Camp Hill Line Railway Stations, Birmingham

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Westminster Hall

[Tahir Ali (Birmingham, Hall Green) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Camp Hill line railway stations in Birmingham.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Nokes. I am here today because the completion of the Camp Hill railway line in Birmingham, which would have connected Birmingham’s Kings Heath and Stirchley stations, has been delayed to the end of 2024. That is what we have been told.

On 27 June, the West Midlands Mayor, Andy Street, announced the delay in his typically understated and unwarrantedly optimistic fashion. In a response to me, he said he was disappointed to see the letter I had written to him on Twitter before he had received it. Yet, none of the councillors in the wards affected—Kerry Jenkins, Izzy Knowles, Lisa Trickett or David Barker—or the Members of Parliament involved, myself and my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), were informed by him before his decision was given to the media.

The delay has come as a huge blow to my constituents, who have little access to direct rail links to Birmingham city centre. Residents of Moseley and Kings Heath, who have been without a rail link for decades, are devastated by the news. They will now have to continue to rely on increasingly congested roads for their travel to and from Birmingham city centre. I am here today to press the issue and to ask some vital questions, which have been put to me by my constituents, regarding the delay. I will also situate the delay within the wider context of the abject failure by this Conservative Government and by Conservative Mayor Andy Street to deliver on transport for the people of Birmingham and the west midlands.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. Does he, like me, remember the Mayor launching his re-election campaign in February 2020 in a blaze of publicity? He promised eight new metro lines, 380 new stops and 21 new railway stations, but since then things have ground to a halt: University station, which was meant to open in time for the Commonwealth games last year, still has not opened; the Camp Hill line has gone dead; and the Pineapple Road station in my constituency is a big hole in the ground. Does my hon. Friend think that the Mayor is better at making promises than at delivering and that he is spending too much time trying to shoehorn Warwickshire into the West Midlands Combined Authority at a cost of £60 million to each of the other councils in order to gerrymander the next election?

[Tahir Ali]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. I, too, remember the promises made by Mayor Andy Street in the run-up to the last election, and he has less than 12 months to come up with some new excuses. We also have to remember that, in all his campaigning, he tried to distance himself from the Conservative party, so I wonder whether he will run on the Conservative ticket or as an independent. More importantly, the issue raised by my hon. Friend—bringing Warwickshire into the combined authority—is simply about giving the Mayor an edge for electoral purposes. Even those elected to represent Warwickshire do not want that. I think he knows that he is in a bit of trouble.

Let me move on to the Camp Hill delay. Many residents have expressed doubt about the finality of this announcement. Is this delay the final delay, or is it simply one of many to be announced further down the line? It is interesting how this has been put back from the end of the year to the end of next year. The Mayor knows full well that there will be a mayoral election in May, and there might be a general election. This is no coincidence, as he knows he might be out of office, along with the Conservatives. They will then say that this is a problem for the Labour party, when they have delayed matters. That is not going to work. Can assurances be given to my constituents that the Camp Hill line will face no further delays, or should they expect further disappointment in the future?

Secondly, there is concern regarding the finances of the project. While the bulk of the finances come from the West Midlands Combined Authority, £20 million comes directly from the Department for Transport, which is a considerable stake. I would therefore like to ask the Department whether an assessment has been made of the costs the delay will incur for the project. Will further funding to make up for the additional cost be provided by the Department, or will that responsibility be passed on to the people of Birmingham and the west midlands? That question is vital. The West Midlands Combined Authority is in dire financial straits. The medium-term financial plan represents a significant challenge to the authority, as a deficit of £29 million is forecast for the 2024-25 financial year, rising to £50 million in the 2027-28 financial year.

Furthermore, the £1.2 billion of priority schemes from the West Midlands Combined Authority investment programme remain unfunded. That raises significant doubts about the completion of vital programmes, such as the Camp Hill line. Will the Government guarantee that any extra funding for the Camp Hill line will be provided and that that will be done in a way that does not jeopardise other projects in the city or the region?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Huw Merriman)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Nokes. I congratulate the hon. Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Tahir Ali) on securing this debate about the construction of three new stations on the Camp Hill line in Birmingham, namely Moseley, Pineapple Road at Stirchley, and Kings Heath. At least, that was the title of the debate; anyone who had wandered in might have thought it was on the election next year or a Labour pile-on on the current Conservative Mayor, but I will do my best, as I always should, to stick to the subject in hand.

