Railways Bill (Sixth sitting)

Debate between Olly Glover and Jerome Mayhew

Committee stage
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Jerome Mayhew]

Clause 15 requires the Secretary of State to publish a document that sets out the long-term strategy for the railway, which we welcome, after consulting with Welsh Ministers and the passenger watchdog. The Secretary of State must keep the strategy under review and publish any revisions.

The clause does not provide any detail, which is part of the problem. The industry is in the dark now, and it will still be in the dark if the Bill ever becomes law. There is no draft prepared. There is no indication of the direction of travel. There is just subsection (4), which is very limited. All it says is:

“(4) The Secretary of State—

(a) must keep the rail strategy under review, and

(b) may revise or replace it.”

Well, with what and when? We are in trouble here, with no direct reference to even the development of rail freight, which we have seen in other parts of the Bill is apparently in the Government’s mind. Amendment 224 would serve to correct that by making specific reference to rail freight.

More widely, the Government have missed an opportunity to set clear targets for the strategy to achieve. Colleagues will know from the debate on clause 3 that we have already tried to amend the Bill to assist with that. Our purpose clause, new clause 1, would have set a clear direction, and new clause 2 would have set KPIs for what the strategy should achieve. That would have helped to inform our set of amendments to clause 15.

We are told that Great British Railways should be the guiding mind, so our approach is that GBR will implement the long-term strategy for rail, based on the Secretary of State’s long-term priorities for the railways. GBR is intended to be the stand-alone expert implementer of the development of the railway. The priorities are set out by the Secretary of State through the licence in schedule 1, access to funding in schedule 2 and the long-term rail strategy. All recognise that the political cycle and control periods are far too short for rail infrastructure projects. The industry really needs more predictable forward views. There is inevitably an uncomfortable fit between the needs of democracy and the political cycle—political views change with general elections and sometimes even between them—and the long-term investment certainty that large projects need. There is currently no indication of how long term the strategy will be, or even what it will seek to achieve.

Amendments 24 and 25, which we debated with clause 13 but would also affect clause 15—I do not seek to repeat the debate, but I wish to mention the impact that they would have—seek to address those failings by requiring the rail strategy to be geared towards enabling GBR to meet its key performance indicators. Without the amendments, the clause will set out a long-term strategy that includes no requirement to set clear growth targets for passenger numbers or freight use, meaning that there will be no measurable outcomes or performance metrics. I intend to seek to divide the Committee on those amendments when the time comes.

The Liberal Democrats’ amendment 134 would ensure that the rail strategy covers a 30-year period. That is logical given the infrastructure life cycle, and any timeframe is, by its nature, arbitrary, but I have to say that 30 years feels on the long side, given the political cycle of four or five years. I wish the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage well and we should be having a stab at setting out what long term actually means, but that is why we have tabled an amendment that would set the period at 15 years. That would be long enough to show the direction of travel, as he has in mind, but short enough to have some sense of connection between the political cycle and the objectives of the strategy. We may have a difference of opinion, but we are pointing in the same direction.

[Olly Glover]

I understand the shadow Minister’s point, but I put it to him that the fact that our Parliaments tend to be four or five years long is precisely why the strategy needs to be very long term, so that we avoid subjecting our railway to the political cycle and the whims and whimsies of the Government of the day. But perhaps the key point is that the Government’s own guidance on the Bill, in the section entitled, “What is the Long-Term Rail Strategy?”, states:

“It will set out strategic objectives for the railway over a 30-year period.”

Would it not be coherent to put that on the face of the Bill?

[Jerome Mayhew]

From the Government’s perspective, yes, it would be, but we have recent experience—this is a slight tangent, but I hope the Committee will bear with me—of Governments passing key objectives to achieve long out in the distance. I am thinking of the Climate Change Act 2008 and its objective of achieving net zero by 2050. That all sounds good in 2008, but in my view it does not achieve the objective of balancing democratic accountability with a long-term direction. Look, we are slightly arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Both parties agree that we want a long-term strategy, but should it be 15 years or 30 years? In a sense it does not really matter, but it needs to be significantly beyond the current five-year control period.

