Channel Tunnel Infrastructure: Reliability

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Tuesday 6th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

The review that I have talked about already will look at the resilience of the infrastructure and at previous recommendations to make sure that the infrastructure is resilient. Obviously, everything that we are talking about is certainly less than 40 years old, which, by railway standards, is like yesterday. There should be no reason—I cannot think of any good reason—why the infrastructure cannot support the much-increased level of service.

To that end, as the noble Baroness knows, the Government are committed to expanding the use of the tunnel for both passengers and freight trains. She will know that Virgin has been granted access to the depot in London, which it believes is necessary for its competitive activity with Eurostar. She will also know that Trenitalia, which is the Italian state railway, has found a funder to independently start additional competitive services with a depot in France, but not needing one in London. So, I am confident that all the infrastructure she mentions can support those services in the future.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, the Minister mentioned compensation in his response. The Government want people to travel by train rather than by plane. He will know that the compensation available to the Eurostar passengers mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Snape, is much less than the compensation offered to air passengers, such as those disrupted at Heathrow recently, leaving many of the Eurostar passengers severely out of pocket. Is there not a case for aligning the compensation regimes between the two modes?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

The noble Lord will know that we used to have far more influence over Eurostar and its commercial policies because we were once part-owners of it, but, sadly, a previous Conservative Government sold their 40% share in Eurostar to what has turned out to be the French state railway 10 years ago. So, we have no commercial influence over what Eurostar does.

If there is a case for what the noble Lord suggests, it would certainly require some examination, but I am not sure that we particularly want to interfere in people’s commercial businesses. What I do want to do is make sure that the infrastructure provided by Getlink, HS1 and SNCF on the other side of the tunnel is reliable, as the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, said, so that the services that currently run and additional future services run reliably.

Walking, Wheeling and Cycling Paths

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Monday 1st December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

Local highway authorities are responsible for public rights of way and are required to keep a rights of way improvement plan. Where opportunities exist to bring historical routes into use for walking, wheeling or cycling, local authorities must decide how to integrate them into their active travel networks. The Government have announced their intention to remove the 2031 cut-off date for recording unregistered historic rights of way so that routes can continue to be identified, protected and enjoyed. I think the noble Baroness will know that, in respect of new railway lines and particularly HS2, there are plans to use the line of route for walking and cycling paths.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, in Holland, 55% of cyclists are women. In this country it is less than half that, at 25%, so what are the Government doing to encourage more women to enjoy the benefits of cycling?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I hesitate to speak in front of such a well-known cyclist as the noble Lord. The answer to that question is to make cycling both more convenient and safer. There are a whole range of measures, including those set out in my two previous responses, to make cycling a more general feature. Of course, safety is a particular issue, which is why investment is needed in making dedicated cycle paths and in cycling on the highways, which are both important. There are a whole range of measures, many of which will no doubt come up in the next eight minutes, about safety, the Highway Code and all those things, in order to get a much better gender balance in cycling, which the noble Lord is absolutely right to raise.

Open Access Rail Services

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

The noble Lord has drunk his own Kool-Aid on this. I made it quite clear that there are benefits to be provided. He also needs to do a bit of careful research, because there are very few commuters on open access services. Commuting is one of the things that has a high fixed cost and generally does not cover the cost of its operations. Open access is successful for people making long-distance journeys irregularly, and some of the operators are very good at it.

The noble Lord also referred to the future railways Bill. We have already made it quite clear that Great British Railways needs to be the body that decides who implements the timetable. Currently, there is not one. It will have to have some rules for access to the railway, which will be developed from the current rules and will be consulted on. If third parties believe that they have been disadvantaged by GBR not following its own rules, or doing something in the wrong way, our proposal will be that they have the ability to appeal to the independent regulator. I think that is perfectly fair, but I also think it is really important that your Lordships’ House recognises that nobody is currently in charge of the national railway timetable except the Secretary of State and me. Outside North Korea, that is really not a good circumstance to have.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

Further to the question by the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, can the Minister confirm that train operators offer choice for travellers, jobs for those in the railway industry and direct links to London from stations not served by other operators? Will he condemn the words of Mick Whelan, the general secretary of ASLEF, who described open access operators as “parasites”?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I think the railway trade unions are quite capable of speaking for themselves. The noble Lord is right: I did say that open access provides benefits such as improved connectivity and choice for passengers. It does provide jobs, although the House might like to note that Hull Trains has been in dispute with its own drivers since February—a dispute that shows no signs of being resolved and results in a reduced service, for which the operator, which is owned by FirstGroup, has no substitute.

