Regional Airports

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Tuesday 15th July 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point about connectivity across the UK. Perhaps the regional air connectivity fund should be used for airports in the north of Scotland. Some might say that such airports are on the periphery of the UK, but they are certainly not on the periphery of the globe. Money from the fund could be used to link Stornoway to the Faroe Islands, or perhaps for through-flights coming from Iceland or wherever, in order to improve the economies of areas that are currently seen as peripheral but are actually very central in the context of global routes.

[Mike Kane]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, although I thought Stornoway airport was bidding to be the UK’s spaceport—

[Mr MacNeil]

Space will exist after independence!

[Mike Kane]

Yes. Let us hope that Stornoway does not enter into competition with the beautiful island of Barra, where the landing strip is on the sea shore.

Since 2008, the UK’s connectivity has declined by 4.9%, whereas Germany’s has increased by 4.3% and France’s by 3.4%. My own airport, Manchester, has a positive story to tell about connectivity. After I have told that story, I will discuss other regional airports.

[Mike Kane]

That is a good point. If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will come to the connectivity fund and expand on the points about airport passenger duty in a few minutes.

Manchester is the international gateway to the north. It has 60 airlines serving more than 200 destinations, which is more than Heathrow. I repeat for Hansard: that is more than Heathrow. Last year, Manchester added more new routes than any other UK airport, serving the 24 million people who live within two hours’ drive. It is the only airport outside the south-east with a strong long-haul portfolio. As well as serving destinations such as Singapore, Pakistan and the US direct, it also offers strong onward connectivity via the middle east: three times daily to Dubai, twice daily to Abu Dhabi and 10 times a week to Doha. More recent connections include Hong Kong, Jeddah and Toronto, and the new Charlotte service has increased transatlantic services at the airport to more than 60 a week. Most of the world can be reached from Manchester either non-stop or with one stop.

However, 5 million passengers a year from Manchester’s catchment area leak to the London airports to catch flights. The challenge for the future is ensuring that passengers have the option to fly from their local airport, taking the pressure off the congested south-eastern airports. However, I hope to welcome High Speed 2 to the airport station at some stage in the near future. It will reduce journey times from Manchester airport to Euston from two hours and 24 minutes to 59 minutes.

As I said earlier, Stansted is the UK’s fourth busiest airport, serving more European destinations than any other airport in the world. Both Ryanair and easyJet have committed to growing their Stansted portfolios; Ryanair’s will grow from nearly 500 flights a week to more than 700 in winter 2014. Edinburgh is Scotland’s capital airport, with over 40 airlines serving more than 100 destinations. More than 9 million passengers a year pass through the airport.

For smaller point-to-point airports, although direct flights are preferable, indirect flights offer an important alternative where they do not exist, either via UK hubbing or through hubs in continental Europe or the middle east. At East Midlands airport, the priority for the future is to access more European hubs in order to widen connectivity; it currently serves Amsterdam, Brussels and Paris. In the longer term, the airport is keen to have direct routes to emerging economies that are key to the region, such as India. Direct access to markets supports business and trade between the region and those markets. It is not just about how connected the UK is to the outside world today; it is about its connectivity in the future and how it compares with other EU and global airports, such as those in the gulf.

Access to global connectivity is not simply an issue of access to Heathrow. Passengers value the choice, competition and service offered by alternative carriers connecting through alternative hubs, such as in the middle east. Manchester airport does not have the luxury of a UK hub operator and relies on overseas carriers to provide long-haul connectivity. Without those carriers, Manchester would just be a spoke into Heathrow. Ultimately, it is the airlines that determine which routes are flown, and therefore overall connectivity, depending on long-term route profitability. However, political and regulatory factors can play a major role in influencing the attractiveness of starting and sustaining routes.

The UK still enjoys a strong position in transatlantic aviation and flights to traditional partners such as India, but is linked to relatively fewer locations in Brazil, Russia and mainland China. Both Germany and France have much better connectivity to China in particular. In a 2012 survey by CBI and KPMG, almost half of respondents expressed dissatisfaction with the UK’s air links to emerging markets. Of companies that deemed flights to China to be crucial, only 46% were satisfied with their current availability.

Regional airport connectivity is not just about the number of destinations served; it is also about the frequency of services, the economic value that they drive, the accessibility of destinations right across the UK, whether flights take place at convenient times, and their capacity. The Government have demonstrated their support for the growth of connectivity from regional airports by announcing the regional air connectivity fund. This will provide public support for new intra-EU routes from airports with fewer than 3 million passengers per year, or 3 million to 5 million in exceptional circumstances. The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) commented on the fund a few moments ago.

Funding will be available for five years and will come to an end in March 2019. Airlines will have to prove that they can make money from the route without public assistance after two years. However, in reality, competition rules will make it difficult for many routes to qualify. Those that do will be at the smallest airports and will be short-haul routes only, not the game-changing routes we need such as Manchester to Beijing.

It is important to acknowledge the steps the Government took in this year’s Budget, when the Chancellor cut air passenger duty on long-haul routes to destinations including China, India, Brazil and many other emerging markets. However, the Government could go further by offering a temporary air passenger duty exemption for new long-haul routes, as recommended by the Select Committee on Transport and mentioned by the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Brady). It would help to make best use of existing capacity and encourage more routes to emerging economies.

A temporary APD holiday would have the advantage of being a proven commercial strategy and one that airports use: that is, a lead-in discount. It would cost the Treasury nothing, as the Treasury receives no income from routes that do not yet exist. Forgoing revenue on new routes until they were established would cost nothing and could result in an income stream later on.

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Gentleman is speaking eminent sense. I am sure that he is aware of the success in Iberia and Catalonia with routes from Barcelona. The Government in Madrid did not take the APD, and 21 new routes were started in one year due to the APD holiday, as he suggested. The Government here would do well to learn from the lessons in continental Europe.

[Mike Kane]

I am grateful for that contribution. We must continue to consider APD. We live in a competitive world and we want a competitive market, but we also want a level playing field with competing airports across Europe, such as those in Spain, particularly Barcelona. A temporary APD holiday would be in line with the Government objectives of making best use of existing capacity and promoting links to emerging economies and economic growth near regional airports.

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[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) on a real tour de force; I do not think there is any airport in the UK of any significance that he missed out in his speech. The importance of aviation to Manchester, other regional airports and the whole of the UK came out extremely clearly in his remarks. He said that in round terms aviation is worth £50 billion to the UK economy, but in fact we could not have a modern economy without aviation. While the people who measure these things put the figure at around £50 billion, if we took aviation out of the system we would not be left with the economy minus £50 billion; we would be left with a very small and primitive economy indeed.

However, as my hon. Friend hinted, there is a paradox at the centre of aviation policy in this country: if we add up all the capacity on all the runways at London and regional airports, we find that we have more than 21 times the capacity that we need for aeroplanes to land in and take off from this country, but on the other hand Heathrow is congested because aviation depends on a hub system internationally. Heathrow is our major, indeed our only, hub airport, and it is congested. Many airlines would like to get in there but cannot. Airlines have cut off routes to the rest of the UK because that hub airport is full, yet we do not have the routes that regional airports, including those in Birmingham, Manchester, Newcastle and the east midlands, would like.

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Gentleman asserted that airports rely on a hub system, but that is an arguable point. I gently say to him that the hub system did not come about accidentally. For about 50 years, the UK had bilateral air agreements specifying that only London airports could be used. If there is a hub system, perhaps the most logical hub would be Schiphol airport, with its five runways. However, as we know, the reality is that a huge number of political choices contributed to the hub system, and similarly a huge number of political choices have been made that are not helping our regional airports. Specifically, they are not helping on APD, as the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) said.

[Graham Stringer]

There were a lot of points in that intervention, but I do not think that the key point about hub airports is that until recently most flights needed—some still do—bilateral agreements to get into Heathrow. The real point about hub airports is that we need that efficiency of transfer traffic in order to thicken routes that would not be viable at other airports. I will come on to APD shortly.

We have this paradox; we have loads of runway capacity, but insufficient runway capacity at Heathrow. That means that our aviation industry, which is vital, is not as good as it could be. My hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East mentioned businesses such as Google moving to the north-west and having headquarters there. However, KPMG has moved its European HQ to Frankfurt because of the lack of runway capacity at Heathrow.

There are two solutions. One is blindingly obvious but has got caught up in party politics. I hope that the three political parties can keep a united front and support whatever comes out of the Davies report. However, my view is simply that we should build a third and probably a fourth runway at Heathrow, because this country is falling behind in its international competitiveness.

That is the hub issue, but what do we do about the second issue, which is the capacity we have in the regions? How do we attract extra airlines to our major regional airports? There are three things that we can do, but Governments have not been good at doing any of them. First, I can see no reason at all why there should not be a completely open skies policy in every regional airport outside London. Why should any airline in the world that wants to fly into the UK, take passengers and go wherever it wants not be able to do so? If it could, that would create jobs and benefit any airport that it operated from.

The Government have gone part way there by granting fifth freedoms to airlines coming here, but there is also the right for UK and other airlines to object to those freedoms, so that measure has not brought about the benefit that it could have had. Having completely open skies with rights for everybody and no right of objection for other airlines, whether British or not, would benefit our regional airports, particularly the bigger ones such as Glasgow, Manchester and Birmingham, but also some of the smaller ones. That is the one thing that we could do that would help the regional airports.

Secondly, as was mentioned both by my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East and in interventions, there should be a change in APD. Let me say clearly that APD is a bad tax. The PricewaterhouseCoopers report last year—I think it was published just before Christmas—showed that if APD was abolished, the UK economy would probably grow by 0.5%. I understand why Treasury Ministers, and Transport Ministers for that matter, say, “We don’t want to lose the revenue we’ve got”, even though other countries such as Holland and Ireland have scrapped APD and their economy has benefited as a result. Even if we cannot prove what would happen by creating theoretical models for this country, we can see what is happening elsewhere, follow the example of other countries and scrap APD; that would be the ideal way to approach the issue.

However, if scrapping APD is too much of a step for naturally cautious Treasury Ministers, we should adopt a step-by-step approach and measure what is going on. We could abolish APD for children, which would be very popular as APD is a tax on holidays as well as on business. Equally, we could abolish APD in the winter, when airlines find it difficult to make a profit; go to any UK airport in November and there will be people rattling about in it. Also, there could be a holiday—not with buckets and spades, but on taxation—for new routes, so the Treasury would not lose any money. In addition, APD could be reduced just in the regions. There are lots of different ways of approaching the problem of how to get rid of a bad tax, which would be beneficial for the regional airports. The Transport Committee looked at APD and recommended that the Government consider it in greater detail. On top of that, the Government should look at practical experience elsewhere, and adopt a step-by-step approach in this country.

The third point, already referred to by my hon. Friend and in interventions, is the importance of surface access. If we compare our airports with continental airports, many airports in north America and airports in the far east, we find that our train links are poor. Our biggest international airport—indeed, the biggest international airport in the world—is Heathrow, but apart from the Paddington link it does not have a mainline rail route going into it. In what country would one of the world’s great airports not have a mainline route going to it, so that people could not get to it by train from many other parts of the country? That is simply poor.

The Transport Committee is holding an inquiry into rail. We recently quizzed Network Rail and the Office of Rail Regulation about how they assess railway lines going to and from airports. I have been on the Committee on and off for a long time, but I found the answer pretty extraordinary: they do not assess them any differently from routes to anywhere else. We should, as the Davies commission recommended, change that approach so that we give priority to our airports. That would take traffic off the roads, help to support the airports and help to attract traffic into them.

The Committee looked at the example of Stansted, which could be part of the solution to some of the congestion in the south-east system. The rail line to Stansted is poor, and the sooner we get a decent fast rail link, the better. We can argue about whether the journey time should be 30 minutes, as Stansted thinks, or whether it can be reduced only to 40 or 45 minutes, but it should certainly be reduced; that would benefit everybody.

In Manchester, we have made our own arrangements in a sense. We have paid for the southern link to the rail system at Manchester airport, as well as for part of the northern link. With other Greater Manchester MPs, across all parties, I had to fight the Labour Government to get the tram link. All airports really should have decent surface links—preferably rail or, in some cases, rail and light rail.

I will finish on that point. Aviation is vital to our economy. It is not as good as it should be. We need to make sure we use the assets we have, invest to make them work better and certainly sort out the south-east system, which will help our regional economies as well.

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[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Thank you, Ms Dorries. It is a pleasure to speak in the debate. I congratulate the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Mike Kane) on bringing this issue to Westminster Hall for consideration. He made a passing comment about Northern Ireland’s airports, and I will, very parochially, mention all three. I want to put down a marker for the importance of not only regional airports but, on behalf of myself and my right hon. Friend the Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds), those in Northern Ireland.

Today’s debate is important for regional airports. It is also important for me, as the Member of Parliament for Strangford and the Democratic Unionist party spokesman on transport. It is therefore a pleasure to make a contribution. I also wish to put on record how important the debate is for Belfast City airport, Belfast International airport and City of Derry airport.

As the quest continues for another runway for Heathrow—nowhere has been confirmed as yet—we cannot allow connectivity with airports in Northern Ireland and on the mainland to drag. I am concerned about that question mark over where a Heathrow runway will go. The hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) mentioned the importance of a third and a fourth runway. I subscribe to that view, because their importance is clear.

Northern Ireland cannot expect to have a hub airport. We cannot expect to have international contact all over the world, but we do expect to have more direct connectivity internally in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and, ultimately, internationally. The World cup has just finished, and I am reminded of a football saying we have in Northern Ireland: “We are not Brazil. We are Northern Ireland.” While that is meant for football, it is clearly relevant to the airport world. [Interruption.] It is good they got to the semi-finals. However, we recognise what we have in Northern Ireland, and we recognise that contact with the regional hubs—with Heathrow and other places in the United Kingdom—is what makes the difference.

[Mr MacNeil]

On the reference to Brazil, I happily remember that Northern Ireland did just as well as Brazil in the 1982 World cup, when, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman clearly remembers, Gerry Armstrong scored a fantastic goal against Spain. However, the substance of my question relates to excellent idea from the hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) about open skies. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) will know that, although there have been negotiations with Russia over routes—137 in and 130 out—none are coming into Scotland, and I am sure it is the same for Northern Ireland. The fact that bureaucrats have spent this long negotiating to achieve zero for Scotland and Northern Ireland may lend credence to the idea that we should further investigate what the hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton said.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution. Yes, I can remember the 1982 World cup. I was in the stadium when Billy Armstrong scored—

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 10th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Goodwill]

I am sure Treasury questions will be along very soon, when my hon. Friend will have an opportunity to ask the Chancellor that very question.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

The regional airports of Munich and Barcelona have been named as two of the best airports in Europe and the world. Both have direct links to emerging economies throughout the world. The situation in Scotland is very different, with the UK Government imposing the demand-management, London-centred approach of having the highest air passenger duty in the world, which they have no intention to devolve. Could not Scotland do an awful lot better if it had the powers to help its airports to catch up with the likes of Barcelona and Munich?