Amendment 137, also in the name of the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage, would require the strategy to set out a long-term strategy for supporting rural communities in accessing rail travel and co-operating with transport authorities to integrate travel options. It is a worthy objective, although we would want to go further if extending clause 15(1) beyond the railway network and railway services—the catch-all descriptors. The amendment is slightly a halfway house, but it nevertheless points in the right direction, and in so far as it makes progress, we are happy to support it.

Amendment 207, again in the name of the Liberal Democrat spokesman, would introduce a requirement for the rail strategy to consider the rail network as a whole, and the relationship between integrated timetables and infrastructure enhancement to enable such integration. There is perhaps a better solution tabled in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer), who is engaged somewhere else as we speak—there may be a better way to achieve that outcome.

Amendment 224, which I tabled, would add paragraph (c) to clause 15(1). As drafted, the provision requires the Secretary of State to

“prepare and publish a document that sets out”

her

“long term strategy for…(a) the development and use of the railway network in Great Britain, and…(b) the railway services that the Secretary of State wishes to see provided in Great Britain.”

This important amendment would add a focus on “rail freight network usage”. Rail freight does, in a sense, come under “railway services”, but we need to give it particular focus, and the amendment offers a good opportunity to do so.

Amendment 25, which is also in my name, would require the rail strategy to remain in place

“for a minimum of three control periods”,

which would be 15 years. We have already debated whether it should be 15 or 30 years, but the provision would provide the industry with a genuine long-term strategy and mean that that strategy is less likely to be used as a political football when Governments come and go. The period of 15 years is short enough to have political weight, but long enough to give the certainty that the industry also seeks.

I will briefly mention amendment 260, which was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge. I know that the subject is close to my hon. Friend’s heart because he has told me so, multiple times.

Railways Bill (Fifth sitting)

Debate between Olly Glover and Jerome Mayhew

Committee stage
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Jerome Mayhew]

It is not a perfect analogy, because GBR is at least intended to be more akin to a business—a nationalised business—but my hon. Friend is entirely right that where we have two organisations in competition, each one thinking that it runs the railways, that is a recipe for confusion at the least, and disaster at the worst.

This is not an idle concern, because it has happened before. We all remember the Virgin West Coast franchise debacle in 2012, when the slightly arm’s length process of franchising did not go well, causing a communal panic in the Department for Transport. The phrase, “Something must be done to prevent this from ever happening again,” was no doubt repeated many times. The result was that more and more micromanaging took place by the Department for Transport in the setting of franchises. The Department no longer talked only about outcomes that needed to be achieved, leaving how companies went about that entirely up to them, which is the appropriate way to draft a franchise agreement. Instead, that devolved into mechanisms of how a franchise should be operated.

We had that mission creep, and I fear that under the Bill we might get exactly the same approach with GBR. It will be set up with the best of intentions, and perhaps in the first two or three years all will run smoothly and the directing mind in practice might well be GBR, but then something will happen, because something always does happen in the real world, with lots of people doing their best but sometimes making mistakes, and there will be a collective gasp from the Department of Transport, because it will feel like it is on the hook, so “Something must be done to ensure that this doesn’t happen again.” We have designed into this mechanism a structure that allows the removal of GBR’s operational independence, and it does so without any reference to actions of last resort by the Government—the Bill is silent on that.

We talk about the Secretary of State, but we all know that officials in the Department for Transport will be advising the Secretary of State on what he or she should be doing in a particular circumstance, and there will be a power grab. Without amendment, the clause will absolutely allow for that. We should be alive to the real-world experience that we all have and take this opportunity to strengthen its wording in order to design out that issue and ensure that there is proper accountability—with GBR accountable to the Secretary of State and, through the Secretary of State, to Parliament—and that operational independence stays with what will be a nationalised business, rather than creating a railway version of NHS England, as my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight East mentioned a moment ago.

I have tabled two amendments to address this issue. Amendment 12 would limit directions to circumstances in which the Office of Rail and Road assesses GBR to be in breach of its statutory functions. It could be argued that the Secretary of State should have an emergency lever; that is fair enough, because bad things happen. One of our great complaints before the election, although I am beginning to hear it from Labour Ministers as well, was, “We pull the levers but they’re not attached to anything—we have no power.” When we form the Government after the next election, we will want to have levers that are attached to something, and I accept that it is necessary to have an emergency lever to pull should a significant unforeseen event occur—another pandemic, perhaps—and an intervention be required.

