East Coast Main Line

Debate between John Penrose and Chris Grayling

Wednesday 16th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

Clearly the Government have to act in a situation like this, and we have done so: we have acted decisively. The reality is—I stand by what I said—that there is no malicious intent. A major corporation has made a major mistake, and it has paid a price equivalent to a fifth of its market capitalisation, which is a big cost for any business.

[John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)]

I welcome the Secretary of State’s response to my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond), who asked about open access. The Secretary of State was clear that open-access services will be maintained, but may I ask him to go further? In preparing for the end of the current deals in 2021, may I ask him, instead of going back to a failed nationalisation model or indeed of relying on the evident fragility of the franchising model, to consider greatly extending open-access rail to cover the entire line once the current deals are over?

[Chris Grayling]

I know my hon. Friend is a great believer in open access, and I think that this line proves that it can make a real difference. I give him an assurance that we will do all we can to continue to encourage open access to maximise the capacity of the railway network.

Rail Update

Debate between John Penrose and Chris Grayling

Monday 5th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

Of course they are paid for by the customers. The private companies make the investment and they make the return on that investment because the passengers pay for fares. That is the way that business works. Perhaps Labour Members do not understand the way that business works. Customers buy something they want to buy. I am absolutely certain that customers want to travel in brand-new trains. That is long overdue on the east coast main line, where they have regularly failed to do so. However, there are clearly lessons to learn on this. That is why we have moved much more towards a quality basis for new franchises. I want an increased quality of service delivered to be the basis for the allocation of new franchises.

The hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) asked about the west coast main line direct award. As I said, it will run for between one and two years. It will finish as soon as possible. I want this up and running. We are going to issue the ITT for the west coast partnership very shortly.

The hon. Gentleman raised the issue of staffing. The private sector-run east coast main line is today employing more people than it did in the public sector. As somebody who believes passionately that we need more customer service staff on the railway rather than fewer, I think that is a good thing.

The hon. Gentleman asked again about the devolution of Network Rail. I simply reiterate that I think that the SNP Government have quite enough to do without going beyond the devolution recommendations that we have put in place.

As regards the travelcard, it is being issued by the industry, which is moving ahead quickly with preparations for it.

[John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)]

The last time the Secretary of State stood at the Dispatch Box, I asked him about open-access rail and competing rail firms. He rightly waxed lyrical about the benefits to customers in terms of choice and value that open-access rail can produce. As he looks at the options for the east coast main line, will he consider, in addition to the two options he has laid out for the House, an open-access alternative so that we can get away from the state-led and potentially even nationalised set of alternatives that we are otherwise being pushed towards?

[Chris Grayling]

I know that my hon. Friend feels very strongly about this. He is right about the benefits of open access. My view is that open access holds the existing operator’s feet to the customer service fire to make sure that it delivers. It would not be realistic to do this in timeframes available to me for making the change that we are going to need. However, I am very clear that the rules around the creation of the east coast partnership must and will leave room for open access.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between John Penrose and Chris Grayling

Thursday 18th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

We have two jobs to do for aviation post-Brexit. One is to conclude negotiations within the European Union, which will be part of the ongoing process of negotiating our successor arrangements, and the other is to negotiate successor agreements around the world. We are working on both those things right now.

[John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)]

On the east coast main line, rather than taking us back to the bad old days of British Rail, as the Labour party’s renationalisation proposals would do, will the Secretary of State instead consider the Competition and Markets Authority’s recommendations for more on-track open access choice and competition, with the far better quality and cost of rail services that it says would result?

[Chris Grayling]

There is no doubt that open access makes a difference. I do not think for a moment that those who, for example, live in Sunderland, Middlesbrough or Bradford and have services from Grand Central would say anything other than that open access has been a good thing. That is the area in which the private sector has really made a difference, bringing services to the network that never existed in the days of nationalisation.