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Norman Baker: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. He has campaigned strongly for the reopening of the line, and he, I and others all say the same thing about that in the same terms. I agree about the SRA's priorities: it has inherited a bad situation from Railtrack, but if I were the Government, I should be looking for 100 or so quick, cheap schemes that would bring real improvements to the railways. They have been diverted on to the west coast main line, and I can understand why, but they are putting all their eggs in one basket. A lot of improvements could come very quickly to the railways.
The hon. Gentleman leads me on to a press release from the Association of Community Rail Partnerships, published on 8 June. It said:
"Kim Howells applauded ACoRP's success in supporting small-scale projects which can bring real benefits to local communities".
The Minister of State was absolutely right there. That is where we can get good, quick hits, and I encourage the Government to do that. Indeed, I think they want to: their instincts on rail are right, but they have trouble with a rail system that will not lend itself to delivering objectives that they want to achieve. The press release added that the Minister of State
"hinted that supporters of community railways 'will be pleasantly surprised' by the outcome of the current Government Rail Review."
I hope that that is true. If so, it will give good heart to those who want schemes such as the Lewes-Uckfield reopening.
We have heard about costs, but the costs given by the SRA are outrageous and way out of line with estimates produced by consultants for the county council and others for a diesel connection—the line from Uckfield north is diesel—between Uckfield and Lewes. The county's estimate is between £25 million and £40 million, not the £100 million plus that the SRA has offered. By the way, the SRA has never justified that figure. We have asked it time and again for evidence for it, but it has not been able to do so. It is a figure plucked out of the air. Yet the Minister for Housing and Planning is apparently relying on that figure and says that the scheme cannot be ruled in on grounds of affordability. We really must have some reason why £100 million has been suggested because I think that the figure is substantially less, and the county council is rightly working on lower figures.
The hon. Member for Wealden and I have discussed with the county council its innovative identification of how the extra housing that the Government require for the south-east, in so far as it relates to East Sussex, can be placed adjacent to the rail line between Uckfield and Oxted and Crowborough. I pay tribute to the former lead member, Tony Reid, for his work on that. By doing that, the Government could generate planning gain that would lead to a significant funding stream that would help reopen the line. The county council is doing its best to secure external funding, and that funding is needed only for the reopening. All the evidence shows that the line would be operationally profitable; there is no question about that. The question is simply whether the capital costs can be achieved.
I suggest that the Government's own policy should be to want the line reopened. That is consistent with their objectives. I understand why it is difficult because of the
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mess the railway system is in, but I ask the Minister to help me find a way through that and to recognise the work that the county council is doing in finding private sector funding to help in an innovative way forward. The county council's brief to me says that in-depth studies carried out by Mott MacDonald, the consultants it employed, concluded that while the basic regional train service on the route would make a small annual operating profit, it would not cover the capital cost of reinstatement. The key area of work, therefore, is to investigate how the significant funding gap in the project can be bridged. It may be possible to use enhanced land values as a result of reinstatement of the railway to pay, in part, for the capital costs of construction.
That is an innovative way forward that the Minister ought to support. It is bang in line with the Government's philosophy. The rail industry itself is also supportive, and the SRA, which I have been castigating, has in fact offered staff resources to the county council to review the work carried out by an outside body. I have met SRA representatives, and the SRA is not antipathetic to the scheme. SouthCentral Trains—Southern, as we now must call it—has also indicated that it is in favour in principle and would operate the route gladly if it were reinstated. Most of the balls in my Christmas cracker game are in place, but what we do not have is co-ordination of the rail industry, which I hope the Minister can help to deliver.
The reinstatement of the Lewes-Uckfield line would be good for the environment, good for social mobility and social inclusion and good for the economy. It makes absolute sense. It is overwhelmingly supported by the communities in my patch and that of the hon. Member for Wealden, and elsewhere. It is supported by all the local councils and all the local Members. It is something that the Government, in their wish to get real services back on track, should support.
It is my ambition to be at the reopening of the Lewes-Uckfield railway line. It was the ambition of the hon. Gentleman's predecessor and I hope that he will still make it. I intend to continue to raise the matter until such time as I am there, hopefully to cut the ribbon, but at least to be there when the ribbon is cut. It would give me no greater pleasure than to be there when the Minister is there to cut the ribbon. I will be the first to congratulate him.