However, amendment 12 would still allow the Secretary of State to intervene in emergency scenarios, as the ORR would deem that such events make it impossible for GBR to conform to its business plan targets. Clause 74 sets out the ORR’s power to monitor GBR’s performance. Elsewhere in the Bill, we shall argue that the ORR needs more teeth to hold GBR to account, and this provision limiting the potential for the Secretary of State to intervene until such time that an independent regulatory body has recognised that GBR has not been able to fulfil its functions will be an important safeguard.

Amendment 11 would put the words “last resort” on the face of the Bill, and would provide that a direction may be made only after the removal of GBR’s chief executive officer. The intention behind the amendment is to treat GBR as a business, which I think we all agree is what it is intended to be—albeit a nationalised one. Where there is a board of non-executive directors, they can question the executive team, and they can challenge decisions and require the chief executive to explain and defend the direction of the company. However, when push comes to shove, and the decision is made that the organisation is moving in the wrong direction, the weapon available to the chairman is the removal of the chief executive officer.

If GBR is operating on a day-to-day basis with oversight from the Department for Transport—the Secretary of State—and concerns arise as to its direction or performance, the sequence of severity of the response should not start with guidance from the Secretary of State and then mandatory directions. They might be the final requirement, because we all need those levers, but surely they should come only after the chief executive has been challenged and then removed, just as in the private sector with an arm’s length majority investment.

[Olly Glover (Didcot and Wantage) (LD)]

I certainly see what the hon. Member is trying to do with these amendments, and the Liberal Democrats share some of his concerns about the balance between holding GBR to account and GBR’s autonomy. However, does he not feel that amendment 11 may go a little too far? Laudable though the KPIs that he has set out are, I am not sure that any railway in this country has ever achieved them all at once, and if the amendment were made we may very well go through a revolving door of chief executives before the Secretary of State can give any direction.

[Jerome Mayhew]

That is a perfectly fair challenge, but amendment 11 would not require the CEO’s removal by the Secretary of State if those KPIs are not met; it would be a necessary first step to demonstrate that the KPIs are not being met, and then there would be a discretion. I suppose the hon. Member is really arguing that my safeguard is not quite as strong as it could be. Nevertheless, it would be a step in the right direction, and it would not require the removal of the chief executive.

New clause 4 would give the Secretary of State the power to dismiss the CEO of GBR on the grounds that a KPI has not been met and—this is an important bit, which the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage might recognise gives the new clause some weight—GBR has failed to act on guidance that has been issued by the Secretary of State under clause 9. It is sequential. First, the chief executive is given guidance from the Secretary of State. Most chief executives worth their salt would take notice of official guidance given by their 100% shareholder, but if for some reason they fail to act on the guidance and they are still missing their KPI, then the power to dismiss would be exercisable. In my submission, that is a good approach.

Clause 7(2)—the “interference clause”—anticipates minor direction changes, which is exactly the kind of direction that should not be issued and is contrary to the explanatory notes. We are told that the powers in the clause will be used only as a last resort, but subsection (2) states:

“A direction under this section may provide, in particular, that a function is only to be exercised—

(a) after consulting the Secretary of State, or

(b) with the Secretary of State’s consent.”

The clause is not an emergency lever. It is quite clear from the drafting that the circumstances in subsection (2) cannot apply to a last-resort emergency lever. It is saying, “You can carry on doing things, but we need to have oversight in the nitty-gritty.” It is truly an interference clause.

Is it the Government’s intention that directions issued under clause 7 will be, as described in the explanatory notes, used as a “last resort” emergency brake, or do they intend—this is the case as the Bill is drafted—that the Secretary of State will give himself or herself the power to intervene in day-to-day management, even down to the level that individual decisions will not be taken until there has been consultation with the Secretary of State or the Secretary of State has consented to them?

Clause 7(5) needs improvement. It requires publication by the Secretary of State, but anticipates no role for Parliament in that oversight. The organisation Rail Forum said:

“We agree that this is desirable to ensure GBR remains arm’s length and is allowed to manage its own affairs.”

That is important. The industry itself is saying that GBR needs to be operationally independent and to manage its own affairs. Amendment 14 would correct that issue. It would require the Secretary of State to lay any decision before Parliament—the right place for primary scrutiny. Rail Forum supports the amendment. It says:

“This is essential to ensure that normal Parliamentary process is not bypassed.”

