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Mr. Andrew Stunell (Hazel Grove): I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way, and for notifying me of his intention to raise the matter. For my constituents in Hazel Grove, the road programme is vital. Does he agree that if the Minister visited the area, he would see that the conventional road network is no way able to take the
additional traffic that will result from the development of the second runway, and that the Government have failed to take proper account of that?
Mr. Day: I agree. By approving the second runway, the Government recognised the importance of the north-west. They recognised the importance to the north-west of Manchester airport. In setting up the study, they recognised to some extent that there was a difficulty with transport in the so-called south-east quadrant of Greater Manchester, yet they took away one of the main solutions to that difficulty that was originally planned because the airport was expanding.
Given my constituents' expectation over 20 to 30 years that the road would be built, given that a third of it is already built, given that the previous Government set a starting date, and given that the second runway is imminent, the Government can no longer hide behind a transport study and deny my constituents the protection and the service that they have every right to expect that the Government will provide, to ensure that their environment, which the Government claim that they are seeking to protect, is protected for the future.
Mr. Gordon Prentice:
We surrender!
Mr. Day:
It will be a nice day for me and my constituents when the Government surrender. For many other communities throughout the country--not just in Hazel Grove, Poynton, Bramall, Woodford, Cheadle Hulme and Heald Green--the Government must formulate a coherent transport policy. If they stopped restricting travel by car, assisted drivers to get where they want, provided investment for alternatives and tried to attract drivers to alternatives, rather than forcing them to use such alternatives and bringing nothing but despair to areas such as mine, that would indeed be a happy day.
8.25 pm
Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody (Crewe and Nantwich): The transport White Paper is the first major attempt for more than a generation to address seriously the problems of transport in Britain. The Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs made it clear that we regarded that as a tremendous advance, and we looked in considerable detail at the aspects of transport that we thought needed not only to be highlighted but in many instances advanced.
The debate has been interesting because of Conservative Members' tremendous insistence on roads. Roads are an integral part of the transport system, but anyone in this country who talks about congestion without mentioning the alternatives to roads, the advance in hypothecation and the first attempt for well over 20 years by any Government seriously to address the problems of public transport is running away from everything that is important.
Under the leadership of my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister, we are at long last seeing a specific attempt to address a number of practical problems that have a direct impact on our economy. Transport and the economy are directly linked. That is not an accident. If we cannot move people and goods around the country,
we are unable to benefit as we should. Indeed, aviation and the rail system have a direct impact on gross domestic product.
It was clear from the Select Committee's work that a number of areas should be addressed. I welcome the discussion about the Strategic Rail Authority. The sooner we get real parliamentary muscle behind the shadow Strategic Rail Authority, the sooner we shall begin to get changes. The previous Government fragmented the railway system like a cheap glass and left others to pick up the shards.
I was interested in what the hon. Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day) had to say about the west coast main line. What the hon. Gentleman did not manage to say was that Railtrack is so concerned about the signalling system that it has issued an instruction to its contractors not to touch signalling. That is for fear that the system is so old that it will accidentally cease to operate, making the signals automatically go red and causing an advancing train the problems that we may have seen in the recent accident in the Winsford area--although I am not saying that such problems were the reason for the accident.
Mr. Day:
On the signalling matter that the hon. Lady raised, today's Railtrack press release says:
Mrs. Dunwoody:
The hon. Gentleman is very sincere, but I do not have the faith in press notices that he appears to have. Let me draw to his attention the £27 billion investment announced by Railtrack recently. If he reads my report, he will see not only how we examined that figure, but how it strangely became £11 billion and then, when we broke it down, only £1.6 billion. Railtrack uses creative accounting, but we discovered that its large investment programme is a combination of money that it would have had to spend on maintenance; schemes that would need even more public money for matching; and action on pinch points which have been outstanding since Railtrack took over.
Suddenly, that £27 billion collapsed--right down to about £1.6 billion--and all those grandiose schemes disappeared into thin air. We are of course told that they will happen--if the taxpayer finds even more money; if we do not count maintenance; if Railtrack manages to use the money that we regard as absolutely essential for reinvestment in the signalling system; and if, somehow or other, Railtrack comes up with a new plan. That is not what all that will mean.
I am delighted that Railtrack is issuing notices saying that it will do fantastic things in the future, but I have the strange, old-fashioned idea that I should like it to do something in the present. Although that may sound rather unimaginative of me, Railtrack is walking away with large amounts of taxpayers' money. When it appeared before the Public Accounts Committee, there was detailed discussion of what it had spent on consultants and privatisation. It said that it had had to spend money because it needed highly specialised information, but the reality is that it is neither entrepreneurial nor efficient--
and nor, so far as one can see, is it capable of managing major schemes. If that is the case, any problems that will arise will arise not from its spending £27 billion but because we may be asking it to do something that it is not capable of achieving.
Mr. Redwood:
Given the hon. Lady's comments on Railtrack, is she suspicious of that organisation's being allowed to be the only bidder--the preferred bidder--for a third of the tube? In view of her comments on its conduct, would she like to say to the Deputy Prime Minister that perhaps he should not allow that?
Mrs. Dunwoody:
The nice thing about my relationship with my right hon. Friend is that I frequently say things to him that he understands without any difficulty at all. That situation has existed for at least the past 20 years and I do not expect it to change overnight.
I am suspicious of Railtrack--that will not come as a surprise to my right hon. Friend, because I have been telling him that ever since it was created--and I shall continue to be suspicious of Railtrack.
The Government of whom the right hon. Gentleman was a member created a merry-go-round of taxpayers' money, which meant that Railtrack finished up with the bulk of the cash. Of course it is one of the strongest players in the game. The fact that I do not trust Railtrack does not mean that it does not have the money. That is one of the things that worry me.
"Phase Two, which will enable Virgin to increase train speeds . . . and provide additional capacity for other users, requires the development of a new moving block transmission-based signalling system."
Phase 1 of the project involves £596 million to deal with the problem. Phase 2 will deal with it more specifically.
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