Oral Answers to Questions
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years ago)
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Chris Grayling
The Pendolinos have many years to go, and I have no doubt that they will be replaced by a high-quality fast train in the future. My hon. Friend will have stood on the platform at Lichfield station and seen trains to Liverpool, Manchester and Scotland zooming past at high speed. The new plans will provide an opportunity for more trains to stop at Lichfield.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Secretary of State knows well that I believe that HS2 is a vanity project that will never come to fruition. He knows that my constituents in the booming town of Huddersfield, which he visited recently, have access to the west coast line and the east coast line, but most of all they want a good trans-Pennine connection everywhere.
Chris Grayling
Absolutely, which is why I have already announced that the £2.9 billion upgrade of the trans-Pennine line will begin this time next year, as the start of a transformation that is vital to the north. In the coming months we will also see the arrival of the first of a complete new set of trains across the north of England that will transform passengers’ experience.
Chris Grayling
Let us be clear. I stand by every word that I said then. We will deliver smart new trains and improved journey times for passengers on the midland main line, as we are currently doing and will continue to do on the Great Western main line, and as we will do on the east coast main line and the transpennine route. [Interruption.] As I have said, we will also deliver new trains providing better services for passengers on the midland main line. The only difference made by £1 billion of spending would be a one-minute saving in the journey time, and that is not good value for taxpayers’ money.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Given that this is such an important matter, surely we should have a point of order on it.
Mr Speaker
As the hon. Gentleman will know on the strength of his nearly 39 years of experience in the House, the effect of a point of order during exchanges on a question is to cause all further exchanges on it immediately to cease. Fortunately for the hon. Gentleman, he does not risk becoming hugely unpopular as a result of his attempted point of order, for the simple reason that no one else was standing and seeking to catch my eye—other than the hon. Gentleman with his rather bogus, albeit enjoyable, point of order.
Oral Answers to Questions
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years, 2 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
My hon. Friend makes a very important point. We are now migrating the franchise system to being much more focused on quality. The quality of service is going to drive revenues as much as anything else. People will see a very different approach where we do not necessarily take the highest bid, we look for high quality in the bids, and we look to be prudent about the risk-sharing mechanisms so that hopefully this does not happen again.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Jesse Norman)
Since becoming road safety Minister, I have met the hon. Gentleman several times, as well as a broad range of road safety organisations and others with an interest in road safety, to discuss many different issues. Those institutions include RoadPeace, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, the RAC, the AA and many others.
Mr Sheerman
I congratulate the Minister on his keen interest in this subject; I have been impressed by him so far. However, is it not the case that there are still 1,720 knocks on the door by a policeman or a policewoman who says that your daughter, your son, your mum, your dad, your grandmother or your grandfather are dead? That is the truth, so we cannot be complacent. Can we now look to having a national investigatory body to investigate every death on the road? Will the Minister also talk to his overseas development colleagues, given that 1.3 million people worldwide die in road accidents every year? Is it not time that we did something to help them?
Jesse Norman
As the hon. Gentleman will know, we are very closely involved in supporting nations around the world to raise road safety standards; he has been involved in that himself. With regard to a national body, we have looked at that. I am sure that he will take some comfort from the fact that only today we are laying regulations that allow driving instructors to undertake motorway driving with learners. That is part of a much wider pushback to improve driving quality and reduce fatalities.
Rail Update
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years, 3 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
I will be immensely careful about both the legal position and what is right for the midland main line. We will take the bid that will deliver the best outcome for passengers, and we will do so in a way that fulfils the legal advice. I am not interested in a second-rate solution for passengers. We will be providing much upgraded services and new trains, and the people who operate those new trains have to be the right ones.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Is the Secretary of State aware that I am very disappointed he did not inform me he was attending a well-publicised meeting in the centre of Huddersfield in my constituency on Friday? He had the opportunity to talk to me and some of my constituents about the deterioration of the east coast line over recent years and the fact that not only the east coast line but the network across the north of England is a very great concern for my constituents who use it to get to work.
Chris Grayling
Just to reiterate, I did make sure that my office contacted the hon. Gentleman’s office on Friday morning to tell them I was going later in the day to meet Conservative councillors ahead of the council elections—an event that I would not normally invite him to. I was particularly struck by how thoughtful the Conservative team in Huddersfield is about the potential transport improvements for that area. It was a very valuable set of discussions.
