Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Tuesday 12th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

18. What steps his Department has taken to ensure that solar power can compete on a level playing field with other energy generation technologies.

[The Minister for Energy and Clean Growth (Claire Perry)]

At a time when people think parliamentarians are engaged in some sort of slugfest, I commend the Opposition parties for perfect collaboration on this first question.

Solar is a UK success story, as I know all hon. Members will recognise. The feed-in tariff scheme, under which 80% of installations have been solar, has cost £5.9 billion to date in supporting those 830,000 installations. Prices have fallen over 80% since the introduction of the scheme, which is why we are amending it, as I set out in the smart export guarantee consultation, and I look forward to receiving the response of the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake).

[Tom Brake]

Does the Minister agree that households exporting to the grid should be paid a fair rate? Will she ensure an explicit minimum price for exported electricity to allow the market to recover some confidence that new solar homes will receive treatment consistent with that of other electricity generators?

[Claire Perry]

I completely agree that nobody should be exporting power to the grid for free, or indeed below zero as has happened in some other countries. The level at which that export tariff and the mechanism are set is a matter for consultation, and I look forward to the right hon. Gentleman’s points on that subject.

Marks & Spencer

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Thursday 24th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

I absolutely do. The work that so many do on an unsung basis in our neighbourhood planning process should take into account these issues: how do we create vibrant centres where people want to live, work and travel to, and which mean we have a very vibrant high street sector? If you will indulge me for one minute, Mr Speaker, Marks & Spencer has been a leading company in its drive for zero-emissions activity. It was one of the first companies in the sector to set up such a plan. It has done amazing work with its supply chain and stores to reduce carbon emissions and sell sustainable products. I really do applaud it for that.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

This is a very worrying time for Marks & Spencer’s employees. I was therefore very pleased to be able to support my excellent store in Sutton by buying this suit there a month or so ago. While I agree with the Minister that people’s purchasing habits are changing, does she agree that inevitably, the report from Mark Carney that household incomes are now £900 lower than had been predicted before the EU referendum will have had an impact on Marks & Spencer? Does she also agree that if “max fac” is introduced, a £32.50 charge for every shipment, given that Marks & Spencer operates in 23 out of 28 EU countries, will also have a significant impact on it and the retail business generally?

[Claire Perry]

I am not going to comment on hypotheticals, both pre and post Brexit, in terms of the impact on the economy. However, the right hon. Gentleman points out the absolute requirement both to satisfy the referendum result, in terms of leaving the European Union, and to ensure that we have as close and as frictionless a trading relationship as possible, so that we do not see food prices or the prices of goods and services going up for these very integrated operators in the UK.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Tuesday 7th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

I can understand why there is not much solar installation in Scotland: it appears that the sun never shines north of the border.

I will take no lessons from the hon. Gentleman about support for the North sea, which is a vital industry. I cannot answer his point about the ambassador, but I shall be happy to discuss it with my colleagues.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

8. What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union on the effect of the UK leaving the EU on the automotive sector.

Vauxhall (Redundancies)

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Monday 16th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

My strong suspicion is that all auto companies are thinking about the future models being partially or fully electric, and about how they might introduce self or autonomous driving capabilities. This Government have sent some pretty clear signals that we think that is the way we should go, partly for all the air quality benefits that brings. I think the hon. Gentleman should be celebrating the fact that this Government have committed a quarter of a billion pounds to the Faraday challenge, to get the next generation of electric vehicle technology together, and over half a billion pounds from the public and private sectors to make sure we lead the world in connected and autonomous vehicles. That is the future of the models in this country. The manufacturers understand that, and we need to get the investment to ensure that the jobs we are talking about today are protected.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I urge the Minister to redouble her efforts to support staff. PSA flagged up concerns over the competitiveness of this plant. Can the Minister explain how the competitiveness of this and other UK car plants, which rely so heavily on just-in-time production, will be maintained, let alone enhanced, post-Brexit, once more burdensome customs rules kick in, risking turning just-in-time production into never-on-time production?

[Claire Perry]

The right hon. Gentleman will have heard me say several times during this urgent question that that is exactly why we need to make sure we have the minimal amount of friction in terms of the supply chain. Indeed, the UK percentage of the supply chain is rising, which can only be helpful as it is much better for logistics. We should all pay tribute to something the right hon. Gentleman referenced: the incredible productivity and skill level built up by the people working in this plant, which we should all be focused on, and which is why Britain continues to be the best place for automotive investment. We have wonderful workers in this and other plants, and we want to be investing to support them in the future.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Thursday 30th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

What assessment has the rail Minister made of the impact of the appalling Southern and Thameslink services and Network Rail’s infrastructure failures on the ability of tourists to get to key tourist destinations such as Beddington Park and Honeywood Museum in Carshalton?