[Mr Goodwill]

I suspect that this matter will be decided in September, but I am pleased that the Government have taken the opportunity of offering public service obligation flights to London. Dundee has put a deal together, and I hope other airports will come forward with good proposals to tap into that fund.

High Speed Rail (London – West Midlands) Bill

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Monday 28th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr McLoughlin]

In the last Parliament, the hon. Gentleman was an absolute supporter of the Government of the day. Today, we hear him attack the scheme so violently, but he did not do that when he was sitting on the Government Benches behind that Government when they proposed it in the first instance. I am happy to accept the support he gave it in the first instance.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

The right hon. Gentleman has said that we have only 67 miles of high-speed rail in England, linking to two independent countries, France and Belgium. Does that not add to the argument that if Scotland were independent, there would be a greater push for rail north, as two sovereign Governments would be working on this rather than one?

[Mr McLoughlin]

I was expecting an intervention from the Scottish National party, but I am not quite sure which sea the hon. Gentleman is thinking of going under, how long the tunnel would be and which continent he is thinking of connecting up to separately with an independent part of Scotland. What I say to him is that I believe high-speed rail is very important for the whole country—it will be important for Scotland, too—and Scotland, part of the United Kingdom, will be much better off.

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[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

High-speed rail is of course supported by the Scottish Government and the SNP supports it in this House. Our criticism, as with many things here, is about the Government’s management. Having already linked up with a partner European state, the highly productive French—and, by extension, the Belgians—in a good example of cross-border progress, the UK Government seem incapable of progressing similarly in what is currently their own territory. Perhaps it is the absence of the efficient French or merely dealing with an independent country that is the difference here but, whatever it is, there is a lack of ambition on a key infrastructure issue on the largest of these isles.

Having already lost its shipping advantage to Rotterdam, the UK is currently losing its aviation advantage. The third error seems to be to putting rail progress into the sidings. The pace of the project, placing the first point of construction in the south and poor planning by not linking to airports or providing bypasses around London are holding us back and taking away from what should be a good project. It seems that the only major spend that can go unchecked in the UK is the £120 billion towards weapons of mass destruction on the Clyde, which are controlled by the Americans anyway and not particularly needed.

Where are we? High-speed rail may not reach Birmingham until 2032, by which time most here may be long retired. Meanwhile, understanding its value, China will have built many thousands of kilometres by then. We heard from the Secretary of State earlier that it has built 11,500 km from a standing start of 0 km in 2007. Back in the UK, the north-to-south advantages would be more pronounced by building in the north first and having the slowest rail replaced the fastest. The idea that everything has to radiate from London is folly and will delay our European partners who want to come to Scotland for business, affecting aggregate European GDP and therefore, by extension, all of us. Building in the north could also be cheaper per mile as it is less densely populated and has fewer buildings, making negotiations to acquire land more straightforward, quicker and better value for the public purse.

In Scotland, we are not following that template and are linking on a pattern of need. We are not radiating from Edinburgh. We have schemes to improve journey times on the northern corridor between Inverness and Aberdeen, as well as post-independence hopes to create greater economic links between the great city of Carlisle and Dumfries and Galloway, as well as building high-speed rail between Glasgow and Edinburgh within the decade. When in Carlisle recently, the First Minister of Scotland pointed out that the benefits of high-speed rail to Manchester or Leeds will also bring some £3 billion of benefit to Scotland, again showing the aggregate gain to the wider European economy from infrastructure improvements not necessarily in the territory. However, such benefits would increase eight times—some £24 billion —with a full high-speed rail link between Scotland’s big cities. The majority of that benefit would of course be in the central belt, but it would help the country as a whole. In addition, there would be a major shift from air to rail, saving fuel, making journeys cheaper and helping the environment. As we heard earlier from the hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins), we know now that most journeys between Paris and London are made by rail rather than air.

Following independence, when we will have two sovereign governments working on the project, as we have seen from the links to the continent, we may find ourselves reminded of the fact that the first rail link between Scotland and England did not start with a link to London, but rather between Carstairs and Carlisle. Independence should give hope not just to Scotland, but to the north of England, as the First Minister laid out in his St George’s day speech in Carlisle.

The arguments for high-speed rail are well researched and I hope they have been well rehearsed in this debate, but it is instructive to look at what the university of Southern Denmark found by analysing the link from Frankfurt to Cologne. It was found that it was difficult to untangle the benefits of high-speed rail as it tends to be built between two successful places. However, political horse-trading meant that the line stopped in two places, Montabaur and Limburg, where university researchers found an extra 2.7% GDP in those places for four years that then continued at a higher plateau.

We hope that high-speed rail will materialise and in the north as well. I mentioned the spending on weapons of mass destruction, but this would be spending on ploughshares that would plant the seeds of future economic growth. The railways that the Victorians planted many years ago are still bearing fruit not only in the UK, but also in Ireland. We should ensure that we help the economy of the future and if the project goes ahead, until we see something tangible in Scotland, there should be Barnett consequentials, as there should be for Wales.

High Speed 2

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sheila Gilmore]

The right hon. Lady will not be surprised that I do not entirely agree with her view. We have to remember, for example, that the lines between cities across the north are already being electrified, quite separately from HS2.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Sheila Gilmore]

I will shortly, but I want to complete my argument about why, if we want to grow regional economies, we need to improve connectivity and why that is not possible within the existing rail network. There has been a huge growth in rail over the past 20 years, and there is limited spare capacity. Investment in existing lines has been increased and, we acknowledge, that investment is continuing under this Government, but—this is perhaps the point that the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) wished to make—the ability to make further improvements is decreasing because of the limits on capacity. If we decide that we are going to build new lines in various places, we may as well think about the high-speed line now.

[Mr MacNeil]

Did I understand the hon. Lady’s response to the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) correctly as implying that, as a Scottish Member, she would prefer to have high-speed rail starting in London rather than in Scotland?

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[Mrs Gillan]

I am sure that most of the hon. Lady’s constituents will be travelling to Kings Cross, but plenty of people from Scotland travel to Euston. As she does not appear to want the route built to Scotland immediately, nor to want the northern routes to be constructed first, she can rest assured that there will be a lot of disruption right across the network as the project develops. I was surprised that she did not ask for the line to be built from Scotland to England, because there is to be a referendum in Scotland and, as I have always said, if we want Scotland to remain as part of the United Kingdom, connectivity to the rest of the United Kingdom is really important. Despite any differing views about HS2, I think that most people in the Chamber would agree that we want Scotland to remain part of the United Kingdom.

[Mr MacNeil]

Does it not show London’s priorities that, rather than building high-speed lines to the north, it built high-speed lines to the south and towards the continent—indeed, to countries that were not in political union with London?

[Mrs Gillan]

No, I do not at all agree with the hon. Gentleman on that, and he knows it. If that is a mischievous way of pushing the SNP’s message, I have to say that I believe that we are better off together and that the people and economy of Scotland will be a lot better off if it remains firmly as part of the United Kingdom.

Today we have a fightback from HS2, because Sir David Higgins takes up his appointment; we have already had the PR charm offensive from HS2 this morning, conducted from Old Oak Common. We heard that we will have a new further education college to train the 2,000 engineers that we do not currently have to complete the build over the next 20 years of HS2. The Government are constantly trying to talk up the project. We have had more fightbacks and comebacks on HS2 than we can possibly imagine. More alarmingly, we heard this morning that over the next six weeks, Sir David will prove that he can produce HS2 cheaper and quicker. That is what he has been charged to do. That will be interesting; it means that the past four years and the work by the Department for Transport and HS2 Ltd is obviously not good enough, and that a great rescuer can come in and show us, over the next six weeks, how we can do it quicker and cheaper. I wish him the best of luck, but it makes me wonder what we have paid nearly £1 billion for in terms of the work that has been carried out so far.

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[Mrs Gillan]

I will be grateful for a reply from the Minister then, of course. He knows that what I am doing is talking common sense and repeating what has happened, as opposed to making anything up. If this project is so good, perhaps the Minister will also, when he replies, let us know why the Government have still not published the Major Projects Authority reports, which highlight the risk. I believe that they have been classified as amber and red. If the Government are so convinced that this is such a wonderful project, it is important that those reports are made public. After all, we came into government saying that we would be the most transparent Government ever.

The hybrid Bill, which has been deposited, has also proved to be contentious. I think that tomorrow the Standing Orders Committee will meet for the first time since 2008 to examine the 14 Standing Orders that it may have transgressed. Alongside the hybrid Bill was deposited an environmental statement of nearly 50,000 pages, from which, as the Minister told me in answer to a question, some 877 pages were omitted. That and the fact that 56 days is the shortest period that has been given for any consultation on HS2 matters reflect the fact that the Government are not wanting to listen in detail to people who are raising valid and very worrying concerns about where we are going with this project.

It is widely known that Buckinghamshire gets all the pain and none of the gain. I am not sure whether the new college that is being promoted by my colleagues in government will be dangled in front of Buckinghamshire —whether it could come to Buckinghamshire. If that were considered, at least it would be something more than we are getting at the moment, because if people start to look in detail at what is proposed and the impact on Buckinghamshire, they will see that it is very worrying.

I talked to my right hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr Lidington) before this debate. We were talking about the effects on the local economy and particularly on tourism in Wendover and beyond, and also in Great Missenden in my constituency. But also, more worryingly—my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford, who is also a former Health Minister, will know about this—concern has been expressed, because of what is proposed in changing the transport architecture locally, that even blue-light services could be affected during the construction phase of the project.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for giving way; she has been very generous. She is painting a truly frightening picture of high-speed rail. I just wonder where high-speed rail has been constructed whether she would advocate digging it up and taking it away, because it does seem to be a very frightening project indeed.

[Mrs Gillan]

I think that I understood what the hon. Gentleman just said to me. We all know that we need to have a balanced economy and that we need to get growth across the country, but there are alternative ways of doing that. It always seems to me that HS2 was a project dreamt up by politicians—by Andrew Adonis in opposition—and adopted by the coalition when it came in and that no one really and truthfully sat down and said, “How do we get an integrated transport system? How do we join up our roads, railways and airports?” We do not appear to have done what I consider to be the overarching work to deliver an integrated transport system. [Interruption.] It is not yet going ahead. As we know, the hybrid Bill must pass through this House and the other House, so it has not got the final stamp of approval.

[Mr MacNeil]

Which ones would the right hon. Lady dig up?

[Mrs Gillan]

I am not digging up anything. The project has not got the final stamp of approval. There is still the option of pursuing other ways in which we could improve our economy.

Let me get back to my local picture, because I think that it is only fair to my constituents that some of their grievances are aired. The agricultural holdings in Chesham and Amersham will be severely impacted. Several farms will be badly affected by the construction, to such an extent that they will probably be put out of business. People cannot run an equestrian business next to a major construction site; nor can they use ground that has been submerged in 50 feet of soil. Will the Minister, although he is rightly going to defend his position, as he must, let me know what detailed work he had done on the losses that will be sustained by the businesses and particularly the farming and agricultural holdings in my neck of the woods? HS2 Ltd estimates that, across the whole route between Birmingham and London, about 300 existing businesses will be required to relocate to new premises, but people cannot relocate a farm and people cannot relocate a family business, when its land has been divided into two or part of its land has been appropriated.

I referred briefly to roads that will have to be closed, realigned or diverted during the construction phase. The impact on communities and local facilities will alter people’s travelling patterns and shopping habits, perhaps even for life. That is a great threat to the local economy. If people start to read through the detail of the environmental assessment, they can see some of the estimates of traffic congestion at the junctions of School lane and the A413, the Amersham bypass and the A404, and Chesham road and Bottrells lane—I could go on, but people will have got the idea. But I want to know what estimates the Department has made of the losses to our local economy from the delays, traffic congestion and disruption that years of construction will bring to Chesham and Amersham.

I believe that some of the claims made by consultants are not correct. There will be a lot of substitution in the economy. Yes, businesses will be attracted to the high-speed rail line and may move, as they did when the BBC, which the hon. Member for Edinburgh East referred to, went to Salford. That move has attracted many production companies and media companies to that area. However, that is substitution, because the businesses have been drawn from other parts; hence one of the very important things that was highlighted in the KPMG report was the disinvestment and the permanent loss to GDP of other regions as businesses are attracted falsely to the line.

This will be a distorting project. Many MPs around the country do not realise that there will be an effect on their constituency, which will suffer disinvestment as businesses move closer to new conurbations, for example into buildings created with Chinese investment, as we have heard, for the Manchester airport area and in other centres where they intend to build buildings that will accommodate businesses or shops.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Lazarowicz]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I was about to come to that important point, so I will not repeat what she has said. As I suggested, high-speed rail stations can be important hubs and promoters of economic activity, and it will be up to local governments, communities and businesses to make the most of the opportunities that those connections offer. They will have to choose whether to view high-speed rail as a benefit, or as something that will suck prosperity away from their economy.

At the start of the railway age, towns reacted in all sorts of ways to new railway lines. Some towns chose deliberately to keep the railways away and avoid building stations, but they soon started to campaign for branch lines to reach their communities. I believe that some communities close to the route of HS1 regret choosing not to have a station and reap the benefits that we now see. That emphasises the fact that communities across the country must take the opportunities that arise from HS2, because if they do not, they will not get the benefits.

There is a question about whether HS2 could damage the economic position of certain parts of the country. If HS2 does not go from London to the midlands, the north and Scotland, those parts of the country are in great danger of becoming worse off as a result of economic developments elsewhere. If there are improved transport links from London to elsewhere in Europe and the world, but no such links going further north, those of us from communities further north will be relatively worse off. In addition to the high-speed services from London to Brussels and Paris, operators are planning direct high-speed services all the way from London to Cologne and Frankfurt, for example. If people and businesses in London have access to that high-speed link, but we are relatively worse off further north, our economic position is likely to be damaged. That is why I strongly support the argument for high-speed routes reaching Scotland as early as possible.

It would be damaging if we had the development of high speed to Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and York, but did not take further the benefits of those connections and faster services. That is why I welcomed the announcement from the UK and Scottish Governments a few months ago of a study to look at ways to ensure that high-speed rail reaches further north to Glasgow and the rest of Scotland. I understand that the parameters for the study laid out by the Department for Transport state that all options should be considered. That could include new lines, upgrading existing lines or a combination of both. I am interested in hearing from the Minister an update on that study of the lines and connections from the end of HS2, as currently planned, on to Edinburgh and Glasgow.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would agree that it is important to take a wider perspective on how to ensure that HS1 and HS2 interact with each other seamlessly, so that we can travel from Scotland into the wider European market without hitting the buffers in London and having to change trains there.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

That is part of the argument, and that leads me on to the issue of where work on HS2 should start. Should it be from the north or the south, or somewhere in between? I am sure that the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham would like it to start as far north from her as possible and never actually make it to her constituency. That might be a bit unfair, but some people do seem to have put forward the argument for starting as far north as possible so that work does not start in the south.