Mr Sheerman
Is it not right that Members should be told of another Member visiting their constituency?
Mr Speaker
I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his point. The Secretary of State says that the hon. Gentleman was notified and his office was informed. I must say, I think the spirit of the requirement is not always honoured. It is quite important that a genuinely conscientious effort is made to contact the Member concerned, but, to be fair, the Secretary of State did start by saying, “I informed his office.” That may or may not be entirely satisfactory, but we will have to leave it there for now, because notwithstanding the hon. Gentleman’s considerable perturbation about what he regards as late notification, other hon. Members are now waiting to ask their questions and will become very perturbed if they do not have the chance to do so.
High Speed Rail (West Midlands - Crewe) Bill
Barry Sheerman ExcerptsTuesday 30th January 2018
(6 years, 3 months ago)
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Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)
I rise to oppose the Second Reading today for reasons very similar to those given by my hon. Friends the Members for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant) and for Stone (Sir William Cash). I echo the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield—I am not at all opposed to additional rail capacity, or indeed to relatively high-speed rail capacity. The problem with the Bill before us now is that it is capable of pretty much no amendment. Yes, there can be very small adjustments made, but none of them would do anything for my constituents who are hugely affected by this development.
First, I want to talk about why the Bill, and indeed the whole project, is wrong in principle; secondly, about the specific problems that we face in the Stafford constituency; and thirdly about some suggestions for how those problems might be ameliorated. We do not need a 400 km an hour line in the United Kingdom, with the little connectivity that these proposals give us. As my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield has said, the line is forced to go so straight that it does not take the most appropriate and sensitive route. A line of 250 km to 300 km an hour would have been easily adequate. In fact, it is very unlikely that the trains will ever reach anything more than that.
In my constituency, the line seems to head straight for the villages, and not for the open countryside. It affects four villages directly, and it is adjacent to a fifth. I would welcome any hon. Member who wants to come for a visit to note the impact on this part of the world—in Staffordshire and in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone. Lots of alternatives have been put forward. We have already heard about the Arup alternative. There is also the High Speed UK alternative, which provides much better connectivity between 32 prominent cities of the UK. I have looked at it in some detail. I am sure that holes can be picked in it, but those holes will be considerably smaller than the ones that can be picked in the proposals that are before us now. This is the wrong solution to a problem that we undoubtedly have.
Just before people say that this is simply a nimby attitude, I point out that both my hon. Friend the Member for Stone and I have supported an extremely large rail project in our constituencies, which came at some inconvenience to our constituents, but nevertheless we saw the benefit of it. That was the Norton Bridge junction, which has increased speeds on that line, and increased capacity on the west coast main line. Indeed, before I was elected, I supported the proposal of the previous Government on the Stafford bypass, which also had an impact on my constituency.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
I was in Committee upstairs, and came down particularly to hear the hon. Gentleman’s speech. He knows that I passionately oppose HS2. I applaud his opposition, and would love to make the visit to his constituency to see the degradation, because £100 billion of expenditure should go not on this, but on a decent railway service across the north of England.
Jeremy Lefroy
I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He is welcome to visit my constituency; we will make an arrangement. He will see the beautiful countryside of the upper Trent Valley, and I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Stone would also show him across Swynnerton Park and up towards Madeley, so that he can see the effect of the line on those areas.
The business case is another reason I believe this is the wrong project. We have heard from other hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Mr Seely), that the business case is not particularly compelling. In fact, our former colleague and former Chair of the Treasury Committee, Andrew Tyrie, said that HS2
“has the weakest economic case of all projects”
within the infrastructure programme. As has been mentioned, there is a hole in the business case. That is, there is no business case that I can see for the continuation of the existing west coast main line without the revenue from the high-speed services that currently use it and generate most of its revenue. How will that line be maintained? Will it be maintained purely with the revenue from local and regional services, on which prices can be extremely low? Will that generate enough revenue? Alternatively, will it be maintained using revenue from freight services? I do not know, but there is not a business case. I have asked for it and it has not been provided. I urge the Government—particularly if they are about to put out to tender for the package of HS2 and the west coast main line—to insist that we have a proper business case for the entire package, not simply for HS2.