[Claire Perry]

The right hon. Gentleman, like all right hon. and hon. Members whose constituencies are served by the line he refers to, knows that—largely due to the major investments in the region—the current performance has not been acceptable. The Government, operators and Network Rail have been working incredibly hard to solve those problems. It was great to see that by April of this year performance had climbed back up to a public performance measure of about 84%—not good enough, but getting better. Unfortunately, since then industrial action and high levels of conductor sickness have seen a deterioration in that measure. We have to get the unions and operators to settle their differences as soon as possible, for the sake both of tourists and of the right hon. Gentleman’s commuting constituents.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Thursday 28th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Claire Perry]

My hon. Friend represents many thousands of travelling constituents, and he is assiduous in raising their concerns. I will, of course, meet him and look at what can be done to speed up that particular piece of work.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

Passengers are, of course, completely inadequately compensated for delays, and I welcome the support that the Minister is giving to my campaign to halve the delay repay timings. Would she also support my campaign to sack Southern, which has proved itself completely incapable of running a railway service and should have its services handed over to Transport for London?

[Claire Perry]

I am delighted that the right hon. Gentleman is supporting the Conservative party’s manifesto commitment to reduce delay repay to 15 minutes. It is lovely that at least some shreds of that coalition co-operation are still in action. He and I have discussed the Southern franchise many times. It is difficult. There are record levels of engineering work taking place on the line, and we are doing all we can, as he knows, to ensure that passengers suffer the least disruption possible and get the compensation to which they are entitled when their trains do not run on time.

Delay Repay Scheme: Rail Commuters

Debate between Tom Brake and Claire Perry

Thursday 4th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Claire Perry)]

I thank the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) for securing this debate. Some people say that I seem to have drawn the short straw by having to participate in Adjournment debates on successive Thursdays, but I am always happy and keen to talk about the railways and what this Government are doing to try to improve them.

I agree with many points made by the right hon. Gentleman, including the fact that the compensation system is not working as well as it should and his comments about performance issues. Indeed, I chair a taskforce comprising the operators, Network Rail, Transport Focus and anyone who might be able to help us drive up performance in this crucial region.

May I crave your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, and put on the record my personal thanks to the Network Rail team that has managed to fix the Corbridge landslip, which had completely disconnected the vital east-west line between Newcastle and Carlisle? The team has moved 35,000 tonnes of soil, the line is open and trains will run from next week. That is proof that the orange army really can deliver, and I want to make sure that that happens in the right hon. Gentleman’s region as well.

It might be helpful if I set out some of the improvements that are already happening. Delay Repay is a universal, standardised offer of compensation that has been adopted by 80% of rail companies. That addresses the right hon. Gentleman’s point about variability in what people are entitled to. As he has said, under Delay Repay passengers can claim 50% of a single fare for delays of 30 to 59 minutes; 100% of a single fare for delays of more than 60 minutes; and 100% of a return fare for delays of more than two hours. Ten operators use the scheme and it is being introduced nationally, along with franchising.

Interestingly, the scheme is among the most generous compensation schemes for rail passengers in Europe. I know that sometimes it does not feel like that, particularly if there are persistent delays, but there are countries that do almost nothing for customers who are delayed.

[Tom Brake]

Will the Minister reflect on the fact that the compensation scheme can afford to be generous because so few passengers actually claim compensation?

[Claire Perry]

The right hon. Gentleman anticipates a very important point—on which I also agree with him—that I will come on to address.

It is not enough to rest on saying that a general scheme is in place and being rolled out. The right hon. Gentleman raised two main, vital issues. First, he asked what passengers can do if there are shorter delays. I have had a look at journey times from his constituency. The average journey time for constituents of his travelling from Wallington to London Victoria is about 38 minutes, and for those travelling from Carshalton and Mitcham Junction it is 25 to 29 minutes. Clearly, it would be a bad day if the delay lasted as long as the journey time. That is why the Chancellor made it absolutely clear in the autumn statement that we will introduce a compensation level starting at 15 minutes. I want to do that quickly. We are, of course, working through the numbers. I cannot yet say what percentages will be paid and when, but the right hon. Gentleman can have an absolute assurance that in the near future a compensation scheme will be introduced right across the Delay Repay franchises, including the Govia Thameslink Railway: the clock will start ticking, quite rightly, at 15 minutes. That is absolutely appropriate.

Improvements were made to the scheme last year. The right hon. Gentleman is right to ask what other industry pays us in travel vouchers. We need to pay people in their own currency, to demonstrate respect for the time they have lost. Three main changes were made to the GTR compensation scheme last year, to the benefit of his constituents. First, when calculating compensation, it used to be assumed that a season ticket holder travelled every single day of the year. Now, holiday entitlement has been included in that. The net result of all those calculations is that if annual season ticket holders claim compensation, they will get £3.70 per journey instead of £3.30, which is a 12% increase in the compensation level. If they experience a 60-minute delay, which would be unlikely, and, indeed, catastrophic, the compensation will be substantially more—an additional 10%.