To me, those options do not seem to be in opposition. Work obviously cannot start everywhere at the same time, but the idea that the line must start from the south and meander until it eventually reaches the north is the wrong approach. There are no economic or technical reasons why starts on the line could not be made at more than one location. I understand that part of the difficulty has more to do with politics. I understand the wish of the Government not to have to deal with the difficulties of the HS2 route from London to Birmingham alongside the difficulties of planning the route from Birmingham to Manchester, or from Manchester to further north. It would be great if Members on both Front Benches made it clear that time would be made available to allow planning for HS2 to go further north from Birmingham, and perhaps for work to be started in Scotland and the north at the same time as in the south. That option should be back on the political agenda, and I urge the Government to consider it.

[Mr MacNeil]

It is a political reality that we probably instinctively feel to be true that if the work started in the north, it would be more likely that a bridge between the two high-speed lines would be completed than that High Speed 2 would be extended further north via High Speed 3. The pressing political and physical reality would make it more likely that a gap would be filled than an extension completed.

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I recognise that there is a strong case for work to start as soon as possible on the London to Birmingham section. There are particular capacity issues there, so I do not think that that should be left until the end. At the same time, I feel that we should be discussing trying to do more work much earlier on in the process to benefit parts of the country that are further north as well.

I have taken longer than I intended, Sir Edward, so I will try to make my last few comments as brief as possible.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I am not suggesting that the process should be reversed. Others are obviously much more expert on the issue, but my point is that I do not see why we have to wait until 2033 for the lines to reach Manchester and York, and then perhaps 10 or 15 years beyond that for them to reach Edinburgh and Glasgow. The Government and Ministers should address that point, as should politicians from all parties who support HS2; we should try to make things happen as soon as possible.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I will give way, but it has to be the last time.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman. Given the time scale he mentioned—up to 2033—and the wait, does he agree that Barnett consequentials are also important to the debate?

[Mark Lazarowicz]

I will have to leave that point.

I will make some final points as briefly as possible. First, one strong argument for committing to high-speed routes as well as high-speed trains going to Scotland is that the economic case for the entire line is improved if Scotland is linked into the process at an early stage. That point has been made by other people, and I strongly endorse it.

My second point is about the economic benefits of the line, not just in the long term, but in the construction phase, as a direct consequence of engineering and construction. The Government must assure people like me that they are making every effort to ensure that the benefits are spread as far as possible throughout the country. A document on HS2 was recently produced, I think by the Department for Transport, that emphasised how Crossrail had brought a wide range of job benefits to large parts of the country. If one looks at the chart in that document, the vast majority of the benefits, perhaps unsurprisingly, were focused around the Crossrail route and south-east England. Hardly any benefits from construction, engineering and knock-on consequences reached further north. The Government must ensure that a major effort is made to make sure that the indirect benefits from the construction phase—jobs and employment—reach the entire country.

Finally, I have a question for the Minister about the further education college that has been proposed to provide trained workers for the high-speed line. I recognise that the college must be based somewhere, but all its activities need not be based around one location; nor must they take place at just one physical college. That initiative should be aimed at ensuring that the job benefits from the construction phase of HS2 are spread as far as possible throughout the country. I suggest to the Minister that it would be worth while to enter into discussions with the Scottish Government at an early stage, so that there could perhaps be a linked initiative in Scotland to provide similar benefits to the section of the HS2 line that I hope will be promoted by both the UK and Scottish Governments at a relatively early stage. In that way, we too can see the jobs benefits, as well as the longer-term economic benefits, of HS2, for which I think the case is very strong.

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[Mr Burns]

I suggest that my right hon. Friend has a word with Councillor Tett; as he is a constituent of hers, it should not be difficult for her to contact him. Certainly, when I talked to officials at Kent county council as a Minister, they made it quite clear that they were more than happy to talk to county councils, and officials there told me that Buckinghamshire was reluctant to engage in any meetings with them on the subject.

On the economic benefits, the most important thing is capacity. Faster speeds for the rail network are important, but so is capacity. The west coast main line will reach its full capacity by 2024-25. Given that it is the spine of the country up to Scotland, and that we need those communications for passengers and freight, it is crucial that we relieve that capacity. People in Buckinghamshire and parts of London will say, “It brings no benefit to us.” Of course it will bring benefit to them as well. Although High Speed 2 will not stop in Buckinghamshire, the released capacity on the conventional west coast line that goes through Buckinghamshire and other related conventional lines will ensure that passengers using those lines to commute to London will have more capacity and a better journey experience, because others who might otherwise have been on those conventional trains travelling to London will be using the high-speed line.

High Speed 2 will also give eight of the 10 largest cities in England far greater connectivity, as was said by the hon. Members for Edinburgh East, and for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds). That is crucial. As the experience of Kent has shown, it will also create jobs through the actual building of the railways and through increased business activity, particularly around stations, whether at Birmingham, outside Sheffield, at Manchester, or elsewhere where there might be stations. The figures that I have seen, which some people would say are on the conservative side, suggest that 100,000 extra jobs will be created, although a conglomeration of local authorities has come up with the bolder suggestion of 400,000 jobs. Equally importantly, 70% of the economic benefits of the project are expected to be seen outside London, although obviously parts of London will benefit from the project.

I would like to mention the KPMG report. I know that people who do not support High Speed 2 rubbish it, but people like me who do support the project have a more open and reasonable approach to it. According to the report, when High Speed 2 is up and running to Leeds and Manchester, the annual benefit to the economy is anticipated to be in the region of £15 billion a year. Of course, as was said, some businesses and jobs may well be pulled away from other areas. That is part of economic life, but it does not mean that we should not allow a project that will bring a potential £15 billion a year in improvement to the economy once it is up and running. People must be careful about rubbishing a report that shows the potential for job creation, increased and enhanced economic development and growth, and an improvement in the growth abilities of our economy as a whole.

I believe also that we must embrace high-speed rail beyond Leeds and Manchester. That is why I am so pleased that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport, along with the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), set up a project in October 2012 to examine the benefits of extending a phase 3 into Scotland, to Glasgow and Edinburgh. Personally, freed from ministerial responsibility, I believe that that is an important next stage for High Speed 2. I also see HS2 as a spine. In time, when there is a business case and financial resources available, it should have spurs to other parts of the country that could benefit economically. The areas that come to mind as potential candidates for a continuation of High Speed 2 are Liverpool, south Wales and the south-west of England.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Burns]

I will, but very briefly, as my time is almost up.

[Mr MacNeil]

May I add to that a plea for Inverness and Aberdeen, and for the integration of Scotland into the high-speed European network as well?

[Mr Burns]

The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely valid point. That is what is so exciting about the project’s potential throughout the whole United Kingdom. In conclusion—

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[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Sir Edward.

I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Sheila Gilmore) on securing this important debate. A constant champion of the railways in this Parliament, her speech this morning exemplified both the passion and the attention to detail that she brings to discussions of rail issues.

I think that all right hon. and hon. Members would agree that the exponential growth in passenger demand now poses a serious challenge for our railways. We have debated the causes of that growth at length before and I do not propose to revisit those arguments today, but it is a fact that passenger demand has doubled in the last 20 years and we are now accommodating the same number of passengers as there were in the 1920s on a network less than half the size it was then. That growth has continued through periods of infrastructure disruption and even through recession. Technology is making it easier for people to travel and young people are now the group who are most predisposed to travel by rail.

Passenger numbers grew by 7.3% at the start of last year compared with the first quarter of 2012, and across the network conflicts between inter-city, commuter and freight trains are common as competing grades of traffic jostle for scarce paths. As my hon. Friend spelled out, some sections are already approaching the limits of their capacity, especially on the west coast main line, where the number of trains being run has doubled during the past 15 years, leading Network Rail to warn that the line will effectively be full by 2024. All this has happened despite the west coast route modernisation project, which cost £9 billion and caused enormous disruption over a period of 12 years without delivering the long-term capacity benefits that we as a country need.

I have full sympathy with right hon. and hon. Members and local authorities who represent communities served by the west coast main line, and they have made it clear that they have no wish to relive the experience. Unfortunately, the heavy demands on the line mean that expensive periods of disruption continue. In 2014, there are three planned closures of the line in the Watford area alone, which means that the southern end of the line will be closed for most of August as track and signalling is replaced. Such closures require sizeable compensation payments to train operators—Network Rail puts the cost for such works on the west coast main line at 18% of its overall budget—and cause delays and inconvenience to businesses and individual passengers, the costs of which are much more difficult to quantify.

Consequently, before I talk about the economic case for HS2, we should consider the economic impacts of inaction. Commuter trains could be cut as train paths are reassigned to more profitable long-distance trains—a process familiar to transport planners and passengers in the west midlands. In the most extreme cases, some smaller stations in Staffordshire were closed while the west coast main line was being modernised, and they have not reopened. Thousands of passengers are already being left standing on their morning commute, not only on routes into London but on the approaches to Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield. In addition, growing congestion on the lines hits resilience and reliability, undermining rail’s traditional advantage over other modes of travel. A consequence of the growing number of services provided is that journey times have not improved on most of the main lines, and in many cases have got worse in the past 20 years. Even after the intercity express programme trains are introduced on the east coast main line, a number of important long-distance journeys will still take the same time as they did in 1991.

There is a clear need for capacity improvements, and as the British Chambers of Commerce has said:

“Future business success depends on infrastructure networks that meet demand. Rail is no exception. The UK rail network must have the capacity to meet rocketing business demand - for long-distance services, for commuter rail services, and for the transport of freight.”

That was why Lord Adonis, when he was Transport Secretary in the last Labour Government, developed proposals for a new north-south line.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Lilian Greenwood]

No. I will not take an intervention at the moment.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) said on Third Reading of the High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill:

“High Speed 2 is a project that is in the national interest.”—[Official Report, 31 October 2013; Vol. 569, c. 1179.]

That is why Labour supports HS2 to meet our north-south capacity requirements and provide the connections between the core cities that our regional economies need to thrive.

In that respect, I am happy to declare an interest as an east midlands MP. There are relatively good links from Nottingham to London, which are due to be strengthened by electrification of the midland main line, but our inadequate rail connections to Birmingham and Leeds hold back growth. As the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns) said, increasing capacity is vital, but so are connectivity and journey time improvements. It can take two hours to travel from Nottingham to Leeds by rail, but with HS2 that journey time would be cut by two thirds. Although it is important that we continue to invest in our existing network—the budgets published up to 2020-21 show that investment is not being diverted from conventional lines—high-speed rail will bring real improvements for journeys between cities outside London.

It is important to stress that communities away from the high-speed rail stations also stand to benefit, as more local services can be run on the conventional network. The right hon. Gentleman drew attention to people’s experience of HS1 in Kent. Similarly, compatible trains will run off the new high-speed rail line, enabling faster journey times and direct connections to the new network. I draw hon. Members’ attention to Network Rail’s “Better Connections” report, which examined how additional services can be provided. We need to see more of this sort of work from both Network Rail and local bodies, who should be emboldened as they plan how to maximise the benefits of HS2 as part of the transport devolution agenda.

When the High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill was in Committee, we took evidence from two academics who both agreed that regional benefits would depend on the quality of the local plans that were put in place, so my first question to the Minister is: what steps is he taking to encourage transport authorities that are not on the immediate high-speed rail route to plan for HS2? We have already seen how high-speed rail can be a catalyst for regeneration in west London. Plans have been outlined by Queens Park Rangers football club to relocate to Old Oak Common in order to create a new 40,000-seat stadium, a project that the developers say will support 24,000 new houses. In Birmingham, the city council has said that the arrival of HS2

“presents a huge opportunity to breathe new life”

into the Eastside area. The new station is planned to be at Curzon Street, which was the original terminus of the first London to Birmingham railway and which last saw long-distance services in the 1850s. If the planners get the design and the connections right, the reborn Curzon Street station promises to be the jewel in the crown of Birmingham Eastside’s rejuvenation. Centro, the west midlands transport authority, has developed a wide-ranging plan for integrating high-speed rail with its Metro system, commuter rail lines and bus services.

My hon. Friends the Members for Edinburgh North and Leith (Mark Lazarowicz) and for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) have touched on the importance of the HS2 line for Edinburgh and Manchester, and as an east midlands MP I can point to other examples of how HS2 can act as a spur to investment. A recent report by consultants Volterra found that development in the immediate vicinity of the planned station at Toton could build 650 to 875 houses and support up to 1,500 administrative jobs. However, more can be done to promote jobs and skills. Can the Minister update us on how many apprenticeships have now been created by HS2, both directly and indirectly? Also, will he commit to the target of creating an apprenticeship for every £1 million spent on the project, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has called for?

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Lilian Greenwood]

I will not give way as I have very limited time to speak.

We heard this morning that the Business Secretary has announced plans for a new further education college to educate the work force we need to build HS2. That is welcome news, but we want a proper jobs and skills strategy. Last year, during the evidence sessions for the High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill, we were told that that document was being prepared. Can the Minister tell us when it will be published? As he knows, the current Crossrail project has begun to train a new generation of highly skilled workers, and a plan must be in place for the HS2 project too.

Labour successfully amended the High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill to make the Government account for the number of vocational qualifications gained each year. Another Labour amendment that was accepted will compel the Government to account for any underspending or overspending in the project’s annual budget. I note that the Minister’s colleague in the Lords, Baroness Kramer, described the process that we put in place as

“a very vigorous reporting process under which the Government must report back annually and record any deviation from budget, and the consequences of that…which has put in place a very intense scrutiny process around the budget.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 19 November 2013; Vol. 749, c. 949.]

I am glad that Labour successfully wrote a “vigorous reporting process” into the primary legislation, but the truth is that the Government should have got a grip on escalating costs since the election.

The right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) rightly raised concerns on behalf of her constituents about the uncertainty about compensation after the Government’s initial consultation was deemed to be unfair—

High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Ellman]

I am a firm supporter of High Speed 2. I believe that it will increase capacity and create the infrastructure that is essential for the future of the nation.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Rail infrastructure in Spain has been mentioned. Studies show that the economies of both Seville and Madrid have benefited from a high-speed line, although only Seville was expected to benefit.

[Mrs Ellman]

That is an important point.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Goodwill]

The trains do not stop at Manchester and Leeds; they keep going. In terms of the connectivity of this new system, it is important that we take traffic away from the existing rail network and allow more freight and passenger services so as to address the problem of the 5,000 people every weekday morning who are standing as they arrive at New Street in Birmingham. To address that problem we need to ensure we have the connectivity.

Limiting this legislation to a particular phase, or to particular phases, would simply mean that a further Bill would be required to be placed before Parliament to prepare for any potential future phase.

