Railways Bill

Debate between Richard Holden and Neil Hudson

2nd reading
Tuesday 9th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Holden]

The hon. Gentleman, along with some of his colleagues, has not been listening to what I have been saying, because we put forward the Williams-Shapps review to deliver a new concessionary model. Some of the funding he mentioned was delivered through modernisation, and it was delivered under the last Government. Let us be clear about what is happening with SWR: under this Government, his constituents are seeing greater delays right across the network. They are seeing that month after month, despite the promises of the Secretary of State.

Despite the right hon. Lady’s flagrant disregard of taxpayers’ money and an “ain’t bovvered” approach to passenger welfare, I had hoped that she would have ensured that this Bill contained the necessary safeguards—guard rails, perhaps—and a strong regulator with the statutory authority to intervene and set things straight. Are we going to have such a regulator? Oh, but we dare to dream! [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Middlesbrough and Thornaby East (Andy McDonald) wishes to intervene, why does he not stand up?

Today, operators propose and the Office of Rail and Road decides, but under this Bill, GBR will propose and GBR will decide. We find ourselves in the most bizarre position of the Office of Rail and Road handing over its powers on deciding track access and access charges to GBR, which is the very entity that has the most to gain by acting in its own self-interest. In this Bill, that self-interest is unfettered and unperturbed by any genuine oversight.

Who, can I ask the Secretary of State, will be in charge of the railways in this new thrilling world of state control? According to the responses I have received to parliamentary questions, we are still not clear. Rail fares, apparently, will be decided by Ministers in the Department for Transport. Automation of train technology will be, according to the answers to written parliamentary questions I have received, the Government’s collective responsibility. Working arrangements with unions will be managed by individual local train operators, and the guiding mind of it all will be GBR. This is not, as the Secretary of State and her Ministers have claimed, how any organisation ought to be run. It is an organisational mishmash—rudderless, directionless. It will not serve passengers, it will not serve freight and it certainly will not serve taxpayers.

Certainty, supposedly guaranteed to freight, industry and manufacturing, is entirely absent. In its place, we have the misfortune of funding mechanisms that can be changed and amended at any time, without any oversight whatsoever. We have a duty to freight, which, although clearly an afterthought, is obviously welcome, but once the reality kicks in, GBR’s overlordship of the process of access, pricing and timetabling will leave freight operators permanently in the lurch. We have conflict of interest after conflict of interest permeating the Bill, with about as much credibility as the Secretary of State’s promise a couple of weeks ago that the Government had no plans to introduce pay-per-mile on our roads. I wonder whether the right hon. Lady has corrected Hansard yet.

We desperately need an indication of purpose. What is this for? Who is this all for? It is pretty clear that we want to passengers to be put first with reliable, safe and accessible journeys that provide value for money, and open access routes protected, including those serving Hull, championed by the hon. Members for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) and for Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice (Emma Hardy), and those serving Doncaster, which the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Ed Miliband), the hon. Member for Doncaster Central (Sally Jameson) and the hon. Member for Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme (Lee Pitcher) know their constituents really depend on. Oversight must be accompanied by actual enforcement, and passengers and taxpayers must be at the forefront of the Bill. Currently, they are not.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Epping Forest) (Con)]

The shadow Secretary of State talks about passengers being at the heart of the Bill. He earlier raised watchdogs and dogs not having teeth. As a veterinary surgeon, I am very conscious of a subset of dogs that we need to think about in relation to passenger access. Does he agree that people need to work together to ensure that people with assistance dogs and guide dogs have good access to the railway? In terms of modernisation and access, we need to keep those people in our mind.

[Mr Holden]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend. It is clear that when it comes to modernisation, access and new trains, that is exactly what we want to see delivered, and there is no mention of that in the Bill.

We have tabled our reasoned amendment today because a Bill with no independent regulator, no protection for competition or taxpayers’ money, no passenger growth duty and no credible enforcement, cannot command our support. Throughout this murky and blinkered process, the Secretary of State has shown that she does not have the will to make sensible changes. Like the Prime Minister, the Chancellor and the right hon. Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall), she does not have the guts to face down her Back Benchers, who call for greater state control right across the system. She will not strengthen the Bill. She will not restore independence. She will not protect open access, embed growth or put passengers first. Instead, she presses on, convinced that centralising power will somehow solve the very problems that centralisation always creates. Let there be no shadow of a doubt: when, as is inevitable, things go wrong, leaving passengers without recourse or redress, she and she alone will face the consequences. She will own the cancellations, the overcrowding, the endless complaints about no internet signal, the strikes, the rising taxpayer subsidy and the fateful day when passengers learn she can no longer afford to use taxpayers’ money to prop up her much-vaunted fare freeze.