Driving Test Delays

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2025 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Young of Cookham]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to reduce delays in taking a driving test.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill) (Lab)]

My Lords, this Government continue to work hard to tackle car practical driving test waiting times. They provided 1.95 million tests last year and have so far recruited a further 170 driving examiners nationally, but further action is needed. In April, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State announced further measures to tackle the test backlog. This included DVSA’s fast-track consultation on improving test booking rules, launched on 28 May, to prevent learner drivers being charged excessive fees and to combat test-buying bots.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

The Minister may recall our earlier exchange on the subject, when he said:

“The real answer is to reduce the length of time it takes to get a test. Currently in England, it is nearly 21 weeks. The Government have a target to reduce that to seven weeks by the end of December this year”.—[Official Report, 13/1/25; col. 909.]


Since then, waiting times have gone up, the December target has moved back to summer next year and, recently, the 60-plus driving test centres in and around London had no slots available at all. Into this chaos, we now have ticket touts using bots to hoover up the available slots at £62 a time and then reselling them to desperate learner drivers for £200 or more. This is not selling tickets for Glastonbury; this is a government service for people who need to drive to get to work. The only people who should book tests are those who want to take them, and if they cannot take the test, the slot should go back to the DVSA. This is a racket ripping off learner drivers. Why do the Government not stop it?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, the Government’s inheritance in this matter was that, as of July 2024, there were 532,782 car practical driving tests booked. That number has gone up, as the noble Lord remarks, but the series of actions taken by this Government is far greater than any set of actions taken by the previous Government—in fact, I cannot find any actions taken by them, other than two disputes with driving examiners, which pushed down the number of tests. This Government have done several things, and the consultation I referred to previously, launched a few days ago, is about putting a stop to the exploitation of learner drivers. The previous Government could have done more, but this Government are doing it now.

Great British Railways: Industrial Action

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Tuesday 18th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I remind all noble Lords that questions should consist of up to 100 words and no more than two points.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, further to my noble friend’s Question, does the Minister recall a speech that he made on 27 April 2022, when he was chairman of Network Rail, to the Rail Industry Association? He said:

“The industry will not back away from its modernisation and cost reduction drive despite the threat of strike action”.


Does that remain his policy?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I was wondering what I had said in April 2022. When I spoke to the Rail Industry Association, it was in respect of industrial relations in Network Rail, which I had the privilege to chair for nine years with 30,000-odd employees. What was very successfully concluded in the summer of 2023 was a ground-breaking deal with extensive productivity in a public sector corporation. It was not widely celebrated by the Government of the time because they did not welcome that progress, but it was very much in line with what I said in April 2022.

Great British Railways

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2025 Grand Committee

Asked by

[Lord Young of Cookham]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what plans they have for open access operators following the creation of Great British Railways.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Scott of Needham Market) (LD)]

My Lords, I remind noble Lords that, apart from the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, and the Minister, the speaking time limit for the following debate is four minutes. When the screen flashes, your time is up.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, for a debate on open access, many noble Lords have applied for the vacant slots. I am delighted that the Minister is in his place to pronounce on the quality of the bids.

Open access did not exist under British Rail, but privatisation, in which I played a modest role, allowed open access train operators to run passenger services. They identify available capacity and apply to the ORR, which then consults on the proposals and analyses their feasibility and benefits. New services have to pass a rigorous abstraction test to ensure that they will add passengers to the railways and grow total revenue, rather than removing passengers and fares from existing services. Open access operators then pay access charges to reflect the additional cost that their use of the railways incurs. They get no direct subsidy and carry the commercial risk of running the railway.

