Nottingham to Lincoln Railway Line

Debate between Patrick Mercer and Stephen Hammond

Monday 27th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Patrick Mercer (Newark) (Ind)]

May I thank your office, Madam Deputy Speaker, for making it possible for me to have this debate today? I should also like to thank the right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House who have supported the project. I will certainly allow them time to speak later, if they so wish. I thank East Midlands Trains for being helpful and supportive. I thank the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond), who has already given a lot of his valuable time to listening to what I and others have said about this matter. Most notably, I have received support from the hon. Member for Lincoln (Karl MᶜCartney), who came with me to see the Minister. I also thank the Minister for being present tonight, when I am sure he has other things that he would like to be doing—

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Stephen Hammond)]

Dinner in 10 minutes, please.

[Patrick Mercer]

As the Minister said, his dinner is in 10 minutes, so I will be as brief as possible.

Newark has many, many assets, probably the best of which, as has been known since at least Roman times, is the ability to communicate quickly and effectively, particularly north to south, and south to north. During my time as a Member of Parliament, one of the things that I have noticed is that it is easy for me to get to London and back, but extraordinarily difficult to get to Nottingham in the west, and less difficult to get to Lincoln in the east. My rail communications inside the area are very good in one direction, but poor in the other.

It is interesting to note that on this 100th anniversary of the start of the first world war, I notice that soldiers from my old regiment, the Sherwood Foresters, were able to move by train more quickly in 1914, from Nottingham to Lincoln, than they are today. That cannot make sense. I would love to see the Minister in Newark; I do not know whether he is familiar with the area. I would like him to see the huge potential in the region, which was recognised by the decision to dual the A46 from Newark to Lincoln. However, we continue to be let down by rail services going from east to west and from west to east.

--- Later in debate ---

[Patrick Mercer]

I thank the Minister and I thank my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Stephen Phillips) for his intervention. This is clear and proper guidance. This is exactly the point of this style of debate. Not only was his meeting very helpful, but now it is on the record and all our constituents will be hearing exactly what we the elected Members have to do to try to force this through and to get a fair hearing. I am grateful.

[Stephen Hammond]

My hon. Friend knows that it would have been easy for me to say some soft words. What I am saying now is probably not terribly good news for him. But he and all the elected Members here have often made the case, and I urge them all again to go to their local bodies, as I have previously tried to indicate. It is incredibly important that the county councils and the economic bodies in the region declare this a strategic priority. That will underline the importance of reconsidering whether the improvements to the line are a high priority for those bodies and, therefore, for the allocation of local funding, which is available. That could then be reflected in the local growth fund.

I say to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Stephen Phillips) that there is still a chance for that to happen, because the bids for the local growth fund are due by 31 March this year. It is still perfectly possible for local bodies to engage with Network Rail and its partners in developing a business case for the proposed enhancements and to put it forward for the local growth fund. Equally, it is still possible for those local bodies to develop a business case and put it forward as a priority for investment for the 2019 to 2024 control period. I recognise my hon. Friend’s ambition to have it earlier, but none the less that would still be possible.

My hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln reviewed his hopes, and I suspect those of Lincoln, for an increased through service between London and Lincoln. I certainly recognise the appetite for more frequent direct services between that city and London. I welcome the work on a business case undertaken by Lincolnshire county council in 2012. As he will know, I cannot commit at this stage to any additional services, mainly because the Department is currently evaluating the business case and the network impacts of running services to the locations not currently served by the east coast main line. However, I can confirm that a number of regions—Yorkshire, the north-east, the midlands and the east of England, including Lincolnshire—are in that evaluation and assessment process. Depending on the outcome of the work, the invitation to tender for the east coast main line franchise might include a requirement or an option for bidders to run services to a specific number of locations.