On Scotland, I would simply say that officials from the Scottish Government made clear during this Bill’s Committee stage that they are content with the Bill as it is, and see no need for the naming of any locations in Scotland. The critical point is that the network is defined as “at least” including the named locations in the Bill. Therefore, not including locations in Scotland will not be a barrier to high-speed rail extending there at some point in the future. The locations named are limited to those which have been named in public consultation documents issued by the Department.

Again I must stress that while some rolling stock will run exclusively on the high-speed network, so-called classic compatible gauge trains will run through to Glasgow and Edinburgh. These new trains are part of the £7.5 billion rolling stock investment in the project and their arrival in Scottish cities will demonstrate how HS2 will benefit Scotland at an early stage.

[Mr MacNeil]

Can the Minister confirm that once this rolling stock reaches Edinburgh it can go further north up to Aberdeen and cities in between?

[Mr Goodwill]

That will be for the railway companies to decide; it will be up to them to decide how best to utilise this stock. Obviously, the rolling stock will be rolled out as it is produced, but having trains arriving in Glasgow and Edinburgh at that early stage of the project will make a major contribution to helping to keep our kingdom united.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lilian Greenwood]

My hon. Friend is right. We will continue to press the Minister on the issue in the months ahead.

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Lady has made the same catastrophic mistake as the Minister in thinking that a transport project is the same as a political governance project. If that were true, High Speed 1 could have been construed by the Eurosceptics on the Government Benches as part of some major European integration project, and the high-speed line that is going through the Baltic countries up to Helsinki would be seen as some nation-unification project. It is not; it is a transport project. I encourage the hon. Lady not to make the same daft mistake as the Minister made earlier.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr MacNeil]

I wish to speak to amendment 28 tabled in my name on behalf of my party.

The Scottish National party and the Scottish Government have been supportive of HS2 in principle. Of course, that is conditional on it being properly managed and, most importantly, it coming to Scotland, so that Scotland, which pays more tax per capita than the UK average, can benefit from it. We also look to help the rest of the UK. As I mentioned earlier, the line that links Seville to Madrid, which it was envisaged would help Seville alone, benefited both ends, as, on reflection, it should have done. We want this link because it would link us into the wider European high-speed rail project that will be found in many places in Europe. Scotland, as an economic powerhouse, deserves to be part of that, not just for Scotland but for the rest of Europe, which deserves to have Scotland linked with it. This will be happening in 25 or 30 years, by which time quite a few of us will not be in this Chamber, if on this earth; we are leaving a legacy for the future.

I am glad to hear that Baroness Kramer will be coming to Scotland tomorrow as part of seeing what benefits can be brought not just to Scotland but to the wider UK and wider Europe through increased links to the central belt of Scotland, which is an important market.

[Robert Flello]

The hon. Gentleman talks about the wider benefits to the UK. At the moment, my constituents have a service that gets them into Euston in one hour and 23 minutes. If HS2 goes ahead, the 30 trains a day we have now will be reduced to three and there will be an extra hour’s journey time to pick up the HS2 link, so my constituents will go from taking one hour and 23 minutes to get to London to taking two and a half hours. How is that an improvement for the rest of the country?

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Gentleman represents his constituents very well. He will of course forgive me if I am not au fait with the train timetable to Stoke-on-Trent. It has sadly been an oversight on my part not to visit Stoke-on-Trent.

[Robert Flello]

You would be very welcome.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am glad to hear from a Labour MP that I will be welcome. I will happily make a speech on the benefits of Scottish independence not just to Scotland but to other European countries and to the denizens of Stoke-on-Trent.

[Robert Flello]

You are more than welcome.

[Mr MacNeil]

It is great to hear that. The point for Stoke-on-Trent is probably to liaise better with the rail authorities and the authorities here to make sure that it is represented and gets a better deal. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, as an assiduous MP—probably the finest Stoke-on-Trent has had—will indeed be doing that. I am sure that will now be very welcome in Stoke-on-Trent.

It is in Scotland’s interests to have the high-speed rail link. It is also in Scotland’s interests to make sure that the north of England is well connected, because we want to make sure that when we are independent we have on our borders a prosperous region of Europe. The north of England becoming a prosperous region of Europe is therefore exactly what Scotland wants. When Scotland is independent it will do everything it can to facilitate and help that.

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

rose—

[Mr MacNeil]

I give way to the hon. Gentleman, who is, let us say, a bit blinkered when it comes to Scottish independence.

[Mr Reid]

Of course I agree that it is important that the high-speed rail link is extended north to Glasgow and Edinburgh. The hon. Gentleman said that he was speaking to the amendment on behalf of his party. Let me draw his attention to the Scottish Government’s evidence to the Public Bill Committee. Question 174 was answered by a representative from Transport Scotland as follows:

“The view of the Scottish Government is that we are content with the Bill as it stands.”––[Official Report, High Speed Rail (Preparation) Public Bill Committee, 11 July 2013; c. 100, Q174.]

The hon. Gentleman’s party runs the Scottish Government, so if it is content with the Bill, why is he speaking to an amendment on its behalf?

[Mr MacNeil]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, thinking is always evolving. When a person is content, they can become happier as a result of improvements. The Liberal Democrats started from a position of being opposed to student tuition fees and seemed to be content with that, but the position evolved so that they wanted £9,000 tuition fees for students, and they seemed happier still. He will probably understand that I think that our evolution towards happiness is perhaps a bit more understanding of the needs of citizens, whereas the evolution of the Liberal Democrats’ thinking leaves many people in debt, unfortunately.

We want Scotland to be linked to a high-speed European network. The mistake made earlier, originally by the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan), was to think that this is some sort of political project. It is not. There are high-speed rail links all over the place. They go to Helsinki through the Baltic states, and there is no movement for political unity between those states. They fiercely retain their independence while supporting and helping each other to get rail links, including high-speed links, through their countries to move into the main European markets. That is a natural and understandable thing to do. Many states in Europe are independent and co-operating together. In fact, Europe has not been as together as it is now, with its 50 independent states, since the empires declined.

[Mrs Gillan]

I am grateful to the Member for the former Western Isles constituency for giving way. I declare an interest because my father was a Scot. Does he think that if Scotland becomes independent the UK Government will be in a hurry to create the link through to the Scottish cities or will they take rather longer?

[Mr MacNeil]

I think that money talks far more than narrow political ideals as they are expressed at the moment. Absolutely yes: the Government will understand full well that it makes sense for the central belt of Scotland, one of 40 global mega-regions, to be linked to other mega-regions, and the political machinations or whatever political understanding the right hon. Lady has in her mind will vanish. The former BBC correspondent Stephanie Flanders put it very well when she said that people will play up the difficulties pre-independence but will play them down afterwards and work well and co-operate, as in the Baltic states and in Finland.

[Mrs Gillan]

indicated dissent.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am afraid that that is the truth, and I am sure that the right hon. Lady knows it in her heart of hearts.

To achieve this link going into Scotland, we have to accept that it will go through England first. I hope to see the benefits in the north of England that Kent has seen. It is only right that our fellow Europeans, wherever they are, see their economies grow and prosper.

We are concerned about the KPMG report that arose from a freedom of information request. The report showed that part of Scotland could lose economically, but on further examination that proved to be only one part of the picture. It was the worst-case scenario, and the best-case scenario showed benefits. Rather than Scotland losing out, it was shown that HS2 would bring gains of £40 million-odd a year to Aberdeenshire and Morayshire.

[Andrew Bridgen]

Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that if Scotland is mentioned in the Bill, that will satisfy Scotland and it will not seek Barnettisation of this project, which would put the cost up even further?

[Mr MacNeil]

I am glad to hear Conservative Members speak against privatisation. That is very encouraging. Perhaps they should have thought about that with regard to Royal Mail, when they transferred loads of people’s money from the taxpayer to private pockets. [Interruption.] I think I misheard the hon. Gentleman and he said “Barnettisation”. It is the accent—I am sorry. If he is indeed talking about Barnettisation, I will come to that point. If he is patient, as I am sure he will be, he will get an understanding of exactly what our viewpoint is.

It is important that HS2 happens and that we work within Scotland to make sure that we have connectivity and can benefit by linking into the network. The Scottish Government do not agree with the assumptions that have been made by KPMG and the Department for Transport. We feel that there is an error in some of the modelling and that some of the assumptions are out of date. We are more pleased with what came out of the Department yesterday, which said:

“Scotland will benefit from high speed services from Edinburgh and Glasgow as soon as Phase One of HS2 opens. Phase Two is expected to reduce journey times by up to an hour without the need to change trains, benefiting the Scottish economy. The Government’s goal is for a network that brings the country closer together, so we are taking forward a study with the Scottish Government to consider how these benefits could be extended further. This is looking at how to boost capacity and cut journey times between Glasgow/Edinburgh and London to less than three hours”.

That journey time offers further access to an inter-European market, which is vital for Scotland.

I hope there will be Barnett consequentials, which are important, so that Scotland can prepare for the benefits of the extension of European high-speed rail. We could consider a link north of Edinburgh up towards Aberdeen. I often remark that the rail journey between Glasgow and Fort William takes about three hours, but the distance is only 100 miles. The average speed is 33 mph, so perhaps medium-speed rail would improve journey times.

The benefits of HS2 will be strong, but they will be stronger still when Scotland is included, as the example of Seville and Madrid shows. We shall work for assurances from the UK Government that they will consider a sensible extension that will benefit not just Scotland, but the south-east of England and the European markets. This is in everybody’s economic interest, as shown by the Baltic line running from Helsinki to the European markets.

High-speed rail will benefit everybody. As the hon. Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) flippantly said earlier, the counter-arguments suggest that, if connectivity is such a bad idea, closing the M6 would result in a boom in the north. Of course, that is nonsense. As Adam Smith said in “The Wealth of Nations”, the more markets and economies are linked, the better for all. There will be mutual benefits and we will all win.

[Mike Thornton (Eastleigh) (LD)]

I will maintain my habit of being brief.

The Liberal Democrats have long supported a fully integrated transport system, and thus we welcome amendment 17. We also believe that the only way to achieve that is by building a modern, 21st-century railway system, not by merely tweaking a bit of this and a bit of that, extending a platform here and adding a coach there.

The west coast main line will run out of space in the next 10 to 12 years. One option would be to improve the line by extending it, but that would subject passengers to 14 years of weekend bus journeys and chaos, and even when completed it would be completely insufficient.

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[Eric Ollerenshaw]

That could be a benefit of having a Conservative London Mayor. From my perspective in Lancashire, I see that the Olympics cost £9 billion; there are continual tube upgrades; I do not know how much is spent on subsidising bus fares in London; HS1 into London cost £6 billion; we are immediately talking about Crossrail 2. I am not complaining—they are all marvellous things.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am enjoying the hon. Gentleman’s broadcast on behalf of the Lancashire national party. Perhaps there will be a letter to Scotland asking to come and join us. Do not the spend on high-speed rail and the debate it generates pale into insignificance compared with the money we spend in the blink of an eye on nuclear weapons? At the very least, the spend on high-speed rail will leave something tangible in the country. That cannot be said of some of our spending.

Aviation Strategy

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered aviation strategy.

May I congratulate you on your new role, Madam Deputy Speaker?

I am pleased to have the opportunity to debate aviation strategy in the UK, which was the subject of a Transport Committee report published in May. A decision on capacity in the south-east has been in the “too difficult” box for too long. The independent Davies commission set up by the Government has been asked to submit its final report after the next general election, but the Transport Committee felt that this was too important an issue to ignore in this Parliament. I therefore thank the Backbench Business Committee for this opportunity to debate our findings.

Our main focus was inevitably on the controversial subject of runway capacity in the south-east. We concluded that the expansion of Heathrow was the best option, because that recognises the importance of aviation to the UK’s economy and the need for more hub capacity to maintain international connectivity, and reflects consideration of the feasible options. The report considers future demand forecasts for aviation, the impact of aviation growth on the global and local environment, the importance of hub airports in securing connectivity, the role of airports outside the south-east, and aviation taxation, especially air passenger duty, and I will refer to all those issues during the debate.

It is vital to recognise the importance of aviation to the economy. In 2011, the UK’s aviation sector had a turnover of some £53 billion and generated about £18 billion of economic output. It employs more than 220,000 workers directly, and it has been estimated that the total number of jobs supported could be as high as 921,000. Aviation is also important for the lives of many citizens by providing transport, and trade and leisure, links to the rest of the world. Demand for aviation links is growing. In 2012, UK airports handled 221 million passengers, which was 1.4 million more than in 2011. The latest passenger forecasts predict that demand at UK airports is set to grow. Unconstrained forecasts—those in which there are no airspace constraints or capacity limitations—show that passenger numbers will grow to 320 million a year by 2030 and 480 million a year by 2050. It is likely that there will also be greater demand for air connections to new destinations.

The UK has direct air links to more than 360 international locations. There are, however, serious and growing concerns about poor connectivity between the UK and some of the world’s emerging markets, such as the BRIC group of Brazil, Russia, India and China. There are particular concerns about the absence of links to China’s manufacturing centres. The lack of capacity at Heathrow, the UK’s only hub airport, is reducing the UK’s connectivity to important destinations. For many years, Heathrow has operated with two runways at full capacity while competitor hubs such as Paris, Frankfurt and Schiphol have benefited from four to six runways each. The growth of large hubs in the middle east, such as Dubai, has also threatened the UK’s position as an international hub. If the necessary hub capacity is not available in the UK, airlines use competitor hubs to places such as Schiphol, Frankfurt and Madrid, and if no action is taken, the UK will continue to lose out.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

What weight would the hon. Lady give to the warning from Michael O’Leary of Ryanair, who says that the UK’s current approach to airport expansion will mean that another runway will be built at Heathrow and at Gatwick some day, but it will be done in an incredible hurry, will not be well planned, and will be the usual sticking-plaster solution?

[Mrs Ellman]

It is undeniable that additional capacity is needed, so we need to make decisions now. We may well need to make more in the future and I will refer to them in due course.

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[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that erudition, of which I was not capable.

I must declare an interest because Stansted airport is in my constituency. However, the views that I hold on airports policy were formed when I had the honour to be the Member for Middleton and Prestwich in Greater Manchester. I took the view then, in the wake of the study by the Roskill commission, the last great body to study airports policy, that none of the inland sites, whether Cublington, Nuthampstead, Stansted, Willingale or any other, should be developed, and that if we were to have a proper airport system for London, it should be offshore. My view was that it would be a mistake to urbanise a large part of the countryside in any of the home counties. I never dreamed that, due to the sad early death of Sir Peter Kirk, a vacancy would occur in the Saffron Walden constituency, which I was chosen to fill. I am therefore not simply saying “Not in my back yard”—I have tried to have a wider perspective on the matter.