Applications are considered in accordance with statutory duties, including protecting the interests of users of railway services; promoting the use of the network for passengers and freight; and promoting competition and improvements in railway service performance. The final decision rests with the ORR, and neither the DfT nor Network Rail, nor the franchised operators, has a veto.

In 2000, the first open access operator entered the market: Hull Trains. Since then, there have been real benefits from open access—especially to underserved areas that provide the only direct link to London—for cities such as Sunderland, Hartlepool, Halifax, Rochdale and Pontefract, helping regeneration in those areas. With a cancellation rate of less than 1%, open access rail operators are the most reliable. They have focused on affordable fares, with Lumo’s average £40 fare between London and Newcastle as opposed to the £195 walk-up fare. These lower fares from open access operators have in turn attracted a broader demographic to rail travel.

Importantly, we now have a mature, evidence-based, 25 year-old case study on the east coast main line, where three open access operators compete with the Government-run intercity operator, LNER. Passengers travelling to the north and Scotland from King’s Cross enjoy robust fare competition and a choice of operators. Importantly—the Treasury should take note of this—LNER’s subsidy continues to fall, despite it facing robust on-track competition.

There have been wider benefits, promoting the Government’s growth agenda. FirstGroup has invested £0.5 billion in new rolling stock, securing jobs in the north-east, with a further £0.5 billion awaiting a decision. Open access operators account for around 19% of all new train orders placed in the UK in the past five years, although they provide only 0.9% of passenger services.

Last year’s Office of Rail and Road report said:

“An economic appraisal of the impact of open access operators in 2022 concluded that open access operators had been beneficial to the UK economy, and that this was particularly apparent for flows not already directly served by a franchised operator. Our 2023 report noted the particularly strong post-pandemic recovery for open access operators”.


All of the leading European countries with state-run operators, including Germany, France and Spain, have increasingly used open access as a vital tool in complementing their national service operators.

I turn now to the Government’s proposals, which dramatically change the terms of trade and put at risk the benefits that I have outlined. There should have been no cause for alarm because, in September, the previous Secretary of State said that,

“where there is a case that open access operators can add value and capacity to the network”,

as assessed by the Office of Rail and Road,

“they will be able to”.—[Official Report, Commons, 3/9/24; col. 18WS.]

However, that is not what is proposed.

The consultation document of 18 February says:

“GBR will become the decision maker for key decisions on access terms that are currently led by the ORR: the duration and form of access rights, developing and setting the access charges framework and the design of performance incentive regimes contained in track access regimes”.


Then, we have the historic understatement:

“For GBR to have the space and authority to take access decisions on the best use of its network, the ORR’s current role must change”.


GBR will, in due course, absorb Network Rail and all the franchised train operators. It will have a massive conflict of interest in deciding whether an open access operator should provide a new service. We know this because, in the last 10 years, Network Rail opposed all 10 applications to the ORR for open access, which then approved five of them, with the DfT either opposing or not responding. The letter which the Minister circulated yesterday—to everyone except me—opposed nearly all the applications. These are the organisations which will decide in the future.

The ORR—the final arbiter, at the moment—will have its powers curtailed. Instead of being the referee, the ORR can overturn a decision only if GBR has not followed its own processes or has acted irrationally. But those processes could include a large increase in track access charges, making a proposition unviable. It could change the abstraction rule, again making current services uneconomic. The ORR would be powerless to intervene. Its role has been crucial to the success of open access, and it will be marginalised. This would be self-harm for the railway, the regions and passengers.

Behind all this is the Treasury—the controlling mind of the new regime, if ever there was one. It is the Treasury which insisted on the letter to the ORR in January, with its primary objective of minimising subsidy, setting aside the wider obligations of the ORR to promote competition and better use of the network. The consultation document does not refer to competition law or the CMA, which will remain in place. In the absence of a strong independent regulator, there is a risk that we could see more competition law challenges, which will be inherently unpredictable for operators and GBR.

