, those tracks will not be repaired again for another 60 to 70 years. I encourage the Minister to support us in making the case to the Treasury and his own Department to spend that money.

I would like to take a moment to look at what transport infrastructure means for the wider south-west region as a whole. Last Friday at the Exeter Chiefs ground I joined Members and businesses from across the region for the south-west growth summit, where I made a pledge to back the south-west, as a number of Members did. The biggest single boost that could be delivered to our region’s economic performance is investment in our train line. The Minister and I are both big fans of modal shift—moving people from their cars on to trains. At present it is faster to drive between Plymouth and Exeter than it is to take a train. Will he help us to make modal shift possible, so that we can reverse those statistics?

Politics has changed, and new approaches are needed. Other regions of our country have seen the way that Opposition and Government MPs can join together to champion transport schemes in their region. I hope that that can be done in the far south-west. As a region, we need to be stronger, bolder and more relentless in delivering transport schemes and more passionate with Government to make sure we get the funding we deserve. If we continue to suffer from poor transport links, we risk losing jobs and missing the chance to protect and grow the economy in the south-west.

I would be grateful if the Minister could address in his concluding remarks the request for a pilot of using Network Rail’s mobile masts in Devon and Cornwall for train mobile signal, £30 million for a speed upgrade on the Devon banks and a proper response to the PRTF report. All three asks are in his hands. Our region awaits his decision, and I hope it is a good one.