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That this House has considered the Union Connectivity Review.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I am pleased to have secured this debate on the Union connectivity review and delighted that so many Members have shown an interest in taking part. I will certainly bear that interest in mind and try to keep my remarks reasonably brief.
Sir Peter Hendy published the Union connectivity review interim report last week, and I want to start by congratulating him and his team on their work so far. What leaps out from the pages of that report is a genuine enthusiasm for transport connectivity and its enormous potential to strengthen our economic performance by improving the opportunities available to the people we all represent. In my discussions with Sir Peter, it has been clear to me that he gets it. I believe we can expect a substantial and potentially transformative piece of work when the final report appears in the summer. The review should be welcomed by everyone who cares about improving connectivity within and across the United Kingdom. It is to be welcomed for practical reasons and for reasons of principle.
Before I talk in more detail about some of those practical benefits, particularly as they apply to my area in the Scottish borders, I want to set out why the review is right in principle. As Sir Peter states unequivocally in his interim report:
“Devolution has been good for transport”.
As he is a former commissioner for transport in the devolved Greater London Authority, it should come as no surprise that he says so—and he is correct. His review is rightly seeking to engage with the devolved Administrations across the United Kingdom, though in the case of the SNP Scottish Government, sadly, that co-operative attitude has not been reciprocated. The decade I spent as a Member of the Scottish Parliament convinced me of the huge potential for more responsive decision making, which is inherent in devolution, even if I did not always think that the nationalist Government were always making the most of that potential. I might return to that point if time permits.
Nothing in the content or intention of the review in any way undermines the ability of the devolved Governments to make transport policies for the nations they serve. Instead, the review does something new, imaginative and, I think, necessary—it looks at our transport connectivity right across the United Kingdom in the round. As Sir Peter points out, devolution, for all its undoubted benefits, has led to a lack of attention to connectivity between the four nations. The review seeks to pay some attention to that important matter.
It is quite right that the United Kingdom Government, as the Government serving the whole UK and accountable to representatives of the whole UK in this Parliament, should have commissioned the review. Everyone who wants devolution within the UK to work should welcome this approach. Of course, if someone’s objective is to show that devolution does not work and that separation is the only answer, no doubt they will object to it. If it is good for the United Kingdom, it is bad for the cause of separation. I fear we might hear some of that dog-in-the-manger negativity from SNP Members later in the debate, but perhaps they will pleasantly surprise me.
Obviously, the hon. Gentleman will acknowledge the fact that the SNP Government delivered the borders railway, which is obviously a great benefit to his constituency.
I am grateful for that. There is an opportunity in the review to accelerate the extension of the borders railway from Tweedbank to Hawick and Newcastleton, and on to Carlisle, which is why I and most of my constituents are baffled as to why the Scottish Government refuse to engage with the review and allow the acceleration of that project to take place.
That is even more surprising because the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) has called for an extension of the borders rail link to Carlisle, and for it
“to become a proper cross-border connection.”—[Official Report, 17 October 2018; Vol. 647, c. 353WH.]
Back in 2018, he asked whether the UK Government would work with the Scottish Government on that line, so I do not understand what has changed. There is an opportunity to get that project moving more quickly, yet his colleagues in the Scottish Government are trying to stop investment in transport in my constituency and other parts of Scotland.
It is hard to get it across to the SNP Government that transport links across the border are important too, and that Scotland’s two Governments should work together to improve them. The UK is a willing partner in that enterprise, as the review testifies, and it is time that the SNP put the politics aside and joined the UK Government in that spirit. My constituents welcome the ideas and intent of the UK connectivity review to boost cross-border infrastructure. The Borderlands initiative, behind which the UK Government have been the driving force, reflects the fact that the south of Scotland and the far north of England are a functioning economic area with strong ties. That is one of the reasons that voters in my area rejected by two to one the suggestion in 2014 that an international border should be erected to separate Scotland from the rest of Britain. We do not want new barriers; we want new connections and stronger links.