Amendment 16 would mean that decisions on fares imposed on GBR by the Secretary of State can be assessed against passenger growth and affordability. Such a direction would have a huge impact on the financial position of GBR, because decisions on fares and passenger growth and affordability are central to revenue. It is crucial that decisions are made on proper evidence and in line with the objects of GBR.

Railways Bill (Fourth sitting)

Debate between Olly Glover and Jerome Mayhew

Committee stage
Thursday 22nd January 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Jerome Mayhew]

That is just as well, because I am going to leave those to the Liberal Democrat spokesman, but I will be happy to support new clause 15 should he be minded to press it to a vote.

[Olly Glover (Didcot and Wantage) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Alec. I wish to speak to new clause 15. In doing so, I must ask the Minister for his assistance with either a medical or a political problem—I am not entirely sure which it is, because I cannot get a GP appointment in Didcot as we do not have a GP surgery on Great Western Park, but that is an issue for another time. In the absence of a GP appointment, I really hope that the Minister will be able to save me from sullying my reputation. In speaking to this new clause, I find myself at risk of having to say something positive about the Thatcher Government, which is obviously somewhat politically embarrassing.

New clause 15 proposes adding a rolling programme of electrification to the Bill. The reason that I may need to say something nice about the Thatcher Government is that according to figures that I have looked at, nearly 3,000 km of railway was electrified under that Government during the 1980s, to which the just 170 km electrified under the 1997 to 2010 Labour Government compares very unfavourably. That perhaps comes as quite a surprise, given that there was significant economic growth during that later period, at least compared with today—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Olly Glover]

The length and complexity of this amendment mean that hopefully I will be able to relieve hon. Members by making a very concise speech. The Liberal Democrats welcome the Government’s commitment to a freight growth target as part of GBR. It is good that we have greater ambitions for the carriage of rail freight on our rail network, which tends to lag behind most European competitors in modal share. However, we think that the Bill has missed an opportunity by not including a comparable target for passenger growth. I have heard the argument made in front of the Select Committee and other forums that that could compromise or undermine the freight growth. I disagree with that premise. As so often in life, it is not either/or; it is both/and. Railways are useful for both passengers and freight.

Freight is arguably neglected on our network and the economic and environmental benefits are absolutely enormous, especially if electrically hauled. One freight train is able to convey many containers or aggregate wagons and take dozens of lorries off the road. We therefore very much support the freight growth target, but feel that there should also be a passenger growth target. Many of our roads are plagued by congestion and many people opt to take the car who, in other circumstances, would like to take the train, but have either had negative experience of overcrowding or fear that they could be subject to overcrowding and a bad experience. Amendment 133 would require GBR to set a target for increasing passenger traffic and publish progress in relation to how it will achieve that. I think that I have said more than enough and am very interested to hear the Minister’s comments.

[Jerome Mayhew]

The official Opposition, strongly support this amendment because it seeks to increase passenger traffic on the railways, in addition to the welcomed inclusion of an objective to increase freight. We agree with it so strongly because it is almost identical to our amendment 35, which I shall also speak to. Amendment 35 would add a specific requirement to subsection (2) paragraph (b) of clause 18—the duties clause—for GBR Ministers and the Office of Rail and Road,

“to increase the number of passenger journeys”.

This directly addresses the concern raised by the Campaign for Better Transport in the evidence received by the Committee. It is an essential amendment to ensure that GBR has a key focus and aim to increase passenger numbers—something that is essential for a railway. It would ensure that the dominant culture of GBR is not one where passengers are seen as creators of damage to infrastructure.

That is not a loose accusation that I have made; I have been listening to the industry for over a year now. The core structure of GBR is Network Rail. I know that I am bound to be corrected if I get this even a couple out, but I believe that Network Rail has about 41,000 members of staff. Network Rail is the central body to which train operating companies have been added at a rate of about one every six weeks or two months over the last period. An oft-repeated criticism of the culture of Network Rail has been that it sees passengers as a necessary irritation in the correct functioning of the railway. Sir Alec, if your organisation is engineer focused, the condition of the infrastructure is what is most important to you. Passengers demand lots and lots of trains, but lots and lots of trains damage the infrastructure. There is a concern in the wider sector— I am merely passing it on—that the culture of Network Rail has historically been one in which it wants to limit the number of trains to what it considers to be acceptable, so that it has a nice steady state of repair of the infrastructure. If that is the dominant culture that pervades GBR, now that it is bringing everything together, that will be a disaster for passenger services, because there would not be an automatic incentive to focus on an increase in passenger journeys, which is why amendments 133 and 35 are so important.

