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Mr. Bowis: Will the hon. Lady give way?
Ms Jackson: This must be the last time.
Mr. Bowis: It will be. Mr. Midwinter has not been the chairman of that committee for some time. Can the hon. Lady tell the House how many months privatisation had been running when that former chairman may have made that remark?
Ms Jackson: It would seem that all the Government's promises are dependent on an ever-lengthening time scale. That is not what we were told when they introduced rail privatisation. We were told that there would be an immediate, recognisable, provable improvement in services throughout the network.
Anyone wanting a true flavour of what privatisation holds in store for the quality of rail services should read the comments of Mr. John Seymour, published in The Independent on 5 February 1996. Mr. Seymour had the historic distinction of being the first passenger to be carried by a private rail service in this country. He was on the 1.50 am Fishguard to Paddington service. It was a bus and it was late. Said Mr. Seymour:
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It was a particularly embarrassing incident for Ministers when they had to explain to one of their senior colleagues, the Secretary of State for Social Security, why travellers from his St. Albans constituency, having been pledged a cut in fares, turned up at the station to find that the somewhat ironically titled "cheap day return" had risen by double the rate of inflation. It was even more embarrassing for them when they had to explain to the Secretary of State for Transport why fares from his Ealing constituency had risen by a similar amount. It must have been positively nightmarish for the hon. Member for Slough (Mr. Watts) when he had to explain to himself why he had pledged to peg fares and had then raised fares in his constituency by more than 30 per cent. above inflation.
In all seriousness, is it any wonder that the public are so disenchanted with the Government and this privatisation when a pledge made in May is so comprehensively broken fewer than six months later? We know that privatisation was supposed to improve services, and that has failed. We know that it was supposed to hold down fares; it has failed there also.
A third great pledge--that privatisation would secure massive amounts of private investment--was alluded to by the Minister. Let us take that supposed new investment piece by piece. First, we are experiencing the longest drought in new rolling stock manufacture since British Rail was nationalised in 1948. The historic railway manufacturing works at York have closed for good, with the loss of hundreds of jobs also at Derby. Thousands of commuters continue to travel on rolling stock that is up to 30 years old, crowded and uncomfortable. As the report into the recent Watford rail crash will prove--if Railtrack has the courage to publish it rather than see it distributed through a series of selective leaks--the rolling stock is also dangerous in the event of collision.
My hon. Friends the Members for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) and for Liverpool, Broadgreen(Mrs. Kennedy) and the hon. Member for Eastleigh(Mr. Chidgey) spoke about the possible deterioration of safety in what used to be an integrated network. Those are extremely serious concerns, yet there would seem to be nothing that the Government either wish to do or can do about it. Indeed, so bad has the drought in rolling stock become that in March, a regional railway, South Wales and West, approached the Steam Town train museum in
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If a franchisee comes to the Minister after two or three years and says that it cannot afford the new rolling stock after all, what sanctions will be available? Will the franchise be revoked? Will the franchisee be prevented from bidding for an extension of the franchise once it has expired? Will there be any financial penalties? If not, that will underline how privatisation is failing to deliver any new investment in rolling stock and is delivering merely paper pledges that will be ripped up the second that the army of accountants now running our rail network casts a negative eye over the balance sheets.
It is the same story with the Minister's grandiose statements about investment in infrastructure. Railtrack's network management statement announces investment of £10 billion over the next 10 years, amounting to an annual investment programme of £1 billion. The Prime Minister leapt on that statement in the House, claiming that such a high level of investment would not occur in the public sector. Unfortunately, he had not bothered to check his figures or facts; if he had, he would have known that in 1992-93, the last year before the Government embarked on their great privatisation experiment, British Rail invested £1.35 billion on infrastructure alone--£35 million more than we have been promised byMr. Horton and his colleagues.
Since 1948, total average investment by the publicly owned British Rail has exceeded £1.2 billion a year--more than the investment pledged by the private infrastructure and rolling stock companies combined. Moreover, in evidence to the Transport Select Committee, Railtrack stated:
For those in any doubt about the impact of the declining investment programme, I offer the example of an incident that took place near my constituency on the very day that Railtrack was floated. The incident began when more than 100 bottles of South African and Australian wine were
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So frequent were the delays in the area that a Freightliner official was quoted as saying:
Mr. Jessel:
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for the hon. Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Ms Jackson), who has been on her feet since--
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. The hon. Gentleman knows full well that it is in order. The hon. Lady has the Floor.
"We weren't given any information at the station at all. Nobody seemed to know why there was no train. Everything from privatisation, work on the line and an accident were put forward as excuses. Next time I come I'm going to fly."
That is the Government's definition of success: soaring complaints from disgruntled passengers who justifiably regard privatisation as a failure. They know that it is a
"Under nationalisation, passengers have regularly had to pay fare increases above the rate of inflation. This is to change . . . Now passengers can enjoy a period of stability and then a real fall in many rail fares."
In November, the Minister for Railways and Roads, who should be present but who, I gather, has a previous engagement, admitted to me in a parliamentary answer that as few as 47 per cent. of commuter rail fares and21 per cent. of inter-city fares would be capped. In January, fares rose by as much as 8 per cent.--more than double the current inflation rate.
"we needed extra coaches and these carriages offer better value."
I trust that the Minister for Transport in London, who is no doubt preparing to regale us with tales of franchise contracts and commitments to new train orders, will answer some simple questions. First, in the past year, before it handed over ownership of rolling stock to the three ROSCOs, British Rail had more than 1,600 locomotives and 10,000 coaches. How many new units are currently on the ROSCOs' order books--not planned or proposed as part of a franchise agreement, but currently on the order books? Secondly, the Minister talked of extended franchises, with rolling stock clauses contained in franchise agreements. My understanding, however, is that in most, if not all, of those cases, franchises are of the conventional length of approximately seven years with an option for franchisees to extend the franchise once new rolling stock is ordered.
"annual steady state maintenance should be £800 million which does not provide for any catching up of outstanding work . . . Renewals are given as £570 million . . . so steady state spending on the rail infrastructure should not be less than £1370m."
That is the reality of infrastructure investment under privatisation: investment will fall not only below the levels achieved while BR was in the public sector, but below what Railtrack itself says is necessary to maintain the network.
"The thieves struck lucky. Normally, the containers would have been carrying boring stuff."
It says much about the state of our railway network that modern-day highwaymen are considered lucky not because they find a vulnerable train but because it contains rick pickings.
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