6.15 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. Tony McNulty): I congratulate the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker) on securing this debate and providing an opportunity for further discussion on the Lewes to Uckfield rail link. I must disappoint him instantly by saying that whether there is good news or otherwise for those interested in community rail partnerships in the rail review, we must wait and see. I do not anticipate commenting further on the comments of my hon. Friend the Minister of State at an Association of Community Rail Partnerships function the other day.
The hon. Gentleman and others have been pressing for the reinstatement of the link over a long period. He secured an Adjournment debate as long ago as 29 July 1998 and it was discussed further as part of another
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Adjournment debate on 31 October 2001. Indeed, as I think he said, he and colleagues from Tonbridge and Malling, Wealden and Brighton, Kemptown along with representatives of East Sussex county council met Richard Bowker, the chairman of the Strategic Rail Authority, on 5 June. So the Government and the SRA are well aware of the aspirations of hon. Members, local authorities and others.
Before responding to the points made by the hon. Gentleman, I wish to touch on recent changes in the area and on performance. As he said, on 30 May the South Central train operator rebranded to the name Southern. That is a return to a respected and valued name—nothing new there necessarily—and underscores its commitment to improving services to East Sussex as a key element of its work. Southern is introducing modern and more reliable trains, improved station environments and better service. Over 700 new carriages will enter passenger service in the coming months up to 2005.
The hon. Gentleman will be well aware of the other improvements as a consequence of the introduction of Electrostars, Turbostars and other similar developments. On the Uckfield to London service, new Turbostars are entering service. They have air suspension, air conditioning, a state-of-the-art public information system and are fully accessible for disabled passengers. They have low emissions, are quiet and have fast acceleration. They are unrecognisable from the old "Thumper" trains that they are replacing. Other improvements include the upgrading of the power supply, which is long overdue, and the train protection and warning system.
Southern has shown an increase in performance in the last year with 80 per cent. of trains arriving within five minutes, compared with 77 per cent. for the previous year.
The Lewes to Uckfield proposals cannot be considered in isolation, but must be viewed in the wider context of the transport network in the region. As the hon. Gentleman will know, the SRA's current focus is to make the most efficient use of the existing network, making sure that capacity is used as effectively as possible. The route utilisation strategies being developed aim to improve capacity and performance, and reduce overcrowding by improvements to operating practices, better deployment of rolling stock and alterations to timetables.
The Brighton main line route utilisation strategy will go out to consultation in the summer and it will include proposals for improved services for Uckfield: a fast, all-day service between Uckfield and London Bridge. It will also consider improvements in services from Lewes to London using the Brighton main line.
The South East England regional assembly's draft regional transport strategy of January 2003 originally included the Lewes to Uckfield scheme as "proposed for investigation." Following an examination in public into the assembly's draft strategy, an independent panel recommended that the proposal be deleted on affordability grounds. However, the panel considered the scheme to be a longer-term possibility that could be revisited in preparing the regional spatial strategy, also referred to as the south-east plan.
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The Secretary of State's first draft regional transport strategy deleted the scheme, as recommended by the panel. The consultation on the draft regional transport strategy ended on 21 May 2004 and I understand that many representations have been received for the reinstatement of the scheme. The final regional transport strategy will be published in the next few months.
In the longer term, the SRA will produce a series of regional planning assessments—RPAs—to identify possible network enhancements for detailed analysis and appraisal. Work on the southern RPA will begin this winter and the SRA will ensure that the emerging south-east plan is captured in this work. It is within that wider planning framework that proposals for a rail link between Lewes and Uckfield would be reviewed.
I would do nothing other than exhort the county council to carry on doing what it is doing. The current structures of the rail network and the rail system are cumbersome, hence the rail review. There are other substantial and appropriate dimensions to the spatial strategy, the transport strategy and other examinations of such issues on a regional basis, but it would be a sorry state of affairs if what we did after the rail review precluded some attempt at innovation at local level to fill the gaps in the network, above and beyond the regional, national and other strategies.
Any consideration would also need to address a number of complex operational issues, including the impact that services over the line would have on other parts of the network. For example, if trains between Uckfield and Brighton were introduced, there would be implications for capacity at Brighton, a station where competing demands on capacity are already heavy, as the hon. Gentleman reminded us.
Supporters of the Lewes to Uckfield link argue that it could be used as an alternative, diversionary route to London when there are engineering works or disruption on the Brighton main line. Laudable as that objective might be, it would be relevant only if the whole of the route from Hurst Green via Uckfield to Lewes were to be electrified, which would further increase the costs.
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