The subject of the debate is aviation strategy, but looking back, it is difficult to espy that there has ever been a real strategy. The evolution of our policy has been part deception, part confusion and part cowardice. Why? Because as soon as we begin to formulate a strategy, all the opposition from different parts of the country is combined, and Governments tend to run away from that. It is easier, perhaps, to pick off particular parts of the policy and have a bit-by-bit approach, which is what has led us to the current wholly unsatisfactory situation.

If I dare mention it, we got nearest to a policy when Geoff Hoon was Secretary of State for Transport. Certain difficulties arose in the House, and the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), in defence of interests around Heathrow, got to the Mace quicker than I could have, as I was occupying the Chair. I therefore recognise the passion to which the subject gives rise.

I contend, as many other Members have, that it was probably a mistake initially to choose Heathrow for London’s principal aerodrome, as it was then called. I do not think anyone foresaw the increase in civil aviation that would take place. I can remember when the facilities on the north side at Heathrow were in tents, and when it was decided that aviation was going to be a more serious factor in our post-war world, I found it astonishing that the permanent buildings were put between the two runways, so that they had to be reached by a tunnel—what a brilliant way of developing the airport.

[Mr MacNeil]

Does the right hon. Gentleman also feel that the subsequent post-war behaviour in conducting international bilateral air agreements, which for decades stipulated that the London airports should be used for access to the UK, was a mistake, particularly given the bleating and screaming that is now happening in the south-east of England and around London?

[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

The hon. Gentleman anticipates me. I will come to that point, but I am starting with Heathrow, the design of which has been a complete disaster. After three terminals were put in the middle of the runways, more were needed, so terminal 4 had to be on the south side. It was sworn that there would be no further expansion, and BAA consistently said that the idea of moving the Perry Oaks sludge works was out of the question—that it was impractical and that those of us who suggested it did not know what we were talking about—but that is where terminal 5 now stands. Had an intelligent approach been taken to the development of Heathrow, that would have been where all the terminals were put. It was not to be.

Giving BAA control of the three London airports was a huge mistake, and it was extraordinary that the person who had to pilot that proposal through the House was the late Nicholas Ridley, who I do not think believed in that type of monopoly being created. With the passage of time, I think very few hon. Members believe that it was the right policy, and it is now being dismantled.

[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

I am coming to that. The problem is that the design of Heathrow is not good and expanding it further—although I recognise that that might happen because in some people’s eyes it is the easiest option, what business most wants and so on—runs the risk of compounding the problem.

The next airport to come on to the horizon was Gatwick. A previous Minister of Civil Aviation said in this House in answer to a question that Gatwick would not be a second London airport but would merely be a diversionary airport for Heathrow. Eventually, of course, the truth came out that it was to be the second London airport.

BAA—I have no time for it—then decided to enter into a pact with West Sussex council not to build a second runway at Gatwick for 40 years, which was the equivalent of the Molotov–Ribbentrop treaty as far as I was concerned. That pact expires in 2019. Having done that, BAA was still anxious to go and find a third airport so it must bear a heavy responsibility for the split situation. Had there been competition between those three airports, we might be in a slightly different place—and this is certainly not the best place.

I agree with the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), the Chairperson of the Transport Committee, that we need a hub airport for our major city. There has been much talk of late of that being old hat, as everything is now point-to-point. Everything is not point-to-point. Point-to-point becomes increasingly possible when traffic increases and routes become, in the language of the trade, thick routes, meaning that so many flights a day can be justified between those points. That is fine and that will go on, but it will be a long time before there is a daily flight between Denver, Colorado and, say, Naples. There will be a need for passengers to interline at an airport and it would be to our advantage commercially, not just for the businesses in London but for the airlines, if British Airways, Virgin or any other British carrier had part of that business. The argument for the split hub, suggesting that interlining is not important, overlooks the fact that many passengers are now not coming through London. They are going to airports in Europe where interlining is more conveniently executed.

I believe that there needs to be a hub in London and I accept that it is perhaps inevitable that that will be Heathrow, but to build a third runway, possibly a fourth runway and a sixth and seventh terminal for that airport will not make it anything like the new airport in Hong Kong, or Changi in Singapore, or the airport in Beijing. It will still be a confusing mass airport. I do not think that that serves London best, but it might be the best that can be achieved in the circumstances.

I absolutely understand why London deserves a decent airport. Our engineers and architects have designed some of the other airports in the rest of the world, so it is a great shame that we cannot give them the chance to build a decent airport for our city.

I am also concerned, as I have a northern history, about balancing this country. I saw the effect of deciding to develop Stansted. One can still walk around the towns and villages of north-west Essex and find a variety of regional UK accents, as people were drawn down to the area. That is all part of a problem that post-war Governments have contested, unsuccessful by and large—that is, the drift from the north to the south. I think that is a great shame.

I was close to Manchester for a time, and I saw the potential for the development of Manchester airport. It has two runways, so why can that potential not be seen? Why not promote that as at least one other gateway into the country? Most air traffic has to do with leisure, and from Manchester not only can the business community be served in that part of the country—going both west to Liverpool and east to Leeds—but there is access to north Wales, the Derbyshire peak district, the Yorkshire dales, Yorkshire moors, the lake district and so on. We ought to encourage those who visit this country to see parts of it other than just London and the home counties. That would take some of the pressure off London, without—of course—excusing the need for a proper hub. I tell my constituents who occasionally ask, “Should we be spending all this money on HS2?” that when I hear that HS2 would bring Birmingham airport within 36 minutes of London, my eyes water because it is an average of 47 minutes from Stansted airport into London.

That brings me to a point about infrastructure. Over the years, our one consistent failing—there have been many—is that we have not been prepared to back airport development with suitable infrastructure for people to get there. So what happens? Well, I can speak for Stansted with some passion. On the back of an airport that we were unhappy to see develop, we did not get the compensation of a good railway system. In fact, we got one that is worse because priority was given on a two-track railway to the Stansted Express. I am all in favour of a good service to Stansted airport, but that must not be at the expense of all the commuters whom Government policies over the years have encouraged to live in the M11 corridor. They get the worst of both worlds and that is wrong.

On compensation, we have been niggardly over the years in the amount of money we are prepared to give to people—it is all spent on long public inquiries, fighting the case and so on, instead of being paid to those people who might feel most affected by the project. We should provide those people with at least some compensation so that if it is necessary in the national interest to bring about a major project, they will at least get some advantage from that. We must do more on that if we are to get people to settle for whatever strategy—if we actually succeed in getting one at the end of all the further deliberation through the Davies commission.

In the late 1960s and during the period of the Heath Government, it was decided, in the name of the environment, to go for an estuarial solution. That was my wish and that would still be the ideal. I do not believe the most pessimistic forecasts about the time and expense it would take. We lack imagination in this country. We struggled over the channel tunnel; we struggled over the rail link to the channel tunnel—we were going to build half of it at one point, and it would be difficult to imagine anything more crazy. Finally, however, we got there. It took us an awfully long time to think about Crossrail before we began building it. Why cannot we realise that London deserves a good airport? The whole country deserves a better deal, and to level up the north.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Alan Haselhurst]

I am about to come to an end and I have given way once already to the hon. Gentleman. The whole country needs to get some benefit from the people whom we encourage to travel to our country for business or pleasure. We need imagination—that is what I appeal for—and a solution that is worthy of our main city and our country as a whole.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)]

I am pleased to congratulate you on your election, Madam Deputy Speaker; this is my first opportunity to do so formally. I am delighted to follow the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin). He rightly said that this is a crucial issue for UK plc, but after that I stopped agreeing with him as he went on to develop his support for the estuary airport and the proposal of Mayor Boris Johnson, which is very much the wrong one. His suggestion of closing Heathrow would be an economic disaster for London, certainly for west London.

I also welcome the Minister to the Chamber. When he was my shadow in 2007-08, he coveted my office and told me that he would have it one day. He has now got it, and I hope he enjoys it—of course, it was not my office, but that of the Under-Secretary of State for Transport. I would be surprised if he does not enjoy his time there. May I also welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden) to the shadow Front-Bench position? We have already had one or two discussions, and I wish them both well in developing the aviation strategy that has been suggested by the Transport Committee.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), the Chair of the Committee, and commend the Committee’s report to the House. I agree with the vast majority of its conclusions. Recommendation 34 is the most important, and that is what I shall be seeking reassurances from the Minister and the shadow Minister about in due course.

Colleagues will know that I was the aviation Minister in the previous Labour Government between 2007 and 2009, during which time I argued for the third runway, both in the House and outside, and that I was shadow aviation Minister until the Syria debate a couple of months ago. I have therefore spent a lot of time looking at this issue. The Select Committee’s examination is timely and its recommendations are food for thought for the Government, so account ought to be taken of them.

I will not repeat all the statistics that my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside set out, but I will say that aviation is responsible for a turnover of £28 billion and 120,000 directly employed jobs, and that it raises £9 billion in tax and duty. In addition, most of the £18 billion achieved through tourism is raised from air passengers. All that demonstrates the importance of aviation to the UK economy and UK plc. It has been clear that the vast majority of the speakers in the debate have underscored the importance of a hub airport in that regard. However, there are also key concerns to address—noise and the big problem of emissions—and recently we have seen the noise health study and the report on impacts on human health. Both the 2003 aviation White Paper and the third runway proposal addressed those issues, as does the Select Committee. It is important that they are addressed—they cannot be ignored—so that residents under flight paths and near airports are reassured.

The 2003 White Paper pointed the way forward, and the 2007 proposal for a third runway was hotly contested. The Conservative party made that a party political issue in the run-up to the 2010 general election. That was political opportunism. I am not criticising that; I suspect that we probably would have done the same thing if we had been on the other side. I would hope that we would not have done, but we did not have the opportunity to demonstrate that opportunism, whereas the Conservatives did. A clutch of west London marginals did not fall because Heathrow has underlying, solid support in west London, however.

Naturally, the Lib Dems are in complete denial on aviation—at least they have been consistent on that. One of the red lines of the coalition agreement was, “No aviation capacity whatsoever.”

[Mr MacNeil]

I am a bit stunned. Has the hon. Gentleman put his finger on something that the Lib Dems have been consistent about over the past few years, both in opposition and in government? That must be some sort of record; I congratulate him on his observation.

[Jim Fitzpatrick]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for pointing out that, as we all know, the Lib Dems are not consistent in opposition and in government. He rightly says, however, that this is one issue on which they have been consistent—consistently in denial.

When we look at the international competition from Schiphol, Charles de Gaulle and Frankfurt, and from the new airports that have been built or are being built in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Berlin and Istanbul, we see the importance of aviation and having a aviation hub. We are falling behind the times. However, when the Prime Minister indicated that the Government were appointing the Davies commission, we saw the beginning of one of the longest U-turns in recent British politics. The moving of the right hon. Members for Putney (Justine Greening) and for Chipping Barnet (Mrs Villiers) to other Departments and the appointment of the current Secretary of State for Transport clearly indicated that, after three years, Conservative Back Benchers who had been arguing the case—as did the CBI, the British Chambers of Commerce, London First, the TUC and others—had gone to the Government and said, “This issue is too important. We’ve got it wrong and we need additional capacity.”

I think that the Conservative manifesto for 2015 will have a commitment to the Davies commission’s conclusions, although I want to hear what the Minister says about that because he has history on this issue, given his support for the village opposed to the third runway at Heathrow. When the right hon. Ladies were moved and the new Ministers were brought in, that was a sign of encouragement for the aviation industry and those who support additional capacity. However, when the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), and Baroness Kramer, the predecessor of the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith), were appointed, it was almost as if the Government were going back to where they were before the last reshuffle. I would like reassurance from the Minister about what that means.

For me, the Transport Committee’s key recommendation is No. 34. Whether we support the Heathrow plan, the estuary plan or point to point, there is general agreement that capacity is an issue, as well as about the importance of aviation to UK plc and the significance of a hub airport. The Davies commission at least gives us a chance of a fresh start and an opportunity to try to build consensus so that there is not the party political squabbling of the past 10, 20 or 30 years and the piecemeal approach to aviation that was cited by the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden (Sir Alan Haselhurst).

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[Mike Thornton (Eastleigh) (LD)]

I was going to join colleagues in congratulating our new Deputy Speaker, but unfortunately she has left the Chamber. I congratulate the Minister and his shadow on their appointments.

On consistency, perhaps I should ask Labour Members about the previous Government’s consistency on maintaining a balanced budget, the 10p income tax band, tax allowances and so on. Inconsistency has been rife on their side of the Chamber.

As an MP with a thriving and well-run airport in my constituency, I am well aware of the importance of civil aviation to the economy of my constituency and that of the United Kingdom as a whole. We are proud of the part that Eastleigh aerodrome, as it was then, played in the defence of this country in world war two, because it was there that Reginald Mitchell designed and built the Spitfire. We are still very proud, although it has now unfortunately become Southampton international airport.

Growth in demand for air travel is inevitable, and responding to that growth through infrastructure and policy takes time. Although it is Liberal Democrat policy to oppose a third runway at Heathrow and the Mayor of London’s proposal to build a brand new island in the Thames estuary, we fully accept that we need to address the forecast lack of capacity. That can partly be done by redirecting some air travel on to rail, better use of airports away from London and the south-east, and more efficient use of existing resources. While Heathrow may be full in terms of flights, there are still too many flights that are not full and too many planes that are too small. We must remember that four other airports besides Heathrow serve London.

The economic needs of the country must also take into account our obligation and moral duty to take a lead in combating the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. One can argue about the speed and effects of this, but the fact that a carbon atom reflects back heat is as much a law of physics as the fact that if I dropped my glasses they would fall to the ground. A build-up of CO₂ acts like an overcoat. Yesterday, the hon. Member for South Antrim (Dr McCrea), who is not in the Chamber today, made clear, in advocating the abolition of air passenger duty, his scepticism about the human contribution to global warming. However, if he went out in the sun and then put his overcoat on, I think he would soon find that he got a lot warmer than just by standing in the sun.

[Mr MacNeil]

In the debate on APD on 18 April, Scottish National party Members made repeated attempts to tease out from the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr Reid), who is also not here today, the Liberal Democrat position on APD. Has that become apparent to the hon. Gentleman since his arrival in this House?

[Mike Thornton]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for alluding to my rival. Obviously our position was that a per-plane passenger duty was far more sensible than an individual, per-passenger payment. Unfortunately, international regulations and laws do not allow for that possibility at the moment. It would be good if we could seek to change that and use a far more efficient per-plane tax system that encourages full aeroplanes.

It is not possible to solve this capacity problem within one or even two Parliaments. Consequently, there is a real danger that political differences, whether genuine or contrived, could prevent a proper, long-term strategy. These are complex matters. We therefore welcome the setting up of the independent commission on aviation chaired by Sir Howard Davies, which is considering the UK’s airport capacity needs and how to address them. As the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) said, the commission will publish an interim report expected before the end of this year and a final report in 2015. It seems to me that there is little point in establishing such a commission if we do not wait to pay attention to its findings. I am sure that the whole House recognises the need for a long-term, consistent strategy. Liberal Democrat Members look forward to Sir Howard Davies’ interim report, which is due shortly.