I trust that we are at least in firm agreement that the successful delivery of these three stations will provide a welcome boost to the hon. Member’s constituents in Birmingham, Hall Green and beyond. Passenger services on the Camp Hill line were withdrawn in 1941, but since then demand for public transport in the area has grown substantially. Investment in rail infrastructure can have transformative impacts on local communities. Reopening the Camp Hill line stations will bring 75,000 people within 1 km of a new railway station and unlock untapped potential in the region.

The business case for the stations, which I received in 2020, presents a compelling array of benefits that align with the Government’s wider objectives for the country. They include supporting the local economy, expanding labour markets, reducing carbon emissions, reducing congestion on roads, helping to tackle regional inequalities, and levelling up the country. The Department therefore approved the release in June 2021 of the fixed £59 million contribution of rail network enhancement pipeline funding to the West Midlands Combined Authority for the delivery of five new stations in Birmingham, three of which are on the Camp Hill line, together with two more on the Walsall to Wolverhampton line.

[Steve McCabe]

Will the Minister give way?

[Huw Merriman]

I will make some progress first. The West Midlands Combined Authority and Birmingham City Council have also contributed funding toward the Camp Hill line stations, which I regard as a positive example of the joint working and strong local consensus formed around this scheme. All of this means that I am hugely excited to see how the new Camp Hill line stations can improve the lives of the people around them. However, West Midlands Rail Executive—the organisation delivering the new stations for the West Midlands Combined Authority—has reported that unprecedented microeconomic challenges, coupled with the emergence of unexpected issues across all three work sites, have delayed the expected completion of the stations to late 2024.

The pandemic, inflation, resource shortages and supply chain disruption have all posed substantial challenges for the construction industry. Meanwhile, on one work site a protected species was discovered that can only be moved at a certain time of the year, and most of the work on the site had to be delayed until the animals were safely relocated. Elsewhere, a historic well, which was not registered on any public records, was discovered, meaning works had to be paused while the public realm was redesigned accordingly. Furthermore, a locally listed historic wall situated close to a worksite was in an unstable condition and had to be carefully deconstructed in a way that means it can be restored later.

While I share the disappointment at the delay to the stations, I accept that construction must not be rushed at the expense of local heritage and biodiversity in local communities, so I support and commend West Midlands Rail Executive’s best efforts to ensure that construction is undertaken in a way that is sensitive to the built and natural environment in which it takes place. My officials are working closely with the West Midlands Combined Authority and West Midlands Rail Executive to track progress and seek opportunities to accelerate delivery where possible. I understand that there are scheduling efficiency opportunities being explored that might see one or two of the stations open earlier in 2024. I give way to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), who wanted to intervene.

[Steve McCabe]

The Minister is too generous. I wanted to refer to a point he raised earlier. He rightly said that the Department had given a £59 million grant to the transport authority. Can he confirm that additional funding was anticipated through a round 2 levelling-up bid, but it was not authorised, and that that is one of the reasons for the current delay? I understand about the protected species and the historic wall, but what is the explanation for the delay at Stirchley, where there does not seem to have been any answer as yet?

[Huw Merriman]

I encouraged the hon. Member to rise to his feet to interrupt me, so I hope I am being generous in that regard. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is responsible for the levelling-up fund and I do not have information about unsuccessful bids, but I will write to him about that. I will also write to him regarding the other station impact. We tend to find a knock-on from one to another: I recently visited the Northumberland line where there was a similar matter of a protected species—great crested newts in that case—and that had a little knock-on effect as well. I will write to the hon. Gentleman on both those points.

On costs, the hon. Gentleman is right; the contribution I mentioned earlier from the Department is £59 million. There is no doubt that inflation, as I find across my portfolio, presents a challenge in ensuring projects are delivered on budget. The Office for Budget Responsibility recently reported that construction inflation is running at around 15%, so that is a big challenge for us. That is why the Department is afforded flexibility on how the £59 million of RNEP funding is distributed between the five new stations.