| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
10 Mar 2010 : Column 113WH—continued
Tom Brake:
I thank the Minister for his intervention, and I am happy to concede that. He has probably also travelled on trains in France, which are of a high standard. Yet someone can travel roughly three times the distance on French trains for the price we pay here
for 23 miles. Let us not go to Poland; we simply need to look across the water and make some comparisons with the train services in France.
Chris Mole: Before the hon. Gentleman rushes into making European comparisons, he should know that one of the features of British train services is their frequency, which one does not necessarily get on the same basis between similarly distanced stations in France.
Tom Brake: We could probably trade statistics for the remainder of the time allotted today. However, I think that most people who have travelled on trains in France and in the UK would find that French trains compared favourably with those in the UK, whether UK trains are more frequent or not. The substantive issue, which, indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Norman Baker) sought to raise with the Prime Minister today, is that we have built a guaranteed fare increase year after year into the system through the retail prices index plus 1 per cent. arrangement. Since 1997, the cost of travelling by train has risen by 13 per cent. and the cost of travelling by car has fallen by roughly a similar amount. So, there has been a 13 per cent. increase in the cost of travelling by train and a 14 per cent. decrease in the cost of travelling by car.
Chris Mole: I am happy to continue to exchange statistics with the hon. Gentleman. For the same period, disposable incomes have increased by 25 per cent., so the real cost of rail travel has fallen.
Tom Brake: I hope that the Minister agrees-I believe that this was certainly a priority at some point for the then Deputy Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott)-that we should encourage more people to use public transport. In fact, on a camping trip to Italy, I recall coming back from a day out to find that a fax had been slipped under the tent door asking me to comment on the fact that it was five years since the Deputy Prime Minister had pledged that, if more people were not travelling by public transport in five years' time, he should be called to account. I had been tracked down to that campsite in Italy to comment on the fact that the target had clearly not been achieved. Yes, it is true that people's incomes have increased, but it is also true that the price differential between trains and cars has grown significantly, which has put people off travelling by train.
A final statistic I shall mention relates to overcrowding. The industry standard for PIXCs-passengers in excess of capacity-is currently set at 3 per cent. or an acceptable level. That is now being exceeded, which leads to substantial overcrowding on some of the train services that have been mentioned today. That is certainly the case on the train services I use as a commuter, and many commuters in the London suburbs have to deal with daily overcrowding.
In the Prime Minister's response to my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes, he referred to an announcement to be made tomorrow, which we presume will be about high-speed train services. The experience of High Speed 1 has set an unfortunate precedent. As the hon. Member for North Thanet and other speakers have made clear, if a consequence of high-speed trains is that it costs people more to travel to a destination that they do not actually want to get to, and that is how people perceive the impact of new high-speed train services, the support in my party-and I am sure in other parties-for extending
those services, particularly so that they can compete with short-haul flights, is likely to evaporate. The Minister will have to deal with that issue when he responds. Notwithstanding his interventions, there will be significant time at the end of the debate for him to set out how he will address these matters.
As we know, the new timetable was introduced on 13 December. The promise then was that high speed would provide an extra 200 trains a day and that capacity would be boosted by 5 per cent. However, many commuters' experience appears to have been the opposite of that. There are fewer options, longer travel times, more overcrowded services and people have to pay a substantial premium if they want to travel on the high-speed link to a destination that, as other hon. Members have said, many people do not want to get to.
Who is responsible for the issue? Other hon. Members have made it clear that, in the correspondence they have received, Southeastern does not accept responsibility for the new service and has clearly fingered the Government-the Department for Transport. If the Minister believes there was any flexibility for Southeastern to implement anything different from what it has been required to implement, I am sure he will make that clear when he responds. Forecasts were apparently carried out to determine which services could be reduced or cut entirely, so will the Minister tell us whether those forecasts were correct?
The fundamental point about what has happened to the service, and about what risks happening to other high-speed services, is that there is a lack of vision and commitment from the Government on ensuring that high-speed train services are properly rolled out and implemented up and down the country. We need to hear from the Government precisely how they will fund an expansion of the programme.
We believe that there is a case for setting up an infrastructure bank to raise funds for public transport schemes. We favour the idea of supporting local improvements, for which people often clamour, rather than the high-profile schemes. In a time of constrained budgets, we should look at the roads budget and take money from it to invest in small rail improvements, such as signalling changes at pinch points, which the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Holloway) mentioned. That can make a significant difference to local commuter services.
We must hear something from the Minister on his vision of how to address the matter. It is clear from other Members' contributions that the concern is not a cheap trick being pushed a couple of weeks before the starting gun for the general election is fired. The matter has had a direct and significant impact on people, has worsened their quality of life and made their journey to and from work considerably more difficult. Therefore, we require a considered response from the Minister and clarity on how he will roll back some of the changes that have been made while maintaining the high-speed link, giving back to commuters the services they have lost after using them for many years, and ensuring that they have the required standard of service.
