Railway Stations: Accessibility

I beg to move,

That this House has considered accessibility at railway stations.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts, and I am looking around as I have constituents who intend to sit in the Public Gallery to hear what I say this morning.

Trains have been and continue to be one of the most important modes of travel in the United Kingdom. According to the Office of Rail and Road, in the past financial year 4,679,220 train journeys were completed every single day. However, even with such a large number of people using the rail network, many stations still lack the facilities to cater for the disabled, the elderly and those struggling with heavy luggage or pushchairs. As Members are aware, to address the issues faced by disabled passengers and passengers with mobility restraints when using railway stations, the Access for All programme was launched in 2006 with £360 million to fund accessible routes from the station entrance to the platform. It was extended in 2014 with a further £163 million. More than 150 stations have been completed and another 68 projects are in various stages of construction or development.

In April 2011 the Government launched a new Access for All mid-tier programme for station access projects. Although funding was originally £17 million, the large number of very strong bids for train station improvements meant that it was increased to £37.5 million and the scheme ran until 2014. According to the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani), Access for All has delivered step-free accessible routes at more than 200 stations since it was launched in 2006 and small access improvements at more than 1,500 stations.

One of the projects was at Goring station in my constituency. We managed to get lifts to make disabled access possible, but it was quite a bureaucratic process. Does my hon. Friend find that that is the case in other stations?

As someone who has walked not only the Thames path but the Ridgeway, I have experience of Goring station. I have found the system quite difficult and bureaucratic. It is a lengthy process and people often ask, just like with Brexit, “Why don’t you just get on with it?” As I get further into my speech, I will discuss my experience of the Hendon constituency.

Kirkby-in-Ashfield and Langley Mill stations, used by my constituents, are a big problem for wheelchair users and mums or dads pushing prams. Making train stations step-free should be a priority in this day and age. Most colleagues here are from towns. Does the hon. Gentleman have any information or can the Minister say whether our towns are being neglected? Or are stations in towns more likely to be step-free than those in our cities?

Although I went to university in Nottingham, I cannot say I know the hon. Lady’s constituency very well, so I will allow the Minister to respond to that point when she sums up.

It is obvious that more can and should be done. In April 2017, the Equality and Human Rights Commission published a report about how disabled people fare in in their day-to-day lives in the UK. On transport, the report stated,

“Transport options for disabled people are very limited because of the need to use only transport forms that are accessible, and these tend to be expensive.”

A few months later, in November 2017, the Department for Transport published the results of its research into disabled people’s travel patterns and attitudes to travel. It found that although being disabled does not always lead to less frequent use of train services, it does lead to problems with trains:

“It is well-established that people with disabilities travel less and for different purposes compared with people without disabilities”.

I have been campaigning on this for six years in my constituency, in Morley. People get on the train on one side to go into Leeds, but they cannot go back because there are steps. Does my hon. Friend agree that disabled people rely heavily on public services and that it is vital they can access them to ensure good quality of life? The Department for Transport should invest heavily in that area.

My hon. Friend illustrates a point that I will come on to in my speech. My constituents who are here today feel very strongly about that.

Leonard Cheshire, the UK charity for disabled people, highlights the issues facing many disabled people when trying to access train station platforms. Its research and analysis, based on data provided by the Office of Rail and Road and the National Rail website, shows that more than 40% of railway stations across England do not have step-free access, leaving many disabled people unable to travel by train. Research with more than 1,600 disabled adults shows that 35% of working-age disabled people have experienced problems using trains in the past year as a result of their disability.

Staveley station in my constituency, the first station in the Lake District national park, is accessible only by a 41-step staircase. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of the problems is having to bid for access funding to provide ramps and lifts? We expect the operator to make a bid, and the operator, in my case Northern, which has not covered itself in glory in recent times, has been reluctant to do so. We should have a top-down approach where perhaps the Minister helps to deliver solutions to, for example, Staveley’s lack of access, directly.

Having lived in Carlisle for several years, I am also aware of the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and his station. Like my station in Mill Hill, his was constructed at a time when disabled and step-free access was not a top priority. Similarly, Govia Thameslink and Network Rail were not aware of my constituents’ need and desire to have step-free access at Mill Hill Broadway station, so I sympathise with his point of view.

Like my hon. Friend, I have a London constituency. As he knows, I am bidding to make Upminster station step-free. I can make the Access for All bid only because the station is operated by c2c rather than Transport for London, and the Mayor has said there is no priority for other stations in my constituency. Will my hon. Friend join me in encouraging the Mayor to invest more of his sizable budget in this area and to look carefully at my request to open up his new £6 million TfL drivers’ toilets to disabled travellers with RADAR keys? It would make a big difference to the quality of their journey if they were able to access facilities.