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[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

I will try to charge through what I have to say and if any political enemies or friends wish to intervene to give me another minute or two, they would be most welcome.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

You could try to intervene on yourself.

[Mr MacNeil]

I can always try, Mr Deputy Speaker.

I know the importance of aviation. I fly probably more than any other MP—at least four times a week and sometimes six times a week. At least, I did until flights in my constituency were vandalised by the local council, which axed 60% of inter-island flights between Stornoway and Benbecula and Barra and 100% of flights to the most vulnerable island community. That was all the more strange given that they were public service obligation routes. While the council can make arguments about rurality and peripherality in Edinburgh, London or Brussels, the arguments hold no weight it seems once it secured the money within its own corridors of power. Indeed, flights used by people going for cancer treatment have been described by the council leader as 10-minute tourist flights, which is very disappointing. The flight was not 10 minutes and the councillors he dragooned into voting to axe flights to these communities have not been to visit them since their election. The upshot of this transportation vandalism is that travel from one end of the Outer Hebrides to Edinburgh, London or Brussels is faster for most of the week than going to the other end of the Outer Hebrides.

Why do I mention this? The debate has concentrated on the south-east of England and Heathrow, about which there seems to be a love-hate relationship. London has tremendous connectivity, with 360 destinations—almost one for every day of the year—which I think is more than Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam enjoy, although the individual airports are better.

[Jim Fitzpatrick]

The hon. Gentleman will be aware that when I was Minister with responsibility for aviation, I heard repeated requests by Members from the regions for access to Heathrow. That clearly was not possible, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) said, because short-haul routes were taken out so that there could be flights to international destinations.

[Mr MacNeil]

The building of Heathrow has been brought about through general UK taxation. Scots have on average paid more tax than the rest of the UK in each of the last 30 years. We have contributed to Heathrow, as have other areas of the UK, and our investment should be protected. There are 360 other areas that have contributed and are arguing for the benefits of Heathrow. The hon. Gentleman makes a good point.

Heathrow is a disappointing airport. If one travels to it by train, one straightaway meets a glass wall between the train and the lifts. That is indicative of rest of Heathrow and terminal 5, where passengers seem to be reversing into each other constantly. Gatwick is no better—a veritable rabbit warren that makes London City airport almost look like bliss. The Heathrow Express, Heathrow airport and the airlines seem unable to talk to each other when there is a train delay—an example of component efficiency rather than network efficiency that is sadly all too typical around UK airports.

There is doublethink at the heart of the relationship with Heathrow. Recommendation 9 of the Select Committee report states:

“It is imperative that the UK maintains its status as an international aviation hub.”

That seems to be about a badge of prestige rather than transporting people, as the hon. Member for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale) said. I have mentioned, yesterday and today, that decades of bilateral agreements have favoured London airports to the detriment of Scotland and other places. This has now come back to bite the south-east of England. One solution could be co-operation with the Dutch and the French. Schiphol and Paris are not that far away, and increased and improved surface transport could bring them closer. As the hon. Member for North Thanet said, it is time, not distance, that matters to the passenger. A global mega-region encompassing either side of the Channel would benefit passengers globally. There is an economic benefit to linking hubs, an argument I would make for the central belt of Scotland, too.

What happened to the south-east of England when the London docklands lost its pre-eminence to Rotterdam will happen in aviation. Schiphol will win and Heathrow will lose out, as the right hon. Member for Saffron Walden (Sir Alan Haselhurst) said, because of the UK’s piecemeal approach.

The right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) pointed out that with direct air links trade improves twenty-fold. As a result of the imbalance in the UK, Scotland has definitely lost out; we have paid in, but we are not getting the benefits. It is disappointing that this high-tax Government are not interested in reviewing APD at any point. Their “see no evil, hear no evil” approach continues. In the meantime, Spain is getting rid of it and Barcelona has seen 37 new routes in the last year. APD is a demand-management tool for Heathrow and it comes at a tremendous price for other areas of the UK, particularly Scotland. With independence, I am hopeful that we can sort that one out.

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[Mr Goodwill]

The commission will publish its interim report before the end of the year, and the Government will respond to it by the spring. There may be some action that we can take at that stage, perhaps in respect of surface connectivity, but I think it is important for the commission to have a chance to do its work properly, and that means giving it enough time. If we are going to do this, let us do it right.

I am pleased by the support for the commission’s work that Members have given today. The Government welcome the publication of its discussion papers on issues such as connectivity, climate change and noise, and we look forward to receiving its interim report by the end of this year. That report will outline the scale of the additional capacity that is needed, shortlist the places that the commission thinks can best provide that capacity, and make recommendations for the effective use of existing capacity in the short term. We have also asked the commission to consider the findings of the report on our trial of operational freedoms at Heathrow, so that, too, will be covered in the interim report.

The Government look forward to the interim report, and we will give it full consideration, but we shall not be in a position to comment on the scope or content of our response—which, as I have said, we intend to issue in the spring—until the report’s publication at the end of 2013. I hope that the hon. Members for Liverpool, Riverside and for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick) will understand the need for the work to be done thoroughly, and the time that that will take.

I am pleased to be able to tell my right hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Sir Alan Haselhurst) that I will visit Stansted soon, so I will learn about some of the issues there first hand. He said there has never been a strategy, but I hope that the Davies commission addresses that failing.

The hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) has considerable experience of this subject through Manchester Airports Group, and I hope he welcomes the fact that I spent an Industry and Parliament Trust year with MAG, when I learned a lot about the operations of airports. He mentioned the vexed issue of APD, which the House had a good opportunity to discuss yesterday. Although I am new to the job, I am not so wet behind the ears that I would encroach on the Treasury’s territory, but I would make the point that there are other barriers to visitors coming to the UK, including the issue of visas for people from China, so I was pleased that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor addressed that on his recent visit there.

[Mr MacNeil]

I would hope that the Department for Transport would have a fairly robust view on this and that it would communicate its thoughts to the Treasury if it felt that APD was limiting the numbers of passengers, although we know it is—by about 2.1 million per annum in Scotland. Surely the Department for Transport will not sit back and let the Treasury take the lead.

[Mr Goodwill]

The Government are determined to stay on track with our deficit reduction plans, and it is important that the aviation sector continues to play its part. A number of Members in the House should shoulder some of the blame for the deficit that we are having to reduce.

On CAA costs, I assure the hon. Member for Blackley and Broughton that I intend to have regular meetings with its chair, Dame Deirdre Hutton. Indeed, one such meeting is already in my diary. Of course, under the Civil Aviation Act 2012, there is a requirement on the CAA to consult on charges.

The right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford) raised the issue of noise and air quality, as did the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), whose views on this matter are well known. The right hon. Gentleman referred to recent research by Imperial college and others about heart attacks and strokes in areas affected by aircraft noise. We need to do further work on that because other factors may also be in play.

My hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) made the case for London to be better connected, so I look forward to his support next week as we push forward with plans for the High Speed 2 rail network, which will connect London with the north of England so effectively. The hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse raised concerns about some of the initial press coverage following my appointment. May I assure him that he should not read too much into the meeting I had with the Scarborough Greenpeace people? Indeed, I was relieved that the coverage was not portrayed as the Chancellor having another of his chums in a Government Department watching his back. I assure the hon. Gentleman that I come to this with an open mind. Indeed, when the Secretary of State appointed me he said, “You’ll be just the person for aviation as you’re 250 miles away from the south-east of England.”

Looking outside London, the Government’s aviation policy framework, which was published earlier this year, supports the growth of regional airports, and we recognise the importance of regional air connectivity to London in supporting regional economies and contributing to national cohesion. In fact, domestic airport connectivity across the UK increased in 2012. We now have a flight from Leeds Bradford to Heathrow, which is becoming a boon to the Yorkshire economy.

Aviation is a challenging topic. Successive Governments have struggled with how best to continue to gain the economic benefits it brings while restraining its impact on local people. I hope that the House agrees that the Government have established the right foundations to move forward, gain consensus and secure the benefits aviation brings for the nation.

Coastguard (Maritime Incident Response Group)

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)]

I welcome the opportunity to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell, and to debate the Select Committee on Transport’s second report on the coastguard service since the 2010 election. I pay tribute to the nation’s coastguards—both professional staff and volunteers—who provide an essential emergency service, protecting life and limb at sea throughout the year in all weathers.

Last year, Her Majesty’s Coastguard dealt with 2,859 incidents—a 23% increase on the previous year— including rescuing swimmers, divers and people falling off cliffs, cut off by tides and endangered by boat failures. The changes are wide-ranging and involve the maritime rescue co-ordination centres, search and rescue and the maritime incident response group, which deals with firefighting and chemical hazards. I am concerned about all those aspects of the service, and I know that there are ongoing issues, in particular about arrangements for emergency towing vessels.

Today, however, I will focus on changes to the maritime rescue co-ordination centres, which handle calls for assistance and co-ordinate rescues. Reform has been discussed for several years, and the current proposals date back to 2010. The proposals raise major concerns, which is why the Transport Committee has paid close attention to them. We published our first report in 2011 and followed it up in 2012, and we are raising the issue again here today.

In 2010, there were 18 centres spread around the UK coastline, of which the Government proposed to close 10. Their work was to be taken over by the two new 24-hour maritime operations centres in Aberdeen and the Solent area. Five co-ordination centres would remain open during daylight hours only. Under those plans, the number of coastguards would fall from 596 to 370 by 2014, a reduction of 38%.

The main rationale for the changes was the claim that individual co-ordination centres were largely independent of each other and that, as a result, the system as a whole lacked resilience. If a centre was affected by a power cut or overwhelmed by work, we were told, other coastguard stations could do little to help. The proposed maritime operations centre would be able to deal with incidents all around the country and would be able to allocate work to remaining co-ordination centres to iron out peaks and troughs in work load.

The proposals unleashed a storm of protest. There was alarm about the potential loss of crucial local knowledge, particularly in parts of Wales and Scotland where local landmarks can have more than one name in different languages. Local knowledge includes awareness of place names, dialects, tides and currents, geography and the volunteer rescuers available in the area for which the coastguard is responsible. Claims that such local knowledge could be replaced by technology were met with incredulity.

There was alarm, too, about the concept of daylight-only coastguard stations. Would it really be safe to hand over co-ordination of a major incident to new staff, perhaps hundreds of miles away, because it was time to finish work for the day and nightfall had come? Redundancy plans unsettled staff, as did talk of redefining roles, grades and terms and conditions. Many coastguards faced a choice between accepting a new role at a new maritime operations centre in a different location or leaving the service.

In our original 2011 inquiry, we visited coastguards in Falmouth, the Clyde and Stornoway and spoke to coastguards from many other co-ordination centres. We shared many of their concerns about the original plans. In particular, we asked the Government to reconsider introducing daylight-only co-ordination centres, because of the difficulty of handing over rescues. We also highlighted concerns about the loss of local knowledge and the limitations of technological alternatives. I will return to that issue shortly.

The Government published a revised plan in July 2011, which took account of some of our concerns. That plan is now being implemented, but disquiet remains. There will be one maritime operations centre in Fareham, backed up by a co-ordination centre in Dover and eight other co-ordination centres. Eight centres will close; Clyde, Yarmouth and Forth have already shut down. The remaining centres will be open around the clock. The Government have abandoned the concept of daylight-only centres, and I welcome their change of mind.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is making a good speech, highlighting the Government’s indecisive “suck it and see, make it up as you go along” approach to maritime coastguard stations in 2011. The same thing is happening to the emergency towing vessels. In the report’s conclusion, the Transport Committee asks the Government to explain how an emergency towing vessel stationed in the Northern Isles can serve the west coast effectively. Is that not a mirror image of what the hon. Lady outlined in respect of the coastguard stations?

[Mrs Ellman]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments. He highlights a crucial issue causing major concerns that have not yet been resolved.

To return to coastguards and co-ordination centres, under the revised proposals, the number of professional coastguards will fall to 436. The new maritime operations centre was due to be operational by April 2014. That has now been delayed until September 2014. Co-ordination centres at Solent, Portland, Brixham, Liverpool, Swansea and Thames are due to close after that.

We published a second report on the revised proposals in December 2012, and we continue to receive deeply disturbing information from coastguards about staffing and morale in the service. It is to those issues that I now turn. The Committee accepted that there is a case for a national maritime operations centre to manage particularly large or difficult incidents, which could overwhelm an individual co-ordination centre or two centres working together. However, we remain unclear about what coastguards at the national centre would do at times when such an emergency was not taking place. Coastguards giving evidence to us said that they had no idea how the new maritime operations centre and the co-ordination centres would work together.

In their reply to our report, the Government spelled out in more detail what they saw as the main responsibilities of the maritime operations centre, particularly in co-ordinating the work of coastguards across the country. The recent agreement on the roles and responsibilities of coastguards under the new system might also bring greater clarity in this area. Will the Minister explain how the new system will work—not just during a major incident, but at quieter times?

We heard strong criticism of the decision to close three maritime resource co-ordination centres before the new system is in place. For example, Shetland coastguards explained that they had to use their own time to gain local knowledge of parts of the northern Scotland coastline for which they would be responsible after the closure of the Forth station. There have been continuing concerns that some co-ordination centres are now severely overstretched.

We were told in March this year that, already, staffing at Belfast co-ordination centre had been below the risk-assessed staffing level on 124 occasions out of 158 shifts. At the same time, Yarmouth co-ordination centre, which has since closed, was moved to daylight-only operations because of staff shortages. It is testament to the professionalism of the service that the closures have been accommodated without major incident.

It was widely believed that ministerial statements and Maritime and Coastguard Agency documents had given a commitment that the maritime rescue co-ordination centres would not be closed until the new system was put in place. This was denied, but the language used by the Minister’s predecessor in the House and some of the documents published by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency back in 2011 were at best ambiguous.

One key area of the dispute is the importance of local knowledge. Coastguards emphasise its importance in their work, and they are tested on their local situational knowledge. Knowing that a particular rock or headland has three names in two languages can help to ensure that assistance reaches people in distress as quickly as possible. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency discounted its significance, considering that local knowledge could be stored electronically, so that it could be used by any coastguard based anywhere. Indeed, when we heard evidence from the chief executive of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, he seemed to disregard the importance of critical local knowledge, which is about geography, tides and currents, language and dialect, and the availability of additional volunteer sources for rescue in the area concerned.

Coastguards remain concerned about the issue. They challenge whether the knowledge built up over many years by experienced coastguards working in their areas can be replaced by databases. Coastguards taking on new areas of responsibility will still be assessed on their understanding of local factors, although it is hard to see how this will apply to the coastguards in the new marine operations centre. Perhaps the Minister will explain what importance he attaches to coastguards having local knowledge and how it will work under the new system and be tested.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I congratulate the Transport Committee on its report and on paying close attention to so important an issue, as well as on securing this debate. I join the Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), in paying tribute to both professional and volunteer coastguards—the professional rescue services and the volunteer lifeboat crews, who devote a huge amount of time to rescuing people from the waters around our coasts.