Investors need certainty and confidence about the terms with which they engage with GBR. If we want to encourage investors in schemes such as Heathrow southern rail, which will be needed if there is a new runway, there will need to be a strong and independent regulatory regime to protect investors’ rights. These new reforms remove existing certainty and could shrink freight, the private rail sector and wider economic growth.

There is a devolution angle to all this. If the mayoral strategic authorities are to be empowered to take control over more railway operations, as Andy Burnham would like, they will need confidence about the terms on which they can access rail infrastructure that they do not own, and a strong independent regulator will be needed, overseeing the prices proposed by GBR that devolved authorities will be charged, and their ability to run trains extending across their own and GBR’s networks.

I noticed with alarm the press release of the RMT—which the Government were so eager to placate last July—headed, Why Open Access Rail is Incompatible with the Government’s Rail Policy. That is, by the way, the very same union that, in 2020, demanded

“urgent Government intervention to support the open-access sector and to protect all jobs at Grand Central and Hull Trains”.

The Minister needs to make it clear he does not share the view of the RMT.

To sum up, do the Government accept the need for a genuinely independent regulator if we are to continue to reap the benefits from open access? Can he confirm that he is genuinely open to persuasion on the proposals in the consultation paper?

Passenger Standards Authority

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Tuesday 11th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for that, too. He is of course right: it is quite hard to distinguish what is going on on the railway from the general economy, principally because connectivity drives growth, jobs and housing, and he is right about both the features he mentions. In respect of the railway itself, the principal feature I would draw attention to is the one I did in my response to the previous question, which is to say that if you have a lot of white space in the timetable, you can run more trains at relatively marginal cost. That white space, on many parts of the railway, no longer exists.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, you wait a long time for one Secretary of State for Transport and then three come along at once. Will the Minister confirm that the Government remain totally committed to the principle of open access on the railways?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

It is always a pleasure to see so many ex-Secretaries of State on the other side of the House—all of whom I have respect for and at least one of whom appointed me to my previous job. The Secretary of State’s recent letter, which was made public, sets out the precise conditions in which open access is an asset to the railway, not a detraction. One thing we have to be very careful about is that if, inadvertently, revenue that would otherwise accrue to the public purse and reduce the subsidy is diverted, that may not be a good deal for the taxpayer. I am sure the noble Lord has read that letter, and I would refer him to it as a very accurate description of the conditions under which open access is a good thing, and the conditions under which it is not.

Driving Tests: Secondary Market

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2025 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Young of Cookham]

To ask His Majesty’s Government whether they plan to ban the secondary market in driving tests.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill) (Lab)]

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency has announced measures to review the driving test booking system. It launched a call for evidence on 18 December seeking views on the current rules to book tests. This will lead to consultation on improving processes with potential future legislative changes. On 6 January, the same organisation also introduced tougher terms and conditions for driving instructors booking and managing car driving tests for their pupils.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

I am grateful for that Answer, but I think the answer to my Question is no—although it was very skilfully camouflaged. This is a racket. Middlemen are hoovering up slots on the DVSA website and then charging learner drivers a premium to access them. I googled this morning “Book your driving test earlier”. I got eight hits on the first page, with lots of inducements: “You can receive a test a month earlier than you would usually find on the DVSA website” and “Get your driving licence faster with early test bookings”. Another one said, “Book a driving test quicker with our booking system”. Trustpilot reveals that some of those are scams, with people paying £90 and not getting a test. Last month, the previous Secretary of State said:

“we will review and improve the rules around booking tests, including”,

as the Minister has just said,

measures to ban the resale of driving test appointments”.—[Official Report, Commons, 18/12/24; col. 52WS.]

Why do the Government not just get on with it and ban this racket?

Aviation Safety (Amendment) Regulations 2024

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Monday 18th November 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)]

My Lords, I want to intervene briefly. I declare my interests. I am a holder of a current private pilot’s licence and a former director of one of our airports. This is a particularly interesting set of measures. I want to ask just a couple of questions and point out one or two things.