New clause 42—to go into the detail a little—would require the Secretary of State to set, publish and keep under review a passenger growth target. It would also require GBR to have regard to that target when exercising its statutory functions. In oral evidence to this Committee, Ben Plowden, chief executive of the Campaign for Better Transport, said:

“It is welcome that there is a duty to promote the interests of passengers and disabled people in the Bill. We think there is a case for strengthening that duty so that it aligns with the duty in relation to freight, which is to promote the use of the network for passengers and disabled passengers. There should also be an equivalent duty on the Secretary of State to set a passenger growth target, as she is required to do in relation to freight, so that, as we picked up on a minute ago, GBR does not end up being incentivised not to grow the network in order to meet its crowding and reliability duties, for example. It seems to us that giving it a statutory incentive to increase passenger use over time would be very helpful to build on the existing duty in the Bill.”––[Official Report, Railways Public Bill Committee, 20 January 2026; c. 24, Q49.]

That organisation was not alone, because John Thomas from ALLRAIL said:

“I think a passenger growth target is really important. At the moment, the duties for GBR only include improving performance. You can improve performance, as we saw during covid, by cutting the number of services, but that is not necessarily in the best interest of customers. We think a balance between a performance target and a passenger growth target is really important.”––[Official Report, Railways Public Bill Committee, 20 January 2026; c. 47, Q78.]

Finally, we heard from Rob Morris of Siemens. He said:

“What we seem to be missing in the Bill at the moment is the ambition for passenger growth, how that will improve the railway and the levels of investment that need to go with it.”––[Official Report, Railways Public Bill Committee, 20 January 2026; c. 64, Q122.]

It is unclear to me why, if the Bill can require a target to increase use of the railway network for freight, the same obligation is not applied to passenger services. The inconsistency suggests a deliberate choice not to mandate passenger growth. And why would GBR care about passenger growth? After all, if it will be dominated by Network Rail, there is at least a risk that its culture will be one of avoiding damage to infrastructure, in excess of looking after growing the number of passengers.

In written evidence to the Transport Committee, Rail Forum said:

“From Rail Forum’s perspective there is nothing specific in the Bill that will guarantee improved travel for passengers. Improvement is predicated on the goodwill of GBR and others driving things in the ‘right direction’. In our view the key to improvement is culture change within those organisations coming together to form GBR. Creating GBR from Network Rail Infrastructure Ltd…will not signal the need for change and creates a risk that the current Network Rail culture will be seen as the norm and hence the status quo will prevail.”

These are not arguments made up by a cunning Opposition to wrongfoot the Government. This is the Opposition doing our job properly and reflecting the concerns of the wider sector—not just from one organisation but from multiple organisations, right across the sector. They identify the drafting as a problem and the culture as potentially a problem unless the legislation makes it clear that it is a duty of GBR to increase passenger numbers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jerome Mayhew]

Thank you very much, Sir Alec. We are making progress—it may not feel like it, but we are. Courage! We’re getting there.

Clause 5 deals with co-operation with relevant local government bodies. It is not going to be a bestseller, but it is important, just like every clause in the Bill. It delves further into the devolution of powers. It is hard to quantify the clause while the Government’s devolution Bill continues its progress through the House, which creates an awkward chicken and egg scenario. The challenge with the clause, about the nature of the devolution of powers across local government, really ends up bleeding into clause 6. I am concerned that the Government and, by extension, GBR will end up picking and choosing who they wish to accept consultation decisions from.

Clause 5(1) specifically uses the word “may” when referring to arrangements between GBR and local government. It states:

“Great British Railways may enter into arrangements with a relevant local government body about the exercise by Great British Railways of its statutory functions in relation to railways and railway services in the body’s area.”