Jeremy Lefroy
I do indeed. The line goes pretty much straight through Yarlet School, and not only that but through Yarlet wood, which is one of our ancient woodlands. I think it is even noted in the Domesday Book, so it is the best part of 1,000 years old.
Another very important part of Staffordshire life that the line goes straight through, or almost straight through, is Staffordshire showground, which hosts not just the county show but hundreds of other events every year, with probably the best part of 300,000 or 400,000 people attending. It is a very important employer and economic entity within my constituency.
The line goes very close to Shugborough. The irony of this is that when the west coast main line was put through Shugborough in the 19th century, the Earl of Lichfield persuaded the railway company to build a cut-and-cover tunnel through Shugborough, which one still sees when going on the main line up to Liverpool. We have been unable to persuade HS2 to provide such tunnelling for my constituents. Clearly, where the railways would listen to the Earl of Lichfield 150 years ago and more, they do not listen to the ordinary people today who would like to have some protection from this line. The line also goes pretty much straight through the beautiful Ingestre and Tixall parklands and landscapes.
The next issue is transport infrastructure. The line cuts straight across several major roads, including the A51, the A518, the A34 and the M6, and goes over the west coast main line. As far as I can see, HS2 and Highways England do not seem to have a plan on how to manage the inevitable disruption to local, regional, and indeed national transport that is going to be caused. I hope they do have one, because the M6 must be, if not the busiest motorway in Europe, then one of the busiest, and the A34 is a kind of relief road for the M6. If both of those are going to be disrupted, particularly if it happens at the same time, the consequences for the regional and national economy, right up to Scotland, will be quite substantial.
Another problem is connectivity after HS2. Clearly, connectivity from Stafford will be better. There will be a faster journey from Stafford to London than at present. It is already an extremely good and fast journey—nobody has complained to me about it in the past—and it will, I admit, be a few minutes faster. Northbound, we are really concerned about connectivity, because we understand that the trains through Stafford and Stoke will end at Macclesfield. I have nothing against Macclesfield; in fact, it is a wonderful town. However, most of the time my constituents tend to prefer to go further to Manchester and Liverpool rather than to stop at Macclesfield. As I say, I have nothing against Macclesfield.
The next problem is the impact on businesses. Last week, I heard from a business that received, out of the blue, a letter saying, “We want all your land.” This business employs a large number of people in a rural area; it is possibly the biggest employer in that area. Yet suddenly, with literally no notice, we are suddenly told that HS2 needs the entire plot that it is working from, without any alternative.
Mr Sheerman
I rarely agree with the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), but I do in this case, about this being a vanity project. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that this is not really about connectivity or helping local industry? As he says, it will damage local industry. The French experience already shows that it does not liberate and rejuvenate the provincial cities and towns. It actually drains even more power and influence down to London and the metropolitan area around the south-east.
Jeremy Lefroy
I largely agree with the hon. Gentleman. I fear that that will be the case unless, as speakers both in favour and against have said, connectivity is taken much more seriously. I urge Ministers to look at the proposals of High Speed UK, even if they do not like those proposals, because it has some extremely important points to make about connectivity for other major cities in the UK.
If the line goes ahead—it seems there is a majority in the House at the moment for it, but that may change— I would like to make some proposals. First, for my constituents and my colleagues’ constituents, we must employ full-time sympathetic and responsive liaison officers who work together with businesses and constituents to ensure that problems are dealt with quickly, efficiently and compassionately. We must also give additional support to local health services. Quite a large number of my constituents have found this a very difficult time and have needed additional support, particularly with their mental health, and local surgeries have not necessarily had the resources to provide that.
It is very important that local people see that there are local jobs in this, and that people are not just brought in. Obviously we need the right skills, but as far as possible, local businesses and local people must be employed.
On the issue of mitigation, I urge the Minister, who I welcome to her position and congratulate on her appointment, to look at more tunnelling, particularly in the area of the Staffordshire showground, Hopton, Marston and Yarlet. I think it is possible. A green tunnel was proposed for Hopton, but it was removed on spurious grounds, or at least grounds that could have been overcome.