Of course, we all welcome the improvement in technology. Technology has come to the aid of, and provides a much safer environment for, those who pilot and operate planes, the airport operators themselves and, of course, passengers. But we are currently going through an enormous shortage of commercial pilots. Training is rightly being more elaborated, but I wonder whether we have sufficient facilities for training pilots in this country. I know it is slightly off beam, but my understanding is that a number of the major operators—I think easyJet is one—are having to train their pilots elsewhere because of a lack of training facilities here in this country. That is rather worrying and not good for this country’s economy. Will the Minister make a comment on that?

The Explanatory Memorandum refers to the instrument allowing general aviation, in which I partake,

“to make use of instrument flight rules”,

which have not been available before. I think we are all aware of the fact that this country is enormously dense when it comes to flying, and there is a lot of danger, particularly in a congested area such as the south-east of England. I published a report of an inquiry I did on lower-airspace controls because of this issue. Most of us involved in general aviation do not operate under the IFR; we operate mostly on a visual basis, although some of us do have instrument capabilities. This extension, referred to in the Explanatory Memorandum but to which I cannot find further reference—perhaps I am not looking sufficiently well at the text—does not seem to have been elaborated on much. I would be grateful if the Minister could comment further on that, perhaps after taking advice.

Other than that, I must say that I am very pleased that we are producing these regulations and maintaining our international standing in aviation.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, unlike my two noble friends, I do not have a pilot’s licence—I will not respond to the shortage referred to by my noble friend Lord Kirkhope by applying for one—but I was caught, as I went through the document, by Regulation 4(21). It says:

“‘fuel scheme’ means a scheme for the use of fuel or energy that is a basic fuel scheme, a basic fuel scheme with variations or an individual fuel scheme”.

That is amplified in the Explanatory Note, where apparently energy is added to fuel. It says:

“The concept of ‘energy’ is a new addition throughout the amendments to allow for the use of non-hydrocarbon-based fuels in future”.


On page 7 of the impact assessment, in paragraph 15, we have this explanation:

“In addition, this proposal also introduces the concept of alternative fuel or energy sources other than hydrocarbon-based fuels. Without this change, UK operators will not be able to take advantage of technological advances in the production of alternative propulsion sources for aviation”.


COP 29 is under way at the moment, and I understand that the airline industry is committed to net zero by 2050. It is therefore quite important that we know a bit more about these alternative propulsion sources. My understanding is that sustainable aviation fuels are already available, but is it the case that up to now it has not been legally possible to use these SAFs, because we have not made the change yet and without this change UK operators will not be able to take advantage of technological advances? My understanding is that Virgin Atlantic is trialling plant-based fuels and that recycling cooking oil is one of the alternatives. Is it the case that at the moment one cannot blend sustainable aviation fuel with conventional hydrocarbons but after this instrument we will be able to? Can the Minister say a bit more about the progress being made? Net zero by 2050 is quite a tough target because the aviation industry is one of the tougher ones in which to remove hydrocarbons, so I would appreciate hearing a bit more about what the current position is—the legality of using SAF at the moment—and the prospects of hitting our target by 2050.

Shadow Great British Railways: Chair Appointment

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Tuesday 12th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I should concentrate on my noble friend’s right description of the chaos of the last 30 years. The railway is not functioning properly; far too much of the time of everybody concerned with managing the railway is spent on blame attribution and contractual negotiation, and far too little is spent on delivering a decent service for passengers and freight and making the railway do what it should do for the economy. That is what the Government’s policy is designed to change.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, following the privatisation of the railways, in which I played a modest part, decades of decline in passenger traffic was reversed. Once the dead hand of the Treasury was removed from investment, there was fresh investment in new rolling stock and modernising the stations, passenger fares were pegged at RPI minus one—a policy reversed by the Government adorned by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes—passenger safety improved, and we developed a market in train operating companies to replace the monopoly of British Rail. What was not to like about that?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

Since Covid, the railway has got only four-fifths of its previous income. The train operating companies are now, in effect, flat contractors to government and their owners are unable to take much, if any, financial risk. The service to passengers is not as good as it should be, and the Government’s policy is designed to make that significant change.