There is no clear obligation to provide any functions to mayoral combined authorities, mayoral combined county authorities, passenger transport executives or integrated transport areas. Can the Minister help me and the Committee by clarifying what functions he has in mind in relation to this clause? How would it work in practice? Will there be guidance on it, and when will we have it? Has that work been done yet? If it has, why has it not been shared with the Committee, with its obvious corollaries? If it has not been done, why not?

That leads me to amendment 232 in my name, which would create a new subsection (2A) of clause 5 as follows:

“Where no arrangement between Great British Railways and a relevant local authority exists, the relevant local authority may appeal a decision made by Great British Railways affecting passenger rail services within its boundary under section 67.”

To bring the amendment to life, we need to refer back to the evidence from Mayors Brabin and Burnham on Tuesday. The amendment would give mayors and other regional leaders the right to appeal GBR decisions to alter passenger services in their area. They would be able to appeal to the ORR, because it would be an independent appeals process, in the event that there was no partnership in existence. In their evidence, Mayors Burnham and Brabin were clear that they expected—in fact, I think Mayor Burnham said he would insist on—greater powers to influence rail in their regions. The amendment would help to achieve that through a continued role for the trusted and impartial Office of Rail and Road.

At this stage, I should make it clear that while the power to appeal is set out in clause 67, the governance—what that appeal can look like—is set out in clause 68. I think I am right in saying that it was described as not being worth the paper it is written on as it is drafted, because it limits appeals to judicial review proceedings in the High Court where there is an error of law. There is strong evidence before the Committee to suggest that that clause should be amended to allow an appeal on the merits, and amendment 232 needs to be taken in conjunction with future amendments that we will put before the Committee to do exactly that. It is intended to include in the Bill the provision for an appeal on the merits to the independent ORR, in order to give succour to mayors and other leaders of regional transport authorities where GBR chooses to run roughshod over their local plans.

[Olly Glover]

The Lib Dems think that clause 5 is along the right lines, and it is good that the Government are proposing to enshrine the principle of local consultation and dialogue into the Bill, because that is important for getting our railways and transport on a better footing. With the greatest respect to all Members present, too much in our country is dictated from Whitehall. We need more devolution; we need to listen more to local voices, and that applies as much to railways and transport as it does to anything else. I do, however, see merit in Conservative amendment 232, which is intended to strengthen some of the provisions of clause 5.

I will briefly say a little about Liberal Democrat amendment 214, which we see as a very simple and uncontroversial amendment. If the Minister does not intend to support it, I would genuinely be interested in why. It is simply based on the principle that clause 5 focuses on mayoral strategic authorities, but, because of the ongoing state of flux that local government reorganisation is in—I will not use any stronger words than that—we do not yet know exactly what the final structure will be; we do not know whether everyone is going to get a mayoral strategic authority. I am not an expert on the south-west of England—the hon. Member for South West Devon, sat next to me, is—but I keep hearing, for example, that Cornwall may not be part of a mayoral authority. Surely, it is not the intention of clause 5 to say that GBR would not have to engage with whatever local or regional authority there ends up being in Cornwall, if not a mayoral strategic authority.

[Jerome Mayhew]

This Committee has been a good example of the hon. Gentleman’s party and mine working collaboratively to improve the Bill. While he knows that I agree with the direction of travel that his amendment has in mind, I question its extension to an organisation as small as a district council. Given that district councils are a feature of two-tier local government—there will be a county council above them—can he explain why he thinks it is sensible to include them in the amendment?

[Olly Glover]

I encourage the hon. Gentleman not to get too carried away by the points on which we have agreed so far, because there will be plenty on which that is not the case. I also encourage Government Members not to get too excited, because I have agreed with them on plenty of things as well. Hopefully that shows that our politics can be more serious and less juvenile and we can all find things on which we agree. Before I make myself feel even more sick, I shall carry on.

I understand what the hon. Member for Broadland and Fakenham was saying. The intention of the amendment is not to suggest that GBR should be engaging with district-level authorities by default. Once local government reorganisation is complete and coherent, there will not be any district councils, so that bit will be rendered null and void. The aim is simply to cover all our bases, because we do not know where local government reorganisation will take us. Until we get there, it is important that whatever the voices are in a given part of the country, they are heard.