We on the Opposition Benches will fight to deliver a railway that works for passengers, taxpayers, freight and the future. We will not sit idly by and allow the Government to turn GBR into judge, jury and executioner on the network it alone controls. I hope that Members from other parties will support our calls here and in the other place over the coming weeks and months.

Green Belt: Basildon and Billericay

Debate between Richard Holden and Neil Hudson

Friday 17th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Richard Holden (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)]

I am delighted to have secured this debate after entering the ballot many times.

The origins of the green belt go back certainly to the start of the last century, but perhaps even further, because in 1580 Elizabeth I tried to impose a block on building within three miles of the City of London, in order to prevent the spread of plague. Today, I will talk a little about the Green Belt (London and Home Counties) Act 1938, the Town and Country Planning Act 1947, and a large area of land now known as the green belt.

Almost two thirds of undeveloped land in the Basildon borough is green belt, covering some 6,590 hectares. Why this debate today? Basildon council has put forward a new local plan, with a consultation that closed just a few days ago, for 27,000 homes right across the borough—the majority of which are in my constituency—covering a huge quantity of that green belt. There are 25% more homes this year on the green belt, because this Labour Government cut the need for housing in London by 17,000 properties a year and increased it in the home counties by 18,000 properties a year. All those extra properties will be heading to the green belt in constituencies such as mine across Essex and the south of England.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Epping Forest) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend and fellow Essex MP on securing this important debate. His constituency, like mine, has precious green belt that is so important to the environment, biodiversity and our physical and mental health. I acknowledge the need for housing, but does he share my concerns about this Labour Government’s central top-down targets being imposed on communities against their wishes and, equally, their plans to reclassify some of the green belt as grey belt, thereby putting our precious green belt under immense pressure and danger?

[Mr Holden]

I certainly agree, and I was about to move on to that point. None of us on the Opposition Benches is against more housing, but often that housing does not come about because of local need in our constituencies. This is about a Government shying away from difficult conversations about densification in our cities, a mayor who has consistently failed to deliver on his own housing targets, and a failure to redevelop crucial brownfield land in the centre and on the edges of our major cities.

My hon. Friend’s point about the grey belt is particularly important at the moment, because the council is starting to redesignate large areas of my constituency. Just a few years ago, those areas were grade 1 or grade 2 agricultural land. Now, they are being designated as grey belt, despite never having had any buildings on them. I am concerned about what this insidious grey belt phrasing could mean for developments right across the country.

The Government will ask where the housing should go. London is a third less dense than Paris. It seems mad that we are building on virgin greenfield sites rather than densifying our cities, especially at a time when constituents in Essex and across the country are having to cross-subsidise the Mayor of London for his transport. They do not get access to it, but they have to pay for it. If we had greater density in our cities, some of those transport routes would be able to fund themselves.

Vehicle Ownership: Fatal Accidents and Rural Crime

Debate between Richard Holden and Neil Hudson

Wednesday 26th January 2022 Westminster Hall

[Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered fatal accidents, rural crime and the adequacy of vehicle ownership restrictions.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd. I pay tribute to the family of Andrew Rowlands, one of my constituents who died in 2020. His parents, Karen and John, are here today. I have met them before, as well as their daughter, Becca. Andrew was killed in a car crash in June 2020. The car he was travelling in was bought not long before for £100. It had no valid MOT and was described by the judge at the time as a wreck. The driver of that vehicle had no driving licence—they had not even had a driving lesson—yet they had still been able to buy the vehicle. They were jailed in June 2021. Later that year, I met John in my constituency surgery.

My request of the Minister today is to look at one simple change to the law. If a person wants to buy a car, they should have to have a driving licence. That means a simple change to the V5 form. At the moment, filling in the date of birth and the details of the driving licence of the person purchasing the car is voluntary. All we want is for that to be made mandatory. That would prevent people without driving licences being able to buy cars.