I shall call other Back Benchers, followed by the SNP spokesperson, the Opposition spokesperson and the Minister. We want to get to Front-Bench contributions by 5.30 pm, and a lot of people wish to contribute today, so the time limit will be between four and four and a half minutes so we can get through everyone.
5:03 pm
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP) [V]
I will not use up four and a half minutes and I will respect those who wish to speak in the debate. That is how it is done: include other people, talk to other people and it is shared around. That is a lesson the UK Government should learn.
As with the levelling-up perspective, published with the latest UK Budget, the UK Government are using the powers they gave themselves through the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 to bypass the Scottish Parliament and govern in ways that could contradict the devolved priorities of Scotland. Where is the consultation in the Union connectivity review? I heard what was said by the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont), but there is a difference between consulting and talking down to what is already a devolved area. The UK Government keep saying that they will consult with the devolved powers when the opportunities arise, but they truly do not. What happened to “Lead not leave”? What happened to the most powerful devolved nation in the world? Promises were swept aside with a smirk, or a shrug of the shoulders.
Now comes a new set of promises, exhibiting what I would describe as a superiority complex, going by its political title—one nation conservatism. The UK Government are once again ignoring the plans of the devolved powers and failing to take those plans into consideration. If the UK Government will not consult, we can only presume that they will not seek consent to any projects relating to devolved matters.
We know what the talk of a physical link between Northern Ireland and Scotland is all about. Businesses in Scotland are being burdened with heavily increased and complex paperwork to ship Scottish goods to Northern Ireland and the European Union. That is a direct consequence of the UK Government’s choice to remove Scotland from the single market and customs union. A bridge will not fix that; a tunnel will not fix it. They cannot bury their mistakes.
The UK Government must honour their commitment to UK-wide infrastructure investment, and they should do so by ensuring that adequate new resources are made available through relevant budgets, to allow decisions on infrastructure priorities to be taken by each devolved Government.
It is not clear from the Union connectivity review’s terms of reference that the review comes with additional funding as a mechanism for prioritising existing funding. However, there is now, more than ever, a need for the UK Government to agree increased fiscal flexibilities for the Scottish Government, so that they can take advantage of the historically low cost of borrowing to invest for Scotland’s future. Such large infrastructure programmes should not be used as last-minute attempts to paper over the cracks in the Union, when support for independence is riding high. If the UK Government and institutions of state really cared for the development of the whole UK—and with that, inter-connectivity—Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the north of England would not have been ignored for decades before now.
Obviously, the hon. Member for Inverclyde (Ronnie Cowan) is disappointed and has delivered what we might have expected. It is all about independence; it is not about delivering for the people of Scotland on the issues that are really important to them.
My constituents, watching this back in Dumfries and Galloway, will be absolutely appalled by the ignoring of the issues that really impact on them. One of those issues is that the A75, which is one of the most important strategic routes in the UK and was identified as such in Europe, has received little or no investment from the Scottish National party Scottish Government.
That is something of a surprise, because back in 1997, when Alasdair Morgan, the former MP, was campaigning, the A75 was Scotland’s forgotten road and was to be prioritised. Then, in 2001, I read in my local paper that the A75 was the nationalists’ top priority. It had been identified in an SNP policy paper as an absolute in terms of upgrading Scotland’s transport infrastructure. But still there is no meaningful upgrade to that road.
Back in 2016, ahead of the Scottish parliamentary election, we were promised a transport summit in Dumfries and Galloway within 100 days of that election. Well, guess what? The SNP Government could not even meet their 100-day target, which did not even come with any financial consequences. A meeting was subsequently held in 2016 and—surprise, surprise—what has happened since? Nothing, nothing; no meaningful upgrades to the A75. That is why my constituents and I welcome this report, which identifies the strategic importance of the A75 for traffic coming from Northern Ireland, but it also is important for my constituents who live in the Dumfries area and want to go to work in Carlisle.