Local government is so complicated. It is different in so many bits of the country—even places right next to each other. My constituency covers South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse, which have district and county, and then next door in West Berkshire it is unitary. Even there, even in parts of the country that used to be part of the same county—I hope the Campaign for Historic Counties is listening; I do sometimes engage with its Facebook comments—

Railways Bill (Third sitting)

Debate between Olly Glover and Jerome Mayhew

Committee stage
Thursday 22nd January 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Jerome Mayhew (Broadland and Fakenham) (Con)]

It is very nice to have you in the Chair, Mrs Hobhouse. I think this a conversation among Labour Members, and I do not want to get in the way of a private dispute. I might just sit down and listen to what the Minister has to say.

[Olly Glover (Didcot and Wantage) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Hobhouse. I want to speak in favour of new clause 24, which I will press to a vote when the time comes, because, as I have said in other forums where the Minister has been present, one of the Liberal Democrats’ big concerns is the Secretary of State’s power over GBR as specified in the Bill. I have given many examples previously of past poor state-led decisions, and fear I will do so again during the Committee’s discussions. Of course, there are lots of problems with private sector railways, but there have also been lots of public sector problems, too, whether with fares, rolling stock or infrastructure.

Our proposal would increase the transparency and accountability of the Secretary of State’s decisions. It would not prevent any of those decisions, but it would create a vehicle for them to be properly discussed. We propose creating a Great British Railways board. If the Secretary of State went against the advice of that board, the reasons for that would need to be communicated. The people serving on the board would represent GBR, but also other key stakeholders in the running of the railway: open access passenger operators, freight operators, the Office of Rail and Road, the passengers’ council and organisations that represent passengers with accessibility requirements. The board would comprise at least six members. To make sure that there is a voice for the other stakeholders that GBR needs to work with and serve, no more than half the board’s membership would be employed by, or otherwise represent, GBR.

It would be for GBR to determine the frequency of board meetings in any year. Any decision or direction from the Secretary of State concerning GBR would be notified to the board prior to being made, and should be made only if a majority of the GBR board approved it. The board would need to publish any decision or direction it considered, and whether it had approved any such decision or direction. If the board did not agree with the Secretary of State, the Secretary of State would be free to go ahead with whatever they decided to do against the views of the GBR board, which we hope would be made up of experts from both GBR and elsewhere, but would need to publish a statement setting out their reasons for that.

That is a summary of our proposal. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s comments.

--- Later in debate ---

[Olly Glover]

I stand to speak in favour of amendment 131 and new clause 9, and we will push new clause 9 to a vote if you are willing, Mrs Hobhouse. The amendments are intended to encourage GBR to think deeply and creatively about fares and ticketing, reflecting the fact that until recently—more on which anon—rail fares have been subject to above-inflation increases for much of the past 20 to 30 years.

Many passengers feel that they are not getting good value for money and that the current fares and ticketing system requires a PhD in British railways ticketing systems, even for a nerd like me. I recently got caught out because GWR’s peak hour restrictions are utterly baffling and incomprehensible. I do not wish to speak too highly of myself—it is not my style—but if I, someone with the generally not particularly character-enhancing reputation in this place of being a railway nerd, got caught out, it does suggest that the system is too hard to process and needs to change. Given that the car is the default mode of transport for so many people, an overly complicated ticketing system creates a further barrier for people using it. That is why we have tabled amendment 131 and new clause 9.

Our amendments would require Great British Railways to prepare and publish a report on how it will exercise its ticketing functions under section 3 of the Act. Our measures set out various proposals that we would like GBR to consider and which we feel would significantly improve the value for money of the fares system and its accessibility and comprehensibility to everyone using the railway, and help it to draw on best practice from elsewhere—both domestically and in other countries—to improve the current situation.

The report that we are asking for would need to include the following information. To give credit to the Government, they recently embraced a long-standing Lib Dem campaign for a rail fares freeze, for which we are grateful and praise them, but it should not just be a one-off that Department for Transport Ministers somehow managed to achieve the miracle of persuading the Treasury to do it. It is something that we need to think about for the future. On this side of the House we are not so fiscally irresponsible—

[Jerome Mayhew]

I do not wish to interrupt the hon. Member’s flow, but there is a wider point there. The hon. Member is right to mention that the Government have frozen fares, but they have not reduced the cost of providing railway services. All they have done is frozen fares on the one hand and increased taxation on the other—and the taxpayer is having to pick up the difference. Does he agree that what the Government have done is put money into one pocket, but taken it out of the pocket of passengers who are, presumably, taxpayers?