The Scottish Affairs Committee, of which I am a member, has investigated the implications of the changes for the coastguard service in Scottish waters. The Forth and Clyde coastguard stations were the first to close, with their functions being transferred to Aberdeen, Belfast and Stornoway. During its inquiry, the Scottish Affairs Committee found that the Government had clearly failed to carry public opinion with them on changes to the coastguard service, and recommended that the Government

“do more to provide reassurance to seafarers who may need to contact the coastguard in an emergency.”

The lack of public confidence in the changes has not been helped by the fact that Belfast, Stornoway and Aberdeen have consistently been understaffed since the closure of the Forth and Clyde stations. In response to a question from the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), the Minister placed in the Library a table showing the number of coastguard watches that were staffed below risk levels during the year from May 2012 to May 2013. The table makes uncomfortable reading, particularly in relation to Belfast. From December 2012, when the Clyde station closed, to May 2013, Belfast was staffed below the risk assessed level 71% of the time, which is extremely worrying. During the same period, its partner station, Stornoway, was understaffed 17% of the time. The table does not tell us how often Belfast and Stornoway were both understaffed at the same time, but the figures show that that must inevitably have happened on several occasions.

For the east coast, the figures are slightly better, but they are still worrying. From the closure of the Forth station in September 2012 to May 2013, Aberdeen was understaffed 52% of the time. The only bright note is that its partner station at Shetland was hardly ever understaffed.

[Mr MacNeil]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for highlighting those figures, which are in the Library. The conclusion that I draw from them is that confidence in Maritime and Coastguard Agency management is not what it should be. I lack confidence in it, as I think do people in my community, due to the very figures that he mentions.

[Mr Reid]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the community does not have confidence in the new system. The seafaring community was very nervous about the closure of the Clyde station, particularly because of the loss of local knowledge. When figures show that Belfast, which has become responsible for most of the Clyde area, was understaffed 71% of the time during the six months following the closure of the Clyde station, that clearly increases the seafaring community’s lack of confidence. I hope that the Government will address that point.

More positively, I am not aware of any incidents since the closure of the Forth or Clyde stations in which understaffing at coastguard co-ordination centres has caused a problem in responding to incidents. That is a tribute to the professionalism of the coastguard staff, but we cannot be complacent. As my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) said, the system will be put to the test when there is a major incident. We all hope that there will not be one, but one will inevitably happen at some point, and that will test the system. I hope that the co-ordination centres are all fully staffed before that happens. The Government have undertaken recruitment programmes, and I hope that the Minister will report that they have been successful and that understaffed watches are a thing of the past.

Concern about the loss of local knowledge was one of the main reasons why seafarers were not convinced about the reorganisation of the coastguard. I hope that both new recruits and existing staff now covering a different area will have been trained and tested on their knowledge of the area for which they are responsible. I hope that the Minister will reassure the House on that.

I am pleased that the Government have listened to the concerns that were expressed and have arranged for two emergency towing vessels to be available in Scottish waters. However, there is concern on the west coast that both vessels are based in the northern isles, and that one is no longer based in Stornoway. I note from the Government’s response that in moderate sea conditions it will take approximately eight to nine hours for an emergency towing vessel to arrive at a position between North Minch and the Little Minch and, in heavier weather when an incident is more likely to occur, it will take about 11 to 12 hours. It will take even longer for the emergency towing vessel to get to the southern Hebrides in my constituency. I hope the Government will have another think about basing an emergency towing vessel in Stornoway and bear in mind the extreme environmental damage that an oil spill would cause. They should compare the costs of a clean-up with the costs of an emergency towing vessel based in Stornoway. After all, prevention is better than cure.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr MacNeil]

Iceland, which has suffered major financial trauma in the past five years, has actually gone in the opposite direction from that taken by the UK Government in northern and western Scotland. Does the hon. Gentleman not feel that a huge error has been made here and that the calculation that should be done is the ongoing cost versus the cost of any incident that could occur? I have a terrible feeling that the Government are spoiling the ship for a ha’p’orth of tar and that we really should have that emergency towing vessel in Stornoway now.

[Mr Reid]

As I have said, prevention is definitely better than cure. It is important to stress that there are two emergency towing vessels in Scottish waters—the same number as there were before—so the Government clearly listened to the concerns that many of us expressed. None the less, the hon. Gentleman makes the important point that one of the vessels should be based in Stornoway to cover the west coast.

[Mr MacNeil]

The hon. Gentleman says that there are two vessels, but it is their location and what they are actually doing that is the problem.

[Mr Reid]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is not the number of vessels that is the problem but the location. There is no vessel based in Stornoway to cover the west coast, and I hope that the Government will take that on board.

I also note that funding for the emergency towing vessels is only guaranteed until the end of the current spending review period in 2015, which is not far off, so I hope that the funding will be guaranteed on a permanent basis. The seas around the west coast and islands provide the basis for much of the local economic activity. Preserving lives and the environment is vital, as is reassuring seafarers that rescue will come quickly if they get into difficulties. Our coastguards, both professional and volunteer, and the professional rescue services and volunteer lifeboat crews do a tremendous job. They deserve to be backed up by a properly resourced system of co-ordination and emergency vessels. I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some assurances on the issues that I have raised today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure and privilege, Mr Rosindell, to serve under your chairmanship and to speak for the first time as the Front-Bench spokesman with responsibility for this area. Like others, I pay tribute to the work of the coastguards. Both the regulars and the volunteers do a fantastic job, as do the other sea rescue agencies that they work with.

I am conscious of the fact that this area is both complex and difficult and one to which I am new. Having served as a Parliamentary Private Secretary in a range of Government Departments and sat on two Select Committees, I know that there are no easy answers, either political or administrative, in such issues. However, the business of Government can be improved by three things: evidence-driven policy, wide consultation with stakeholders and using Select Committees as a critical spur to challenge too many paper or computer-driven scenarios.

Evidence-driven policy has often been lacking, as the Select Committee discovered after much prodding and probing over the past two years. The deficiencies in the process are clear. As the Select Committee pointed out, there was no thorough public consultation and the original proposals were deeply flawed. To their credit, the Government responded to those points, but it is concerning none the less that, even at this stage, the Select Committee, two years on from the original proposal, still has some specific concerns about the direction of responsibility.

There are big issues around greater local interoperability and they seem to have been ignored or ducked. In many cases, the Government seem to have put the cart before the horse, closing MRCCs before the maritime operations centre is fully operative, and there are widespread woes, as we have already heard this afternoon, that local knowledge is being spurned and not transferred.

We know that the day-today co-operation between MOC and the centres is soon to be replaced by the coastguard operation centres. The Government say that coastguard officers will be trained more broadly and extensively, making them more flexible. We have already heard about how local knowledge can be shared between local coastguards. However, I have a question, which echoes what the Chair of the Transport Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), said—how can local knowledge be shared when so little time has been allowed for handover between the closing of MRCCs and the neighbouring centres? Also, how will staff in the MOC gain this information for all their areas? I understand that on one occasion the Department for Transport spokesperson said that they could use social media, but the Minister must be aware that there are very strict conventions within the maritime service about how social media are used, so perhaps he would like to examine that issue or comment on it.

The Government have also said that the MOC will oversee a range of services, including search and rescue, but do more resources need to be put aside for it also to manage the introduction of a newly privatised search and rescue service and to have the capacity to adapt to the longer term search and rescue solution? I ask the Minister, specifically, what confidence he has that Dover, as a back-up to the Fareham-based MOC, will be far enough away from Fareham to provide an effective back-up, so that a serious event could not result in both centres being incapacitated at the same time?

At the close of the second consultation, at the end of November 2011, the then Minister—the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning)—admitted that concerns had already been expressed about having both an unmanned centre and back-up in the south, when they should perhaps be more geographically separated.

Of course, there are also wider issues of collaboration here. If the Government boast that this change is a thorough overhaul of the service, why has there been no broader assessment at any stage of the relationship between the coastguard and the MOC, and the other traditional rescue services—the beach patrols and lifeguards that local councils run, the fire and rescue services, and crucially the relationship with the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, which is not only about central administration but local volunteers?

Recently, I have put a couple of written questions to the Minister on that issue. I will just quote from the reply to one of them:

“The RNLI, like coastguard rescue teams, independent lifeboats, rescue helicopters and other rescue facilities, are not affected by these changes.”—[Official Report, 15 October 2013; Vol. 568, c. 661W.]

I submit that if anyone ever wanted to see an example of silo mentality in a Department, there it is. I invite the Minister to comment on why I received that written response.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Gentleman take this opportunity to state whether he believes an emergency towing vessel should be based in Stornoway? Indeed, will he commit to such a vessel being based in Stornoway in the future?

[Mr Marsden]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He and his colleague, the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr Reid), have already raised that issue and I will return to it later in my speech.

How do the Government expect fire and rescue services in particular to develop proposals for an at-sea presence without direct central funding, at a time when local budgets are more stretched than ever? I know that there is, of course, a piecemeal arrangement along the south coast, but so far as I am aware that does not extend elsewhere.

In response to the Select Committee, the Minister has produced positive scenarios about the interaction of MOC staff and MRCC staff, but the Committee has rightly pressed the Government on major incident scenarios. If we look at the Government response, we see that page 7 contains a list of actions that superficially seem impressive. I came to this brief from looking at further education funding. In that sector too, there are wonderful diagrams about the process of money and the process of communication, and I am sure that if the Minister got his officials to produce a complicated diagram of the various steps that are listed on page 7 it would be even more impressive. But the crucial question is how long it would take the complex chain of command detailed on page 7 to operate and respond. That will be the determination of how effective the MOC is, and raising that issue underlines the continued concerns and disquiet that members of the Committee and other hon. Members have expressed today about emergency vessels.

I turn now to the issue of staffing, because that has already been talked about in considerable detail. The demographic profile of coastguards is highly skewed towards older employees. The Minister’s own figures, from the Government response to the Committee, show that, for example, in Falmouth 14 of the 33 coastguards are over the age of 50 and in Humber 16 of the 27 coastguards are over 50. So those valued employees will probably be leaving the service during the next five to 10 years and taking their experience with them, at the same time as there is major upheaval in coastguard operations. In addition, there is currently a growing loss of valuable expertise in the service. For example, only one of the London coastguards has more than 20 years of experience. Therefore, the emerging picture is that no replacement generation of coastguards is coming through with the extensive service that is needed both to replace those who will soon leave and to oversee the introduction of the new system.

In 2011, the Government proposals estimated a total reduction in staffing numbers from 596 to 370, with coastguard numbers falling from 491 to 248. Therefore, there will be an increasing reliance on volunteers, with the number required rising from 80 to 105. We have already heard today about some of the problems with volunteers, so could the Minister give more up-to-date figures on the assessment of job losses as a result of this reorganisation?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Marsden]

That is a nice try, but the hon. Gentleman knows that we cannot make commitments to future funding until we have seen the books, after the next election. He also knows that the first step in making decisions in this area is to do a proper analysis, which the Government have failed to do.

When the Government responded, initially—

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Gentleman explain the difference between his position and the Government’s? He seems to be talking about investigations tomorrow. There is no firm commitment whatever to looking into the real, pressing need, as identified in the Select Committee report. It is fluff we are hearing from the hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Marsden]

I regret to say that the hon. Gentleman would do better to stick up for his constituents, rather than play party political games. He knows perfectly well that the real issue is whether there will be support in the short term, and that is an issue for the UK Government, so perhaps he will turn his attention to that in future, rather than play political games.

[Mr MacNeil]

What is the difference?

[Mr Marsden]

I am not taking another intervention from the hon. Gentleman.

There was an airy response from the Department in October 2010, when it announced why the process would proceed as set out. It said:

“ship salvage should be a commercial matter between a ship’s operator and a salvor.”

In my view, that shows that the Government do not get it. What about the pollution issues, in respect of which ETVs have been proposed as a solution?

We were told in the original assessment that the removal of a commitment to ETVs would save £32.5 million over the spending review period, but, for example, we heard the hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) mention her concerns about the length of time it might take for an ETV from the south coast to come and deal with an incident in her area. I have already talked about the problems and deep concerns on the east coast about tanker-to-tanker oil transfers. If a major pollution incident were to take place, how much of that alleged £32.5 million saving would be swallowed up in cleaning costs? This decision is based on an assumption that the private sector would pick up the tab. However, outside Scotland, where, I gather, specific commitments have been made recently, there is no evidence that it will do so. The Transport Committee was right to label this, in June 2011, as potentially a dangerous situation.

The Government’s response to this issue over the past two years has been a curious mix of detailed response to the Select Committee’s excellent report and prodding, and dangerous complacency. It is quite clear that, throughout the process, emotional intelligence and a sense of the need for co-operation from the work force has been severely lacking.

The end of the Department’s most recent response to the Committee’s report slipped back into a Maoist view of permanent revolution, which will do little to assuage the concerns of coastguards and coastal communities, about services that liaise with the general public. The Department dismissed the comments about the future, saying, “You can’t make decisions for a generation.” Of course, no Government can guarantee no further change, but it is important to respond in a considered, thoughtful way to a Select Committee report, rather than arrogantly.

Generations are normally considered as periods of 30 years. Earlier this year, I attended a moving unveiling ceremony in Blackpool on the 30th anniversary of three police officers losing their lives in a sea incident. That brought home to me the need for all emergency coastal services, whether voluntary or statutory, to co-operate and collaborate. That is what we should be looking for out of this process—as well as answers to the detailed questions that the Transport Committee has still to receive.

High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Wednesday 26th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr McLoughlin]

I am sorry the hon. Gentleman feels that way, because I believe there will be advantages to Wales as well. As HS2 serves an area up to the north Wales coast, there will be ways in which that can be an advantage. I think he is saying that he will vote against because he is not getting the opportunity to get high-speed services. If we do not get the route as currently proposed, he has no chance of getting any high-speed opportunity whatsoever. He will see, if he looks at the way the plans are laid out, that this can be developed further—even further up to Scotland, as the Bill makes clear.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

The Minister talks of expansion further up to Scotland. When? Given the remarks about no Barnett consequentials, the “when” is not in a decade, but should be here and now.

--- Later in debate ---

[Maria Eagle]

It is starting to worry me, when I contemplate my political future, that the average length across the parties of Secretaries of State for Transport appears to be somewhat on the short side. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman, while his Government are still in office, and I can increase the average length of time served.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Maria Eagle]

I will make a little progress and then give way to the hon. Gentleman.