I ask the Minister to ensure that we have full planning well in advance for local, regional and national transport, including additional roads. I suggest a link between the A34 and junction 13, just as we have a link between the A34 and junctions 14 and 15. The very long viaduct at Great Haywood must be of outstanding design and faced with traditional stone or brick. I also suggest that the bridge constructed over the M6 for the railway or at least the supports for it should be put in place when the M6 is widened between junctions 13 and 15, rather than having to close the motorway for two separate civil works.
In conclusion, I would rather the Government paused, rethought and built for the whole country, with much better connectivity than this proposal gives us. If this goes ahead, at least for the time being, I ask that all the mitigations that my colleagues and I have put forward be taken seriously, because to date, they have not been.
Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Leigh (Jo Platt). I share her pain, because HS2 phase 1 goes right through the middle of my constituency and brings no benefits, just burdens. I think there are many such seats, as we have heard from other hon. Members on other occasions, as well as today. I agree with her about the north. My father was in steel in the north of England, and we have always known that to assist in increasing the prosperity of the north of England, the cross-Pennine links should have been prioritised a long time ago. It is a pleasure to follow her short but elegant speech.
May I welcome the Minister to the Front Bench? My hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani) is an extremely capable person, although I have to say that I do not envy her her task. She follows in the footsteps of no less than—let me see—one, two, three, four, five Secretaries of State and one, two, three, four, five, six junior Ministers. Since 2010, it appears that no Minister has managed more than two years in this position in charge of HS2. I would not have wished HS2 on her, but I hope her ministerial career will last a great deal longer than that. I wish, however, that her colleagues would listen and that we could have a Minister dedicated to HS2 on its own, because this project is such a gargantuan one that it really deserves to have ministerial attention focused on it completely. If we look at the project’s history since its inception, with the catalogue of failures and problems it has thrown up, we can see that a Minister dedicated to it is much needed and would be very welcome.
Mr Speaker, I feel like saying, “Here we are again, and yes, I am on my feet.” I think we probably do divide into sheep and goats on the Floor of this House as far as HS2 is concerned. Whether I am a sheep or a goat I do not know. I am probably an old goat, but I am happy to stand up here with some other old goats, like my hon. Friends the Members for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant), for Stone (Sir William Cash) and for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy), and even the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman)—most of whom happen to be in the Chamber at the moment. I have been really heartened by the support that I have had over the years as I have tried to fight this project, and then tried to have it altered and modified so that it did less harm than was envisaged.
Mr Sheerman
In passing, I congratulate the right hon. Lady on becoming a dame. Is it not a fact that she and I have campaigned against this project for a very long time, on the grounds that it will not deliver, it will never deliver, by 2033, and it will be superseded by different forms of transportation by 2033, and also on the grounds that £100 billion of national treasure that could have flowed—I say this as a Labour MP—into the national health service and transport across the north will have been wasted?
Dame Cheryl Gillan
I am loth to agree with the hon. Gentleman entirely, but I find myself tempted to do so, because the first point I want to mention is cost.
The cost of this project will go up exponentially. When it was first announced in 2013, the cost of the whole project was about £16 billion, and by 2015 those costs were updated to £55.7 billion. The National Audit Office published a report on HS2’s progress and preparations, and it highlighted the fact that the £55.7 billion funding package does not even cover the funding for the activity needed to deliver the promised growth and regeneration benefits that the hon. Member for Leigh so desperately wants for her young constituents. I think that still continues to be a problem, and I would ask the Minister to have a look at when she can update the costs of this project, and ask her to lay out clearly for the House what extra funding will be required from the Treasury to deliver those growth and regeneration benefits that have been so much boasted of.
I think HS2 will turn out to be, as Michael Byng said, the most expensive railway on earth, at £403 million a mile. In fact, Michael Byng, who created the method used by Network Rail to cost its projects, made the estimates for the DFT and said the line would cost double the official figure, and 15 times more than the cost per mile of the TGV in France. We need to be very careful about how those costs are escalating.
