Integrated Rail Plan: North and Midlands

Ian Mearns Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

There is an awful lot coming alongside the IRP, which is just one part of our rail infrastructure. The rail network enhancements pipeline has tens of billions of pounds, and there are also programmes such as the Beeching reversals—I have been to my hon. Friend’s patch in the past to talk about some of those reversals. There are many other opportunities for Members on both sides of the House to look to improve their rail services. The Government are building new lines and just yesterday, as I mentioned earlier, I opened one that had stopped running in the 1970s.

[Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)]

I was personally invested in HS2 as a member of the hybrid Bill Committee for the section from London to Birmingham. I sat on that Committee for 15 months, so I have some understanding of what is happening. Only nine months, one week and one day ago, the Prime Minister answered my question:

“I can certainly confirm that we are going to develop the eastern leg as well as the whole of the HS2.”—[Official Report, 10 February 2021; Vol. 689, c. 324.]

To people in the north of England who live well north of Leeds, this now looks as though HS2 was affordable for the south but it was not affordable for the north. If we are going to put this right, we need to get local schemes such as the Leamside line, the Bensham curve and the new Gateshead station put into the programme, so that people can see some real benefit. It is not just about getting to Leeds, to York, to London; it is about getting from Newcastle to Carlisle, and from Newcastle to Sunderland, to Hartlepool, to Middlesbrough, and those lines take an age. So, Secretary of State, let us make sure that what the Prime Minister said to me nine months ago is not just more empty rhetoric from the bank of broken promises.

[Grant Shapps]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point about new lines. The Ashington to Newcastle line, which is likely to be the second or third Beeching reversal, will do exactly what he has asked for: it will bring services from Ashington, through Blyth, to Newcastle. These are brand new lines. This integrated rail plan is not the whole picture; it is the part of the picture that was to do with NPR and midlands rail. I know that he dismisses it, but a 21-minute improvement on journeys from Newcastle to London because of this plan will be appreciated by his constituents—I cannot think why it would not be. It is exactly the sort of capacity improvement that we want to see. I remind him and the whole House: this is not the end state of our railway. It is just the next stage, which will immediately provide a 21-minute improvement for his constituents.