The fact is that it is only now, four years on from Lord Adonis’s initial action, that the Government are introducing the legislation required to enable money to be spent in advance of construction. The legislation needed to actually begin construction is still nowhere in sight. The Secretary of State’s own departmental plan continues optimistically to claim that Royal Assent on the hybrid Bill will be secured in May 2015, yet in The Times at the weekend he could not be any more confident than to say, “I hope it will.” I know he does not want to admit it, but is it not the truth that there is absolutely no prospect of securing Parliament’s approval for phase 1 before the next election?

Despite its inclusion in the Queen’s Speech, Ministers cannot even guarantee a Second Reading for the hybrid Bill in this Session, leaving just one year to secure its passage through both Houses. It took two years and one month to take the hybrid Bill for High Speed 1 through Parliament, and Crossrail took three years and five months. Neither of those schemes was on the scale, or came with as much controversy, as this new rail line. The Government’s inaction in the past three years requires them to rush the Bill at the end of this Parliament. The National Audit Office has warned that this compressed time scale poses even greater risks to the project:

“Faster preparation for the bill may increase the extent of petitions to Parliament which may make it less likely that royal assent is granted by the planned date of May 2015. It may also divert the Department and HS2 Limited from focusing on the deliverability of the design.”

With construction due to begin in January 2017, less than two years into the next Parliament, Ministers know full well that they are now cutting it very fine indeed.

The fact that Royal Assent will no longer be achieved for phase 1 in this Parliament raises the question of why the new line was split into two Bills in the first place. We all know that that decision was taken to ensure that at all costs Conservative MPs did not have to go into the next election with pressure from their constituents to vote against it. The Government have failed to achieve that goal, and have completely unnecessarily opted for two hybrid Bills, when taking the proposals forward as one scheme would have provided greater certainty and ensured that there was no doubt about the Government’s commitment to the whole north-south line, as Ministers claim.

[Mr MacNeil]

Harvard Business Review says that there are about 40 mega-regions in the world that straddle national borders. They contain about 18% of the world’s population, 66% of its economic activity and 86% of the world’s patents. In these islands, we have two such mega-regions: south central England and the central belt of Scotland. Professor Richard Florida of the university of Toronto says that linking these regions helps global aggregate prosperity. When would the hon. Lady like to see high-speed links between these two UK mega-regions?

[Maria Eagle]

We cannot get any further north than Leeds and Manchester until we have got to Leeds and Manchester. That is a constraint, but I hear what the hon. Gentleman says.

--- Later in debate ---

[Maria Eagle]

I understand my hon. Friend’s point, and the one I made in response to the earlier intervention was simply that we had to get to Leeds and Manchester before we could go further. Work is going on—led by the Department, I think—looking at the prospects for further phases, if one wishes to put it that way, after we have got to Leeds and Manchester.

The delays over the past three years are no surprise, given that the Department has been promising to publish a transport strategy ever since the election, but has yet again delayed it until later this year. The failure to deliver progress on this new railway line could not be a better example of what happens when one decides on a transport strategy towards the end of a Parliament, rather than at the beginning. It means major transport decisions—for example, how we connect the new rail line into Britain’s hub airport at Heathrow—are not being taken forward in an integrated way. That is entirely a consequence of ducking the big questions on aviation for the whole Parliament and of the Government’s decision, which we believe to be wrong, to tell the Airports Commission not to report until after the next election.

It is not just the rapidly slipping timetable that raises alarm bells and worries those of us who support this project. The National Audit Office wrote:

“We identified three areas of risk to the Department’s effective governance of the High Speed 2 programme:… Underdeveloped governance and programme management… Insufficient resources in the Department’s High Speed 2 team”

and

“Inadequate stakeholder management”.

The criticism that Ministers failed sufficiently to resource the team in the Department will be familiar to anyone who has followed the fiasco over the collapse of the Government’s rail franchising programme. The NAO has warned that there is

“a high risk that it may have insufficient skilled staff in the areas of procurement, corporate finance, rail technical and programme management.”

Yet again, the reckless way in which the Department was reorganised after the election and the scale of cuts to key staff have put a major project at risk.

The Government have finally, belatedly, appointed a new director general for HS2 as well as a new senior management team, which is welcome news, but is it not extraordinary that, just as with the west coast main line fiasco, it took so long for a senior responsible owner to be identified for the project? No wonder the Major Projects Authority has rated the delivery of the new rail line as amber/red. That should have been a clear warning to Ministers to take its concerns seriously, not simply dismiss them as irrelevant.

To be fair to the Secretary of State, there was one bit of good news in the otherwise highly critical report from the MPA. It found that

“the Department has strengthened its working relationship with HM Treasury.”

That is very sensible indeed, particularly in the light of the NAO’s concerns about the budget for the project. It has called the Department’s use of a precise estimate of £16.3 billion for the cost of phase 1 of the scheme as “unwise”, as I think we have discovered today. It said that an honest figure would be between £15.4 billion and £17.3 billion, so I welcome the fact that the Secretary of State has today given updated figures. I am sure that he will continue to do so, as he has undertaken to do.

The NAO was also unable to verify the Department’s claim that the £1.5 billion savings recommended by Infrastructure UK could be delivered. Work apparently only began on identifying those savings in September. The House needs to be told whether the savings have now been locked in. The NAO also raises doubts about the Department’s claim that phase 1 will result in reduced operating costs on the existing network of £3 billion over 60 years. This is on the assumption that fewer long-distance services are likely to run on the west coast main line, but because the Department has not set out any revised service patterns it is difficult to see how such a precise and neat rounded figure has been generated.

The Government should also be clear that the £42.6 billion cost of completing the north-south line as far as Leeds and Manchester does not include the £7.5 billion cost of the trains to run on the line. The Secretary of State has made that clear today. These factors are an essential part of the project, and they ought to be included in the estimates in future.

Worryingly, the National Audit Office also claims:

“The Department has not included VAT in its cost estimates or affordability assessments”,

and warns that

“HS2 Limited will be liable for VAT at 20 per cent on almost all of its spending.”

Ministers need to confirm that the Chancellor and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs have agreed that the VAT will be reclaimable. If that will not be the case, that should also be accurately reflected in the budget.

The NAO also warns that, even with the additional £3 billion capital spending from 2015-16 that has been confirmed today, there is a risk that the project

“may restrict the ability to fund other capital projects across government”.

It goes on to warn:

“We estimate that there could be a gap in affordability of £3.3 billion spread over the four years from 2017-18 to 2020-21, which are the peak spending years for phase one.”

The Secretary of State will, I think, have negotiated something in that respect, but he must make it clear, when he can, that the settlement he has reached with the Chancellor—the details of which we might get tomorrow—has closed that funding gap in full. It would be unacceptable if the Department’s failure to plan the spending needed for this scheme were to result in any cuts or delays to the vital upgrading on the rest of the network. That includes the rolling programme of electrification and new inter-city trains, both of which have already been delayed or scaled back under this Government.

Finally, on the budget for the scheme, there is already a creeping increase in spending from the allocation set for this Parliament in the 2010 spending review. The Minister of State, Department for Transport has admitted to me in a parliamentary answer that the budget for the current spending period has been revised upwards from £773 million to around £900 million. That is worrying in the context of the legislation we are debating today, which will effectively give Ministers a blank cheque from Parliament to spend on the scheme. I am sure that the Secretary of State will keep Parliament fully apprised of where the money is going.

In addition to the delays and the criticisms of the budget, serious concerns have also been expressed about HS2 Ltd. It was initially set up to advise Ministers on the route for the new north-south line, but the Government have expanded its role to include building support for the scheme and then delivering it, despite the fact that HS2 Ltd has faced criticism for the way in which it has engaged with communities along the route, with local authorities and with MPs. The fact is that it has not proved to be an effective advocate for the scheme.

The NAO has issued a warning on this, too, saying:

“The programme has a complicated governance structure. This is because the Department aims to preserve some independence for its development body, HS2 Limited, while also maintaining effective governance.”

By divorcing the scheme from delivery of the investment in the existing rail network, there is a risk that we will not focus on the need to create a fully integrated single rail network. It makes no sense that Network Rail is, in effect, having to mirror some of the work of HS2 Ltd, including appointing staff of its own to work on the scheme and having to lobby HS2 Ltd to ensure that decisions are taken in a way that does not have a negative impact on the wider network.

It is increasingly clear that a better option would be to transfer responsibility for the planning and delivery of the new north-south rail line to Network Rail. That would reduce duplication and cost while better enabling the integration of investment in the existing network and the new line. The hopelessly inadequate plans for connecting the new north-south line with HS1 are a good example. The focus of the debate on this issue has been on whether there would be any demand for services from the continent to go further north than London. We should surely not turn our backs on the opportunity to end unnecessary and environmentally damaging short-haul flights, but the real case for getting the connection right involves the opportunity to run the excellent Javelin trains that served us so well during the Olympics further up the country, instead of simply between the coast and the capital.

[Mr MacNeil]

According to the latest Government figures, Scotland has 8.4% of the UK population but provides 9.9% of the taxes. In effect, Scots will be paying for 9.9% of the new high-speed rail development, so it is disappointing that neither the Secretary of State nor the hon. Lady can give the House a date, an ambition, a target or a hope of when it might reach Scotland.

[Maria Eagle]

I do not accept the hon. Gentleman’s premise that there will be no benefit to Scotland before the high-speed rail line gets there at some time in the future. It is clear that it will benefit from the project.

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 25th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Burns]

I seek to give my hon. Friend a partial reassurance, because I cannot prejudge at this stage in proceedings what might be in any franchise document, but I can say that there will be full consultations with relevant stakeholders and others before the document is finally put together so that all the issues, desires and wish lists can be fully considered.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Is the Minister aware that every year there is no high-speed rail connection between south and central England and Scotland is a year when both economies underperform? Recent studies at the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto have identified that two of the world’s 40 co-called mega-regions are in the United Kingdom and that good, fast rail connections would benefit both. When will a date be set for that key infrastructure, as I am particularly keen that England should keep up with Scotland after we become independent?

[Mr Burns]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said last October that the Government are investigating whether there should be a phase 3 for High Speed 2, from Leeds and Manchester to Glasgow and Edinburgh. We look forward to the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends supporting us as we put forward the proposals and the legislation for establishing High Speed 2, which will bring so much benefit not only to England, but to Scotland and Wales.

Rising Cost of Transport

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Wednesday 9th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)]

After many years of above-inflation rail fare increases, rail fares are now simply too high, so I am pleased that as a result of pressure from the Liberal Democrats and others, the coalition Government’s previous plan of introducing an increase of the retail prices index plus 3%—which would have made a bad situation even worse—has been dropped and that that increase has been reduced to RPI plus 1%, which means fares will be lower than they would have been under the previous Labour Government.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Reid]

I certainly will. I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman will draw the House’s attention to the fact that his Scottish National party Government have raised fares to his constituency and to Tiree and Coll in my constituency by 10%.

[Mr MacNeil]

RPI plus 1% was an SNP Government policy, so this is a case of stolen clothes. Unfortunately, ferry fares have risen for haulage, but there was no effort at all to reduce ferry fares under the Edinburgh Liberal-Labour Administration. Will the hon. Gentleman apologise for that?

[Mr Reid]

I am certainly not going to apologise after the SNP has just increased ferry fares by 10%. The hon. Gentleman is right, however, that the SNP Government in Scotland copied the Government here, so the rail fare increase in Scotland is also RPI plus 1%.

Liberal Democrats believe it is important to end the era of above-inflation rail price increases as soon as possible. However, that important aim has to be balanced with the need to raise cash for the investment that our railways so badly need. Our railways have suffered from decades of chronic under-investment, leading to a system which was increasingly inefficient, overcrowded and highly expensive to run. I am therefore pleased that the coalition Government have committed to invest about £16 billion in our railways up to 2019. That will support over £9 billion-worth of improvements, which will help to provide more services and greater capacity, particularly for commuters to our nation’s biggest cities.

The coalition Government are currently overseeing the biggest investment in our railway infrastructure since the Victorian era, and at the same time we are working hard to reform our railways and reduce unnecessary costs. The coalition plans for further rail electrification will also ultimately result in over 800 miles of track being electrified. Many speakers have contrasted that with the record of the previous Government. Our future plans include the important High Speed 2 project. It will create a direct high-speed link between London and Birmingham, which will eventually extend to Manchester and Leeds, and, I hope, Edinburgh and Glasgow as well. That will help enhance rail connections throughout the country and reduce journey times, and boost future opportunities for jobs and growth.

I will not support the Opposition motion, as it has fallen into the typical Opposition party trap of calling for fare cuts while saying nothing about where the money will come from for the investment our railway system so badly needs. Liberal Democrats and Conservatives are working together in government to put our railways on a sustainable footing, and we hope it will soon be possible to keep fare increases below inflation.

Although the country needs to reduce the deficit, I am pleased that the Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Norman Baker), has recently been able to announce more than £120 million of funding for buses, including £31 million for low-carbon buses. I also welcome his launch last year of the Government’s policy document, “Green Light for Better Buses”. It sets out a series of reforms that will attract more people on to the buses, ensure better value for the taxpayer and give local authorities more influence over their bus networks. Ultimately, it is for local authorities working in partnership with their communities to identify the right transport solutions for their areas.

[Mr Reid]

The important thing is that the Government work together with local authorities and that power is devolved to them to find the correct solution; this Government are providing money and are working with local authorities.

Cycling has another important transport role to play, and I was pleased with the announcement in the autumn statement of a further £42 million investment in the sustainable transport fund for cycling infrastructure, including cycling safety. No matter how much effort is put into providing public transport and encouraging people to use it, in rural areas, particularly sparsely populated ones such as mine, the car will always be part of the transport solution. So I am pleased that the Government abandoned Labour’s fuel duty escalator and have reduced fuel duty by 1p a litre on the mainland and by 6p a litre on the islands. I hope that the Government will soon get the EU approval required to extend this scheme to remote parts of the mainland.

[Mr MacNeil]

Hear, hear.

[Mr Reid]

I am glad that policy is welcomed by the hon. Gentleman. This is the one Government policy he is very supportive of, and it has certainly done a tremendous amount for his constituency. I am sure that he is suitably grateful.

[Mr MacNeil]

Does the hon. Gentleman not feel that the 5p reduction is perhaps a bit small and that, given the price of fuel, we should be striving to make that derogation from the European Union somewhat greater?

[Mr Reid]

I would certainly support any efforts to increase that discount. Such a move would need EU agreement, but I would certainly be happy to work with the hon. Gentleman to try to obtain it. It is important to point out that from April fuel duty in his constituency will be almost 20p a litre less than it would have been had the previous Government’s policies continued.

I hope the Government will introduce road pricing on motorways and major trunk roads, using that income to reduce fuel duty. Such a system would rightly tax people more for using their car on journeys where there is a public transport alternative. This coalition Government are tackling the problems of lack of investment in our public transport system, in contrast to the Labour motion, which offers no solutions whatsoever. I certainly will not be supporting the Labour motion, and I am sure it will be overwhelmingly defeated.