I want to mention the environment. I have had some notable gains in Buckinghamshire—our own county—to save the Chilterns from even greater damage than was first anticipated. I am grateful for the tunnelling. It saves some 9.2 hectares of ancient woodland in three separate woods, but the Woodland Trust has estimated that on phase 2a and 2b it is losing 24 irreplaceable woods, and we shall still lose 63 ancient woods on phase 1 to start off with. I say to the House: once they have gone, they are lost forever. You cannot replace ancient woodland, however much planting you do in other areas of the country.
I want to mention the process. I think the hybrid Bill process for phase 1 was a travesty of our procedures, and I pay tribute to the Chairman of Ways and Means and the House authorities who looked at the Standing Orders and changed some of the aspects of a hybrid Bill to improve the petitioner experience. I want to place it on the record that I think our Clerk who is no longer with us, Neil Caulfield, who was so excellent, would have been pleased to see adjustments to these procedures. Although it is still an arcane process, I think it was important that we fed back the agonies of going through the hybrid Bill process, and that the House responded. I think the positive changes that have been made, particularly the changes to the language, which will increase accessibility to the petitioners, will make a difference and protect the rights for petitioners to be heard. I also think that submitting petitions electronically is a way forward. I still think that the fee of £20 to fight for one’s house, business, land or property is insulting, and I see no reason why petitioners must pay £20 to have their case heard when the state is trying to take their property.
I also feel that corridor deals need to be stamped out. Corridor deals conducted by silks and barristers acting on behalf of the Government are completely opaque and have no enforceability. There is intimidation and pressure from the QCs and the legal teams, hustling up to people in the corridor right before their petition is heard. I hope that the Government will listen and ensure that corridor deals are stamped out completely in this next legislative phase.
I want to refer to engagement by HS2 and the attitude towards the people affected. My colleagues have spoken eloquently already about the ways in which HS2 and its staff and personnel still fail to engage with the people who are most affected by this project. I am still hearing of poor engagement up and down the line, and the Country Land and Business Association reports delays, secrecy, broken promises and poor management.
We are still waiting for answers on various matters, such as the incident that took place in the Colne Valley the other day. I asked for the outcome of the investigation, because I thought that was quite a serious incident. I have still not had any response outlining exactly what happened and why people behaved in such a fashion to people crossing land that would be affected by HS2.
I would also very much like to find out what is happening in my own constituency, in Buckinghamshire. The other day, the Secretary of State promised that I and other MPs would be informed where works were taking place and that has not yet happened. The Secretary of State gave a categorical undertaking at that Dispatch Box, but messages I have had none.
Only today, despite a clear, agreed contract with HS2, a constituent has found that the payment they were due to receive within 21 days is still outstanding three months later. I will give details to the Secretary of State because it came in just today, but that just proves to me that HS2 still cannot keep its commitments or treat the people who are being affected by the project in a rational, decent and respectful manner. It is a gross miscarriage of justice for people to be treated in such a way by the Government and by HS2 Ltd.
Rail Franchising
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years, 4 months ago)
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Andy McDonald
Indeed. That point is entirely consistent with the issues I am putting before the House.
Labour would not have let Virgin-Stagecoach off the hook on the east coast franchise. To return to what my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) said, did the Secretary of State consider taking the east coast franchise into the public sector following the default—yes or no? Does the Secretary of State not worry that, because he refuses to use a public sector operator even as a last resort, struggling train companies now know he has no option but to bail them out in the event of a failure?
Such failures are not confined to the east coast franchise. Today’s National Audit Office report highlights a litany of errors in the Government’s planning and management of the Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern franchise. Those blunders have caused misery to millions of people, and it is the Government’s disastrous handling of the franchise that led to industrial action on the line.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Does my hon. Friend accept that this morning’s report was scathing about the dreadful performance of Northern rail? My constituents are not as dependent as I am on the east coast franchise to get up and down the country, but the local franchises are how ordinary people get to work.
Chris Grayling
I have been Secretary of State for 18 months. Let us be clear what I have done. There are a number of problems on the network—I have never made any attempts to hide that. The infrastructure is not good enough, which is why we have launched an immediate £300 million programme to upgrade some of the areas of the network that are failing too often and why we have changed ways of working. I asked Chris Gibb to go in and bring together the operation of the track and the train on a daily basis in order to improve things. London Bridge has been opened, and we are now able to run longer trains for passengers. Those are brand-new trains going through the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. Chris Gibb, who everybody has rightly said is a well regarded, independent figure, said that above all, the unacceptable disruption to the hon. Gentleman’s constituents was caused by the trade unions. The Labour party and the unions demanded the publication of Chris Gibb’s report. It was published, and that is what it said. They may not like it, but that is what it said.