To buy a shotgun or rifle, the buyer must provide a licence and be over the age of 18. To buy an alcoholic drink, lottery scratchcard or lottery ticket, the buyer must provide ID. To scrap a car, a person must provide ID and have a UK bank account, yet to buy a car—even a totally unroadworthy one, such as the one driven on the day Andrew was killed—a buyer does not have to do those things. It is taken on trust, on the V5 form, that the buyer is a suitable person and able to own a vehicle.

In the modern day, it is totally unacceptable for somebody without a driving licence—without even having had a driving lesson—to own a car, and there are three reasons for that. The first, obviously, is the death of one of my constituents. We do not want to see more young people being killed because other people can buy totally unroadworthy vehicles and use them on a public highway.

Secondly, it has broader implications. Since I met John in my constituency office, I have been talking more broadly to Durham police and the rural community to find out what other impacts such a change could have. For example, Durham police are very concerned about so-called community vehicles. Basically, what happens is that I buy a car off anybody, but I do not provide my address or details, because I can sort of fill it in. There is no requirement to check a driving licence and no requirement to put down a date of birth—it is just an option. Those vehicles are then used in county lines drug trafficking; they are used to move people around the country. They are often parked up somewhere slightly out of sight, and they are easy to use. There is a real crime angle there for towns and cities.

Thirdly, I have spoken to local farmers, and there is a real rural crime angle as well. Since I was elected, I have lost count of the number of farmers who have got in touch about people trespassing on their land. This is not trespassing in the form of a poacher with a couple of pheasants under their jacket, like something from the 1940s. This is people driving through farm gates, smashing up land, destroying crops, worrying livestock and allowing animals out on to the roads.

[Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)]

I applaud my hon. Friend for bringing forward this debate on this important issue and for highlighting the tragic case in his constituency. Does he agree that the rural crime he talks about is part of a bigger picture that people in rural communities face? It could be vehicle crime, property damage, fly-tipping, poaching, farm machinery theft or animal theft—they are all part of a bigger picture that our rural communities have to suffer. It is great that Cumbria police and Durham police are working hard to support communities, but these crimes have a major impact on the mental health of people in rural communities.

[Mr Holden]

They do have a big impact on people in rural communities, particularly on their mental health, because of the isolation element of living in a rural area. My hon. Friend makes a broader point about the use of such vehicles for other crimes. The police have told me in conversations that if people are involved in what some might consider low-level crimes, such as lamping or poaching, they are usually involved in other crimes as well. It is a major issue that they are able to move around almost at will by using vehicles that nobody can trace. That is exactly the issue that I am trying to point to.

Some of the farmers I recently met over in Satley in my constituency face these issues on a regular basis—so regular that they have set up their own local WhatsApp group. Fences have been driven through, causing thousands of pounds of damage for the farmers, but even if they spot the vehicle and get the number plate, it is impossible to trace the ownership because the vehicles have basically disappeared into the system.

In Stanhope and all the way up in rural Weardale, farmers have faced similar issues. It was at one of my first constituency surgeries after being elected, in Stanhope town hall, that this issue of rural crime and untraceable vehicles was brought to me. More recently, down in Muggleswick, during the pandemic, when people were meant to be staying at home, there were people driving such vehicles—totally untraceable—to do drug deals in rural areas. People phone the police to say, “We have the number plates”—people have done the right thing on their farms and rural homes and put up CCTV—but that is totally useless if the ownership of the vehicle cannot be traced.

This proposed change would mean the traceability of vehicle ownership, and it would therefore prevent people being able to use such vehicles to commit rural crime. Thirdly, it would stop people without driving licences from using such vehicles.

We have seen the impact of changes to the scrappage scheme. We used to hear all the time about people nicking bits of railway and trains having to be stopped. We used to hear about people dying in substations when they were trying to nick expensive metals. We used to hear regularly about lead being stripped from church roofs. All of that ended with a simple change in the law that meant someone had to provide ID and bank account details if they were selling scrap metal—a really simple change. All I seek is a similar change for people when they are selling cars.

I am not asking the Minister today for an immediate yes or no to a piece of legislation; I am asking to meet her in order to talk in more detail and find a suitable legislative vehicle for addressing this issue. I cannot see why the Government would not want to push forward with this, because it would tackle rural crime and the criminal exploitation of young people in our towns and cities, and it has the ability to stop more tragic deaths, like that of Andrew, from happening in the future. It is a sensible change that I cannot see the Opposition opposing. Will the Minister today commit to meeting me to talk about this further, to see what we can do to make this very sensible change, which will save lives?