Transport: North-east

Debate between Stephen Hepburn and Bridget Phillipson

Wednesday 23rd November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Bridget Phillipson]

I feel that deregulation has been an unmitigated disaster for regions such as the north-east, where we have had a knock-on effect on fares, falling bus patronage and local communities often entirely cut off from bus services. I know that my hon. Friend faces similar problems in his community in Hartlepool to those I face in mine.

On that point, the people in my constituency are entirely dependent on bus services. There is no other option. It is therefore imperative that the comparatively small amount of money allocated to the north-east for transport is spent on ensuring that local public transport services meet the needs of local people and businesses. Unfortunately, expenditure on local public transport in the north-east has dropped by more than 45% over the last five years, which is by far the biggest decrease in spending on any mode of transport in the region.

I want to take the opportunity to again raise with the Minister my long-standing concerns about the state of north-east local bus services. Over the past six years, thousands of local people have contacted me to express their deep dissatisfaction about the cost of fares and the level of service being provided by private bus companies. That is why I vocally supported efforts by Nexus and the North East combined authority to use existing legislation to re-regulate local bus services, through the introduction of a London-style quality contract scheme in Tyne and Wear. It would have integrated fares and routes and ensured that taxpayer subsidies were used to improve services instead of to increase operating profits. I was therefore sorely disappointed with the quality contract scheme board decision a year ago to reject the proposals, even though it acknowledged that the scheme would offer local people a transport system unrivalled outside London. I still find it incredible that the board believed operators should be compensated for the future loss of potential profits. The people of the north-east should not have to compensate bus operators for what is taken for granted in London.

One year on, north-east passengers are no closer to getting the bus service they deserve. Nexus was clear during the QCS process that if the scheme was not implemented, bus cuts were inevitable, fares would increase and ridership would go down. That scenario is playing out. Annual bus statistics show that bus patronage has decreased by 2.7% again in Tyne and Wear and given the frequency with which operators chop and change services and raise fares, that is hardly a surprise. While north-east bus passengers continue to suffer from the absence of a fully integrated network, bus operators in the region continue to make large profits. In fact, in some cases the profits made by commercial bus operators are even being used to prop up loss-making rail franchises, as David Brown, chief executive officer of the Go-Ahead Group recently admitted. We cannot go on like this.

The QCS board decision last November may have blocked efforts to introduce franchising schemes under existing legislation, but there was much hope that the Bus Services Bill would give us the power to implement the change we so desperately need. Unfortunately, despite sensible amendments to the Bill in the House of Lords on bus franchising schemes, the Government seem determined to ensure those powers will only be available automatically to mayoral combined authorities. It seems as if the region will once again be denied the opportunity to improve services for passengers. The current deregulated system has not only failed to prevent a decline in bus patronage—it has exacerbated it. I ask the Minister to think carefully on the amendments and to give the north-east the powers it needs to implement the urgent, radical change needed to arrest and reverse that decline.

Buses are of course not the only means by which people travel across the north-east, although they are the only mode of public transport for many of my constituents, which is one of the main reasons for the poor connectivity between semi-urban and rural constituencies such as mine and the urban centres they surround. If the Government really want to create better transport links between economic centres in the north, they must provide Nexus with the long-term funding necessary for essential infrastructure works to refresh and expand the metro. With 60 stations, around 40 million passenger trips per year and trains running up to 19 hours a day, the metro has been serving the needs of north-east residents for more than 40 years.

[Mr Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow) (Lab)]

I am very interested in that point about how busy the metro is. Is my hon. Friend aware that Network Rail maintains the principal part of the rail tracks that the metro runs on, as well as the rest of the rail tracks in the north-east? Does she agree that we should press the Minister to assure us that Network Rail will not be privatised again, as has been widely reported in the national newspapers? It was brought into public hands because of a poor safety record in the private sector. We need an assurance on that today, bearing in mind how dependent we are in the north-east on the railways and the metro.

[Bridget Phillipson]

I am sure the Minister will want to respond to that point; I am not sure that my hon. Friend will get that assurance, but he has made his point clearly.

The metro, a system that was once the envy of the country, is now in need of major renewal and investment. The metro reinvigoration programme, published by Nexus in July this year, provided a clear strategy for the creation of a joined-up rail and metro network that will make use of the disused former passenger and freight routes that criss-cross the north east, such as the Leamside line. Those plans would provide people in my constituency, as well as those living in Washington, Seaham, west Newcastle, Gateshead, Team valley and elsewhere, with the means to travel much more easily and efficiently across the region.