The second change that the right hon. Gentleman rightly focused on is that the industry now pays compensation in cash, not in vouchers. He will share my disappointment that there is not widespread knowledge about that, certainly among staff. I will talk a little about my expectations of the ORR super-complaint in a moment.

The third change is, I think, the most important. People do not have time to faff about trying to claim compensation. These are busy people, trying to get to work and home to their lives and families. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman will welcome the introduction of automatic compensation. It is already happening. Certain operators offer automatic compensation if passengers buy a ticket online, so it can be linked to a specific journey. Others, including GTR, are linking automatic compensation payments to the use of a smart card, which has been rolled out for season tickets.

C2C, which, like GTR, has benefited from the south-east flexible ticketing programme—the Government’s great investment in smart ticketing in the south-east—will, from this month, provide automatic compensation of 3p per minute for every minute’s delay after two minutes. If someone is sitting on that train, even if they are only delayed for five minutes, their time is worth something. That is exactly the sort of scheme that works well for constituents such as those represented by the right hon. Gentleman, who take shorter journeys and for whom those persistent minutes of delay are very annoying. That is something that we are monitoring and we would like to see it rolled out, particularly across the metro franchises.

The right hon. Gentleman raised an important point: it is completely unacceptable that all these measures are being put in place but, as Passenger Focus found, only 12% of passengers claim the compensation to which they are entitled. That is made doubly annoying by the fact that train companies receive compensation from Network Rail and from each other if delays are created—the so-called section 8 compensation payments. Money is flowing into those train companies, and it should be flowing out to all passengers who are entitled to compensation.

Southern and GTR have a “reasonable endeavours” clause in their franchise about making announcements. We are determined that they should meet that, and one of the measures I am looking at is whether to get all the train companies to publish their numbers for compensation claims so that we can see, relative to the number of passengers they are carrying, which ones are doing well. As the right hon. Gentleman says, making announcements is not rocket science. Indeed, some companies do so, particularly on their Twitter feeds, where they say: “This is a delayed train, and you are entitled to claim compensation. Here’s how you do it.” By the way, rather than having people muck about with bits of paper, the claim forms now can generally be downloaded or completed online. In fact, GTR has an app that enables passengers to submit their delay claims straight from their mobiles.

The right hon. Gentleman made an interesting point about nominee companies and airlines. Such companies exist in the rail sector. I do not know whether I am supposed to say this, but companies such as Delay Repay Sniper will do all the work and take all the hassle out of the process. I want people to get the compensation that they are entitled to. I mentioned the smart card, on which GTR will offer an automatic refund by 2017. We will not stop here; we will keep pushing for better compensation.

The right hon. Gentleman made a suggestion about announcements on trains. The new fleet of class 700 trains that will start running on the franchise this year have lots of onboard information, and it is perfectly reasonable to have an electronic message that states, “You are entitled to compensation if you are on this train.” Those are all good suggestions.

The right hon. Gentleman mentioned performance. In an ideal world, compensation would be zero, because the trains would all get there on time. I am sure that we all want that. There might be an element of apples and pears in the statistics that he cited about historical cancellations, because the franchise was re-let in a very different form two years ago. It is now the biggest in the country, with about 20% of Britain’s passenger journeys, and that may have something to do with the big increase in the cancellation numbers.

I would be the first to say that the performance level is not good enough. I have pulled out the performance statistics. They show that about four out of five trains on the Southern metro service, which serves the right hon. Gentleman’s lines, arrive on time according to the public performance measure, which is about 77%. I am interested in trains arriving at the right time, for which the figure is 51%, and that is substantially better than what it was last year.

The point that so many people have collectively missed is that the impact of a crowded train of 1,000 people arriving late on the British economy is very substantial in terms of the productivity of that train load of passengers. My view is that performance on that very crowded part of the rail system should be driven up and made substantially better, because the aggregate level of human misery created by delays is higher and the hit to the productivity of the British economy caused by delaying millions of people is also higher.

I have therefore challenged the entire group of people operating that part of the railway, from the head of Network Rail downwards, to drive it back on to a high-performance route by the end of 2018. By then, the London Bridge works will be substantially complete; we will have the new class 700 fleet, which will offer so much relief in terms of better trains and increased capacity; and we will largely be through the Thameslink programme, which has created disruption for so many people. We must stay focused on how we can deliver a high-performance railway at that time. However, it is not enough to wait until then. I have made it absolutely clear to the operators and Network Rail that performance needs to improve now, so that although people can claim compensation, they will not necessarily need to do so because their trains will be on time.

[Tom Brake]

Will the Minister clarify one point? She said that at some point in the future—perhaps she will speculate on when—compensation might kick in after 15 minutes. Given that only 80% of TOCs have currently signed up to Delay Repay, does she expect 100% of them to sign up to that new, enhanced system for 15-minute delays?