3.32 pm
Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con):
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Benton. My hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent
(Hugh Robertson) was surely right when he said that our hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale) is not only liked, but respected in his area. He put one of the most eloquent cases on behalf of constituents that I have had the pleasure to listen to in my short time as a Member. I, too, have been contacted about that issue by some of his constituents, as he will know, and by those of other Members in Kent served by that line, and about the concerns my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent raised about the other line.
Having listened to the case put by my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet, I do not think that anyone could be anything other than utterly impressed by its strength. He started by saying that there were 1,500 reasons why the line needs improving and, with all due respect to him, at one point I thought that he was going to go through them all. His stop-by-stop tour of the misery line, including the stop in the constituency of the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Gillingham (Paul Clark), was a powerful evocation of local people's concerns. One of the key roles of MPs, which we should never underestimate, is our ability to bring those concerns to the forefront in the House and in other places.
My hon. Friend was also right to talk about what he considered to be the failures of consultation. In a letter he received on the consultation, the concerns of so many people about the introduction of the timetable were dismissed in a statement that simply acknowledged that some people would be disappointed. That might strike some as complacent, and others as extremely condescending. Indeed, it is a telling point that the managing director of Southeastern, Charles Horton, when my hon. Friend met him, was clear about where much of the blame was attached, and I want to address that point in a few moments. Clearly, Mr. Horton thought that the Minister's response that people were well served by the services in 2009 was not necessarily right and that, had he had the opportunity to do so, he would not necessarily have put that into his franchise. The failure of the specified franchises is at the heart of the matter we are debating today.
My hon. Friend also quoted the Secretary of State, Lord Adonis, and was right that the message that the service is working successfully must cause a hollow laugh in his part of the country. Again, the operators are restricted from pursuing sensible timetabling and ending short trains. They must have the chance to look at exactly which stations might be better provided for at better times of the day. That is what needs to happen, rather than the huge over-specification of the timetable, which the Department for Transport has got itself into, as its franchising policy has failed and is failing. The move to longer franchises, which I recognise, will offer no reassurance unless it is accompanied by a move to less specified franchises.
My hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent identified three concerns and also referred to the Adjournment debate, secured by our right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Sir John Stanley), on 6 January on another train service in Kent. My hon. Friend was right to end his remarks by pointing out to the Minister that there is a genuine concern. It is not electioneering, but the genuine and honestly-felt concern of a huge number of people.
Like the hon. Member for Dover (Gwyn Prosser), I am in little doubt that the new high-speed trains that run on High Speed 1 represent a great leap forward for our railways. This country has waited a long time for high speed to come into operation, and it is clearly an achievement that it now is in operation. The UK has 68 miles of high-speed services, compared with 3,480 miles on the continent. The Minister knows that an incoming Conservative Government would address that, but we will also ensure that any development of the high-speed network is integrated with the classic network, that the cost of travel is affordable and that it is not just a premium network, and that it sustains economic growth. I suspect that several Members will be looking to the test tomorrow-maybe-when the Secretary of State might talk about high-speed rail and the development of the network in the country as the Government see it.
Tom Brake: The hon. Gentleman has just said that in the event of a Conservative Government he will ensure that high-speed rail is affordable. Would he explain to Members how he will do that?
Stephen Hammond: Absolutely. I would be delighted to explain that to the hon. Gentleman. The economics are simple. If one does the detailed financial modelling, as we have done, but as I understand his party has not done, one can take the average fare available and set it as the average fare available for high-speed rail and therefore say that that is the fare one would introduce. That is exactly what we have done in detailed financial modelling, which has enabled me to make that claim.
The debate is not about the success or otherwise of high-speed rail, but about the failure of the Government's franchising policy. I cannot help but agree with my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet when he said that, while some of the people of Ashford and some parts of Kent might have gained as a result of the new services into St. Pancras, those in other parts are clearly losing out. The new timetable was drawn up to accommodate the high-speed services and has undoubtedly resulted in winners and losers. I am sure that the Minister will remember his comments in the Adjournment debate on 6 January, when he more or less dismissed the concerns of others. He stated that
"between 20 and 50 per cent. of the people...board and alight the trains at Ashford."-[Official Report, 6 January 2010; Vol. 503, c. 79WH.]
He dismissed the concerns of the 50 to 80 per cent. of people who do not board or alight at Ashford.
The winners and losers aspect was freely admitted to me by Southeastern, as it was to my hon. Friend. When the timetable was in draft form last summer, I wrote to the management of Southeastern and was told:
"I'm afraid that no timetable will please every passenger."
That may be true, but to disadvantage so many passengers clearly cannot be right.