As a London MP, I certainly agree with that and I urge the Mayor to allow it to happen. Indeed, I urge the Minister to make representations to the Mayor to allow it to happen. It seems not only a sensible solution to a particular problem, but something that could be rectified easily, so I certainly agree.

Not only disabled people suffer from a lack of step-free access in stations. A Department for Transport study showed that two thirds of disabled people are over the age of 65, and demographic trends predict an increase in the proportion of older people in society. According to the NHS, in the UK falls are the most common cause of injury-related deaths in people over the age of 75. The need for reliable, ever-present step-free access is imperative to ensure such injuries or fatalities do not occur in train stations. The Government’s generous funding commitment to improve station facilities is welcomed by Members present today, but I am sure we all agree that the previously mentioned statistics are of significant concern.

The issue is not just about people with disabilities. Obviously, we want to improve access for them, but it is also about a range of people. I am the father of a 15-month-old child and we would struggle to use many of our local stations, particularly Langton station in my constituency, where, I am pleased to say, we have an Access for All funding bid in at the moment. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to improve accessibility at stations not only for people with disabilities, but for everybody?

I certainly agree. In my constituency, the Thameslink line serves Gatwick and Luton airports. People, including myself, use those trains either very late at night or very early in the morning, and often struggle with heavy bags, as I have recently.

I returned to Westminster from maternity leave this week with my six-month-old baby boy in a pram, and I found using the trains incredibly difficult. My hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero) made a valid point about towns. We have an accessible lift in Halifax, but it has been my nemesis since I became an MP, as it is regularly locked and regularly broken. However, further to the points that have been made, using the tube in London with a pram was incredibly difficult. We can do so much more on that, so we really have to focus those efforts.

The hon. Lady’s contribution and those of others have illustrated the problems that many people face, not just those who are disabled. Some 60% of disabled people have no car in their household, but many other people also do not have one, particularly in London. People who, like the hon. Lady, visit London as part of their work will probably not have access to a car when pushing their baby in a buggy. Step-free access is therefore about not just disabled people, but parents, travellers and people who have general mobility problems.

My hon. Friend is making a powerful argument, and this is an important debate. Does he agree that there is also a problem with different station operators? One of my constituents, who is partially sighted, got on a train at York station, which is run by London North Eastern Railway, and went on that train to Manchester Victoria, which is operated by Northern. The two station operators did not talk to one another, and my constituent was ultimately left on the train—it was a through-station—and carried on past her stop. That is a real problem, and station operators really need to start talking to one another.

I am grateful for that intervention, because I had a constituent who reported the same problem; he had problems with his vision and had great difficulty in accessing the train service. I understand that point, and agree that train operator companies should talk to one another—whether it is c2c, Transport for London, GTR, Southern or any of the ones that my hon. Friend mentions. I hope that the Minister hears that plea. It should be not only a requirement for train operators but a requirement under disability regulation. I certainly agree with that point.

I have two mainline stations in my constituency: Hendon and Mill Hill Broadway, both of which are on the Thameslink line, which connects Bedford with Brighton and includes stops at St Pancras International, London Bridge, Blackfriars, and Elephant and Castle. Both stations serve the two London airports that I mentioned: Luton and Gatwick. Neither station has adequate step-free access, but I believe that it is true to say that the problem at Mill Hill Broadway is particularly acute.

Mill Hill Broadway is an important interchange for a large number of passengers connecting with buses, the M1 and other modes of transport. The quality of access and subsequent movement around the station is not commensurate with a station catering for about 2.7 million passengers per annum—a figure that will increase significantly in future years as a result of the thousands of new homes being built in the area. We all know that London needs new homes, and Hendon is certainly playing its part, but infrastructure and other public services need to keep up with that redevelopment.

There is no step-free access from the lower concourse where cars and buses arrive at Mill Hill Broadway, so 39 steps must be climbed to access the station. Furthermore, the subway that connects the two platforms is narrow, which raises concerns about congestion and safety at peak times. There is no question that the lack of a lift prevents some of my constituents from using the station. That is a key issue for the disabled, parents with small children, those with suitcases and the area’s growing older population. Such passengers are advised to use Elstree and Borehamwood station or West Hampstead station, which, following past upgrades, now have step-free access throughout. I believe something is fundamentally wrong when a passenger has to travel to a station that is not their most local to access our railway network.