Mr Sheerman
This could turn into a really good debate on the future of the rail industry, but I suggest that the Secretary of State is making it a bit too partisan. Could we not return to what everyone across the House knows to be the serious problem—the quality of management and the broken franchising system? Will he get on to that?
Chris Grayling
The biggest problem is that we have not had enough new trains or enough investment. That is why it is right and proper that this Government are spending more than any since the steam age on improving the infrastructure, and why new trains are being introduced right across the country. There are new trains on the Great Western routes, on the east coast main line and in the north. Every single train in the north of England is being replaced or refurbished as new in a transition programme of a type that has not been seen for decades and decades. That is what the railway really needs.
Oral Answers to Questions
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years, 5 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
The east coast is the key priority in road-building terms. We are very close to opening what will, extraordinarily, be the last bit of motorway linking London and Newcastle; it is long, long overdue, and I am amazed it has not happened already. We are then pressing ahead with dualling the A1 north of Newcastle, and my goal is to take that up to the border, but it will be for the SNP and the Scottish Government to make sure that something is there to meet us coming the other way.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister might know that I have probably done more miles on the east coast line than any other Member of this House. May I tell him, with that experience, that it is chaos again on the east coast? Stagecoach is being let off the obligation to pay the full money it should be paying to the British Exchequer. Yet again, the east coast line is in a mess, and he is doing nothing about it.
Mr Speaker
I am very glad that the hon. Gentleman has already recovered from his obvious misery at Arsenal’s demolition of his team by five goals to nil last night.
Mr Hayes
This scheme is a subject very dear to my heart, and my hon. Friend has raised it previously in the House. She is absolutely right that the inappropriate parking of HGVs is a menace. We are trialling a “clamp first” policy in Kent. The preponderance of people who park most irresponsibly are not drivers from the United Kingdom; it is therefore difficult for local authorities to pursue them in the way that one would expect. We will look at the results of that trial and we will go further. I am determined to stop the irresponsible parking of HGVs, which causes such nuisance.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the Secretary of State feel any guilt about the fact that many of my constituents and many people in this country thought during the referendum campaign that people like him were promising that more money would be spent on transport infrastructure and the NHS because we would save so much money from leaving the EU? Yesterday’s announcement of a £50 billion debt that we have to pay to the EU was a shocking revelation. What is he going to do about it?
Chris Grayling
First, we made no announcement yesterday about money for the EU. Secondly, we are spending more money on transport infrastructure.
Oral Answers to Questions
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years, 6 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
As I indicated, it is very much my hope that a number of schemes around the country will start to be brought forward for development under this fund. I would be rather surprised if the Shipley eastern bypass is not one of those brought forward as a proposal to the Government early on. As he knows, I will be joining him to see the issues around the Shipley eastern bypass and to see the possible routes shortly, and I have no doubt that he and his colleagues in his constituency will be making strong representations when I visit.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
No one begrudges the money for a Shipley bypass—certainly no one in Huddersfield does. What we are angry about in Yorkshire is the fact that this Minister has taken away the money and the promise for a trans-Pennine railway electrification. That is what we will not forgive him for. He must get his act together and invest in the north.
Mr Speaker
He mentioned Shipley but it is not sufficient simply to animadvert on Shipley. The question ought to relate to the matter.[Interruption.] Which is a bypass, as somebody has observed, very originally and wittily from a sedentary position.
HS2 Update
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
On the latter point, I can give my hon. Friend the assurance that we cannot end up with principal routes cut off. The environmental work we are talking about and the hybrid Bill Committee will consider the issues he mentions. I am happy to carry on talking to him about those options, but now, with the Committee, my hon. Friend and others have the opportunity to make the case to parliamentary colleagues about changes that might be necessary. That worked for the phase 1 Bill and the Committee will no doubt give careful thought to what he has discussed in the context of the phase 2 Bill. I will happily keep talking to him about his concerns.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Secretary of State might remember that I have been a consistent opponent of the project for a very long time. It was £20 billion as a Labour project, then it became a Conservative project and would cost £40 billion, and I was told that I was irresponsible for saying that it would reach £60 billion. It is very clear from the article in The Sunday Times only this Sunday that it will cost £100 billion and beyond. I believe that people who elected me and who vote for my party believe that that sort of national treasure should be invested in public services and the national health service, not in a technology—I hope that he will listen to this—that by 2033 will be as out of date as the canals were by the time the railways arrived.