[Olly Glover]

Of course, taxpayers pay for a wide range of services, public or otherwise. Too often, the railway has been viewed almost uniquely, with the high expectation that it covers its own costs. The key challenge with a rail fares freeze is that it needs to be fiscally responsible. While the one-off gesture is welcome, and relieves some of the pressure that has built up over the last few years during the cost of living crisis, our measure for the future is, we believe, more fiscally responsible. A cap on fare increases that does not exceed the rate of inflation should become the default, and should be reviewed as part of each five-year funding settlement.

We also advocate for extending, where not currently provided for, a 50% discount on all train fares for passengers aged under 18 to address the anomaly of fare rates for young people aged 16 to 18. We want a tap-in, tap-out method of ticketing that is consistent across the countries of England, Wales and Scotland.

Railways Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Olly Glover and Jerome Mayhew

Committee stage
Tuesday 20th January 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Jerome Mayhew]

Q They do not agree, do they? We have heard stark evidence today that the lack of a level playing field and the lack of advanced sight of where this legislation is going are making investment in the railways less likely, not more likely. That is the evidence of the sector that you have heard today. You can put your fingers in your ears and say something different, but that is the evidence that we have heard.

Whether it is the access in use concerns, the failure of the appeals process to be anything worthy of the name, or the fact that the proposed powers for the Secretary of State to change without notice access in use, taken in combination, the evidence from multiple witnesses today was that the Bill does not make it easier. Are you going to listen to them, or are the Government going to pursue their dogged insistence that everyone else is wrong and they are right?

Keir Mather: If you take something like the rolling stock and infrastructure strategy, the consultations are undertaken in close partnership with the private sector. If you are asking me whether it is going to be easier in the long term, with GBR created, for private sector operators to engage with a level playing field, I think that it will be. I think that it creates a very clear structure of accountability measures, clear metrics by which decisions are taken and robust accountability, if GBR does not meet its obligations under the access regime, to make sure that it does things correctly, especially on the matter of access.

I think it is important that we dig into this further, because it came out consistently with the freight operators. GBR has to decide how it meets its capacity duty once it has decided what best use of the railway constitutes. That is a really important safeguard that is built into the Bill. The Secretary of State gives GBR its funding envelope through the business plan, and needs to ensure that GBR will deliver the services that it has said it will. It is therefore very important to have that capacity duty in place, but that is after GBR has made a determination, while balancing its existing duties and its need to promote freight and service providers on the railway, on whether or not those services stack up.

I think that the accountability process and appeals process are very clear, and give private operators multiple points to raise concerns, and robust enforcement measures for the ORR to substitute decisions and ask GBR to think again. The point about thinking again is very important, because we want GBR to improve as an organisation, and to become more agile and more responsive to the needs of the private sector, and the appeals process facilitates that.

[Olly Glover]

Q You have both been very clear, and so has Lord Hendy, that a key intention of the Bill and the creation of GBR is to better integrate infrastructure and train operation. If that is the case, why has funding for passenger services been excluded from the periodic review process of GBR’s infrastructure costs? Does separating those funding streams undermine the goal of a truly integrated railway?

Keir Mather: That is a really important point. I hope that you feel that the human side of the equation, in terms of furthering the interests of passengers through the duties, is embedded in clause 18, but I take your point about the funding envelope, and the way that passenger services are funded via the spending review period set by the Secretary of State, as opposed to infrastructure more broadly. The reason for that in the immediate term is that the procurement and delivery of passenger services is a far more complex and changeable process to work through than the delivery of long-term infrastructure, or other functions that sit under GBR.

In the future, we can certainly get into a debate about whether passenger services should be funded in a similar way to other aspects of GBR’s operation, but for the moment, and after GBR is stood up, which let us remember is in quite short order after the passage of the Bill, in around 12 months’ time, the Secretary of State needs to be able to determine that passenger services offer value for money. It is therefore right that she retains more control over the funding envelope for those services at that stage. We can certainly take the debate on how that should change in the future forward as part of this Committee. I would be very keen to explore it further.