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Transport

[Relevant documents: The Ninth Report from the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee, Session 1998-99, Integrated Transport White Paper, HC 32-I, and the Government's response thereto, HC 708 of Session 1998-99.]

7.13 pm

Mr. Bernard Jenkin (North Essex): I beg to move,

That this House notes that, while government spending on transport has fallen in comparison with the period before the 1997 General Election, taxation on the motorist has been raised to record levels, so that £1 in every £7 now spent by the Government is raised from the motorist; condemns the Government for presiding over ever-worsening congestion without any policies to deal with continuing road traffic growth; welcomes the increasing investment in transport industries that were privatised during the previous administration; laments the failure of the Government to build on these achievements and that total public and private investment levels in transport are still well below what is required by people, business and industry; and condemns ministers for failing to secure increased funding for anything except for the growing costs of running the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions which is the Government's largest and least effective Department of State.

I am afraid that the first question that I have to ask is where is the Secretary of State? [Hon. Members: "Where is Archie?"] I am the man responsible for the transport policy of Her Majesty's official Opposition, but the Secretary of State is responsible for transport, the environment and the regions, and much he has made of them since being appointed to the job. We are debating his policy and his White Paper; standstill Britain is his achievement. He is responsible for three years of perpetual policy chaos. He assumed office with ludicrous anti-car policy objectives such as traffic reduction targets, centralisation and control, and the travelling public are paying the price in congestion--not only on the roads, but on all our transport networks--transport spending cuts, delayed investment and, of course, ever-higher taxation. He is more mouth and less delivery than any other member of the Government. With all due respect to the Minister for Housing and Planning, who will reply to the debate, the Secretary of State should do so.

The Conservatives transformed many of the transport industries with privatisation and deregulation, starting with National Freight, British Airways, the British Airports Authority, British Rail's hotels, Sealink, Associated British Ports, the National Bus Company and the Scottish Bus Group, and finishing with British Rail. We stripped away the Treasury controls that stifled investment and we exposed those companies to proper competition. There has been an explosion of investment and innovation in those industries because they now put the customer first, and even the Government admit that there has been a transformation in the rail industry.

Angela Smith (Basildon): I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way so early in his speech, but does he agree with the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman), who said today, "At Asda, we give a refund in all circumstances. That is because we are customer-led."? Will he give the British public a refund for the privatisations?

Mr. Jenkin: I shall treat the hon. Lady's intervention with the contempt that it deserves. I certainly support the

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comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman), who speaks for the customer. It is about time that Ministers started speaking for the customers on the railways instead of for the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions.

The Conservatives invested huge sums in many Conservative projects, such as £26 billion in our trunk roads and motorway system. It is now a largely completed network, thanks to the Conservatives. We substantially reduced the maintenance backlog to a manageable level. What would transport be like today if we had not built the M25, the M40, the second Severn crossing or the second Dartford crossing? The long list of such transport projects includes the docklands light railway, the Manchester metro, the Sheffield metro, the £12.5 billion investment in the channel tunnel and the docklands light railway extension.

During the past two or three years, there has been a succession of celebrated openings of great transport projects. The Prime Minister opened the Heathrow express in June 1998. That was a Conservative project and our achievement, as was the Jubilee line extension. The Croydon tramlink, which the Deputy Prime Minister opened in April, was a Conservative project funded with Conservative Government money backed by the Conservative commitment to transport. A fair description of Conservative transport policy would be, "A lot done, but a lot left to do." Labour's response could be summed as, "Not much done, and no plans to do much either."

Ms Claire Ward (Watford): The hon. Gentleman is keen to take credit for the Jubilee line extension, but does he also take credit for the fact that it went massively over budget and over time?

Mr. Jenkin: That project proves the virtues of the private sector rather than the public sector. The hon. Lady seems to suggest that we should have involved the private sector more, and I have no doubt that such projects would be handled much more efficiently by a privatised tube.

The Labour party has produced not massive, great projects such as ours, but three years of dither, delay, broken promises and U-turns. After all, we waited more than a year for the integrated transport policy to be produced, even though the Labour party had 18 years in opposition to think about it. We waited for almost three years for the Transport Bill, but it will not take effect until almost four years after the Government were elected. Most of the achievements to which they lay claim are Conservative achievements. The improvement in the cleanliness of motor vehicles is the result of regulations that we introduced in government. That is why car pollution is decreasing.

It was the privatised Railfreight service that set the target for the trebling of freight on the railway in 10 years. It was the Conservatives who launched, for instance, the national cycling strategy and the safer routes to schools initiative. From the way this lot carry on, one would think that the Government had invented it all--but they are Conservative policies that they have hijacked. The only Labour initiatives have been all mouth and no delivery.

The Secretary of State said--this was quoted in the House--

I will have failed if in five years time there are not . . . far fewer journeys by car.--[Official Report, 20 October 1998; Vol. 317, c. 1071.]

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However, three years into his Administration, congestion on our roads is increasing. It has increased by 6 per cent. since the election and is unaffected by any of the Government's policies.

On traffic levels, the Government's White Paper said:

We will therefore . . . consider how national targets can best help

to reduce congestion. The Government, however, now agree that that was a silly idea, and that national traffic targets are destructive. That is why they voted against a private Member's Bill earlier in the Session.

In paragraph 1.29 of the White Paper, the Government said that they wanted to

tackle the pinch points in transport networks that lead to congestion.

Barely a month later, however, following the roads review, 100 vital road improvements and bypasses were cancelled. As for the Birmingham northern relief road project, which the Government now say they support, not a sod has been turned. We were left with only 37 road schemes--and it came as no surprise that one of the first to be commenced was the A1033 Hedon road improvement scheme, which just happened to be in the Deputy Prime Minister's constituency. What we get from this Government is roads for the privileged few, but congestion and potholes for the many.

The roads White Paper claimed:

We are refocusing our approach to trunk road investment.

"Refocusing" is new Labour speak for "massive cuts". The transport White Paper said:

We commit ourselves to challenging targets and rigorous monitoring.

What exactly does that mean? It means multi-modal studies, a substitute for real action, a cry for help from the Highways Agency. Meanwhile, improvements on the A66, the A14, the M1, the A1 and many other vital trunk roads and motorways that are crying out for improvement have been frozen.

I should be interested to hear from the Minister whether he plans to go through with all the multi-modal studies, however long they take, before any action is taken on those roads. Will no improvement be made to the A14 while a multi-modal study takes place? Does the same apply to the Hindhead and Salisbury bypasses, to the A36 bypass and to the Stockport A6 bypass, which is jammed in the Government's "carry on consulting" policy? Even "carry on consulting" has failed, however, because the Government have so much consulting to do that they have run out of consultants. There are not enough consultants to conduct all the multi-modal studies that the Government have set in train: it will take years for them to clear those multi-modal studies.

Perhaps the Minister will give us a date. When will the multi-modal studies that were announced nearly two years ago be completed--or will he go abroad to find even more consultants to complete the work?

In the roads White Paper, the Government said:

adequate maintenance of existing roads is our number one priority.

They also said--twice--

We will improve trunk road maintenance, making it our first priority.

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Two recent surveys have shown that roads are in a worse state than they have been since the early 1970s. That is because this Government are spending less on road maintenance than the Conservatives did.

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