Chris Grayling
If we roll the clock back 30 years, we were being told that about the rail network, and large chunks of it were closed. I now have hon. Members from all over the place saying, “Can we reopen it?” I am afraid that I do not accept the argument that in 10 or 15 years’ time the railways will be redundant. If we are going to maintain a balance between our roads and rail system for transport around the country, we will need investment in both. That is what this is all about. I would simply say to the hon. Gentleman that I accept his view, but I thought the stuff I read in The Sunday Times yesterday about cost was absolute nonsense, coming from somebody with no involvement in the project.
Oral Answers to Questions
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(7 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Andrew Jones)
No assessment has been made of the merits of establishing a road collision investigation unit, as there are well-established collision investigation units in the police service, and effective ways of reporting conclusions and outcomes. The Department does, however, directly fund a programme of detailed investigation under the road accident in-depth study, in conjunction with police forces, coroners and several hospitals.
Mr Sheerman
The Minister knows of the interest that I take in this matter, as chair of the Parliamentary Advisory Council on Transport Safety and the international council for road safety research. There is no doubt that we need an investigation unit to deal with sea, air and rail transport. All the transport safety interests across the board are in favour of the establishment of such a unit. We do not think that it would be costly, and it would be effective. Will the Minister think again?
Andrew Jones
I am aware of the hon. Gentleman’s long-established campaigning interest in road safety, and I would just refer back to the earlier answer: we have well-established collision investigation units within the police service, so I see no point in duplication.
Oral Answers to Questions
Barry Sheerman Excerpts(7 years, 2 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
It is important that I remind the hon. Lady and reiterate what I said. The matters relating to her constituency—the routes through London and the route on phase 1—have been exhaustively examined, not simply by my Department but by Committees of this House and the other place. Although we will always be open to representations about ways in which we can minimise impact, these issues have been exhaustively dealt with by this Parliament.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr John Hayes)
We are working with local authorities to drive the improvements in air quality that are so needed in our more polluted cities. My right hon. Friend the Environment Secretary will consult on a new air quality plan later this spring.
Mr Sheerman
Diesel vehicles are part of the problem and we need urgent action on them, but is the Minister also aware of today’s Environmental Audit Committee report on how Heathrow will affect pollution and climate change? I have just come back from Beijing and saw the level of pollution there. Will the Minister bear it in mind that that is not where we want to go for towns and cities in this country?
Mr Hayes
It is important to appreciate, as I know the hon. Gentleman does, that this is not a matter of some high-flown theory about what might happen in many centuries’ time; it is about the wellbeing of people now in our cities and elsewhere. The direct relationship between air quality and health is well established. Pollutants are affecting the quality of life—more than that, they are affecting the health and wellbeing of our people. The issue is about the defence and promotion of the common good, which, as he and the whole House know, is always central to my heart.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Paul Maynard)
My right hon. Friend is certainly right to observe that on any crowded part of the network—be it in the south-east or elsewhere—we have to make choices over the stations that are served. He rightly points out that that choice will involve outer stations in the south-east versus inner London stations. I can certainly assure him that this ministerial team is more than aware of those challenges, and I am sure my officials can benefit from his wisdom on this part of the network and look forward to his meeting with them.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Chris Grayling
Of course, it is not an either/or. We are currently spending money on the Ordsall Chord in Manchester, which will provide a dramatic improvement to services in the Manchester area and enable more services across the Pennines. We also have the most ambitious improvement plan that the northern rail network has seen in modern times. So I am very proud of what we are doing transport-wise in the north of England. I would simply say that if we are going to meet the capacity challenges of the future, we are going to need to build a new railway line, and if we are going to build something new, why would we not build something state-of-the-art? That, I am afraid, is the view of the overwhelming majority of Members of this House?