It is clear that for those travelling to St. Pancras, the new high-speed services will greatly enhance the journey, but if one is accustomed to using the classic network, if one lives in other parts of Kent, or if one still needs to get to Cannon Street, Victoria or London Bridge, the new timetable, as my hon. Friends have pointed out so well, makes the commute worse. There are fewer
trains on the classic lines in order to free up paths for the high-speed trains. What is more, fares across the whole network have risen to fund the cost of the high-speed link.
Chris Mole: Will the hon. Gentleman give way on that point?
Stephen Hammond: As he has to wait such a long time before I finish, yes.
Chris Mole: I am trying to understand how the hon. Gentleman justifies the assertion that fares across Kent have risen in order to support the high-speed link. I thought that it was generally understood by most people that the RPI plus 3 was to fund replacement of the slam-door stock, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Gwyn Prosser) referred, with the new trains on the Southeastern franchise.
Stephen Hammond: The Minister says that it was generally accepted. Would he like to confirm that no part of the fare increase of RPI plus 3 went in any way to subsidise the cost of the new trains and the new high-speed link?
Mr. Gale: We had better get this right for the record. It is not RPI plus 3 per cent. The Minister knows that and is being disingenuous. RPI plus 3 is an average for the whole of Kent. The increase on the Kent coast line has been way above RPI plus 3, as he knows.
Stephen Hammond: I thank my hon. Friend for that. I am sure that the Minister will want to deal with my question in a moment.
The new timetable, which was designed to integrate the high-speed lines with the classic network, has clearly left several problems. We must not fall into the trap of assuming that nothing can be done, or that it is entirely Southeastern's fault. When I wrote to the company last summer, it replied that
"the service pattern for the timetable was set by the Department for Transport."
The main reason why Southeastern has been unable to respond to the needs of its customers is that its hands have been tied behind its back by the overly tight specifications of the franchise agreement, which was set out by the Department. I am delighted that the Government are accepting the need for longer franchises, but, as I said, longer franchises will not work unless they come with fewer specifications.
That begs a question that the Minister may wish to come back to in his remarks: are officials in the Department still writing timetables? Conservatives want to see an end to the absurd practice of civil servants setting detailed timetables across the network. That cannot and should not be right.
The Minister will remember that one of his many predecessors, the hon. Member for Glasgow, South (Mr. Harris), told this Chamber, and confirmed it in a written response, that there were 16 civil servants in the Department writing detailed timetables. The clear message from today's debate is that this is not a failure of high-speed rail but of the Government's franchising process. I certainly believe that the Department's role in franchising should be stripped back, and that the focus should be on overall policy decisions rather than
what we see today, which is detailed intervention that so often leads to a diminution of the service for so many people.
Today's debate presents us with a conundrum. We all want high-speed rail services, but we do not want them at the expense of classic services. The future success of the high-speed network in this country will depend on the ability to ensure that it does what it should do, which is to create extra capacity for many people.
This debate also touches on rolling stock, which so often causes constraints in providing the service that so many people require. I would be delighted if the Minister would address the questions about rolling stock that I have asked him in two previous debates, which he will remember. Indeed, when does he expect a more detailed rolling stock plan to be produced?
I look forward to the Minister's response, and to his saying that he accepts that this is a real and genuine issue, and that the concerns raised by my hon. Friends the Members for North Thanet and for Faversham and Mid-Kent are not a closed book. I hope that he will tell us that operators need to be given greater freedom to react to the demands of their customers. I am convinced that, if he is prepared to accept that, the problems that my hon. Friends have so eloquently set out this afternoon can be addressed.
3.46 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Chris Mole): It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mr. Benton. It would be normal for me to congratulate the hon. Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale) on securing this debate on rail services to and from the north Kent coast, and I recognise that his contribution was forceful. The contribution of the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent (Hugh Robertson) was thoughtful, that of my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Gwyn Prosser) was well focused, that of the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) was somewhat tangential, and that of the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) was, as usual, better informed than a contribution from the shadow Secretary of State for Transport would have been. If I am unable to deal with any of the issues that have been raised, I will ensure that I write to hon. Members.
I shall start by outlining some of the benefits that have been and will be derived from high-speed services in Kent. The introduction of such services has facilitated a number of journey time improvements across the network for existing users who wish to take advantage of them. In addition, high-speed services will create new markets for and in Kent, and will contribute to the regeneration of the area. That will be achieved, in part, by much greater connectivity between Kent and areas such as the docklands, the midlands and the north of England. The current timetable started on 13 December 2009. It represents the biggest change to train services in the area for more than 50 years. It offers integrated main line, metro and high-speed services across Kent, south-east London and East Sussex, and offers more choice to people who live or work in Kent or visit the area.
| Next Section | Index | Home Page |