Instead of having these snivelling, pathetic constitutional arguments about the administration of the project, I want to see the Scottish Government grasp this opportunity and get the job done. I want to see a dualled A75 between Gretna and Stranraer. I would work with anybody to achieve that. My son, Oliver Mundell, who is the MSP for Dumfriesshire and has campaigned relentlessly to dual that road, is of the same mind. It is not about all these constitutional technicalities and the obsession with independence, it is about getting the A75 dualled. When people come to vote on 7 May in the south of Scotland, I think they will know who are the people who stand up to get something like the A75 done and who are just apologists for the SNP Government in Edinburgh.
While we await the final recommendations of the connectivity review, when Sir Peter Hendy publishes his final report this summer, I am pleased that the interim update released last week identifies issues with cross-border rail services between south Wales and Bristol and the Bristol area as an important emerging theme.
As referenced in the interim report, 9.4 million passenger journeys were made between Wales and England in 2018-19. This total includes many of my constituents who commute to work in Bristol and the west of England from Newport, the Severn tunnel and the Severn tunnel junction
The Severn tunnel junction is a gateway station for Wales. It has been one of the fastest growing passenger stations on the Great Western mainline over the last two decades. This is despite having lost a number of services on the Great Western franchise back in 2006 and more recently having one less cross-country service. Over the last 10 years, total passenger growth has been large—three times the UK average.
Unfortunately, there has not been an investment in capacity to meet this growing need for cross-border travel from south-east Wales. I realise that at the moment we are in different times, but, for example, in pre-pandemic times, GWR morning services from the Severn tunnel junction to Bristol Temple Meads and beyond have been plagued by overcrowding and a lack of reliability for years.
The situation is compounded by the fact that the Welsh Government and Transport for Wales were restricted by the Department for Transport from providing any additional cross-border services under the current terms of the Wales and Borders franchise. Extra services would help to alleviate some of pressure. As I have highlighted in numerous Transport questions, it is still not clear why the DFT is blocking this. I hope the final report of the Union connectivity review this summer will have something to say about that.
Before we go to Dr James Davies, I will reduce the time limit to three minutes.
5:15 pm
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con) [V]
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. Ms McVey. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) on securing this important debate.
The Government’s levelling-up agenda, in particular the Union connectivity review, represents a welcome step forward for north Wales, where there have been decades of under-investment in infrastructure. Although the UCR focuses on all forms of transport connectivity, in the interests of time I will confine my comments to rail services.
The all-party parliamentary group on Mersey Dee North Wales, which I chair, works closely with a rail taskforce with the same footprint, otherwise known as Growth Track 360, to promote the infrastructure needs of our region. For that area, the connectivity we need is not just efficient long-distance travel but fit-for-purpose regional services that can better support day-to-day life and the success of our cross-border economy.
Mobile phone data from 2019 demonstrate that the number of daily journeys from north Wales to the north-west is more than 20 times higher than the number from north Wales to other parts of Wales. Those journeys take place despite the poor existing infrastructure. At present, a 65-mile journey by train from Prestatyn in my constituency to central Manchester takes at least one hour and 45 minutes. Travelling by car is a quicker option, at just over an hour. A rail journey of the same distance in the south-east takes as little as 40 minutes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, currently only 1% of cross-border commuting in our region is by rail, some 80% less than the national average.
Sir Peter Hendy’s interim report highlights connections from Ynys Môn and the north Wales coast to Merseyside and Manchester for freight and passengers as a key issue arising from the work he has undertaken so far. That recognition is welcome, as is £20 million of funding to explore the development of projects across the country. I hope that forthcoming plans for the north Wales line will be ambitious, seeking provision for eight train paths an hour, greater line speeds, more frequent signalling stanchions as necessary, and the accommodation of express, freight and stopping services.
In the APPG’s submission to the UCR in January, I raised the need for HS2 to work for north Wales. It is pleasing to see the UCR acknowledge that. It will require the correct configuration at Crewe, including both a hub station and a junction to allow trains to reconnect to HS2 northbound. It is also important that the interchange between HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail at Warrington benefits north Wales and west Cheshire.
Our Union connects us constitutionally, politically, economically and culturally. There are links of identity and a web of physical and emotional ties that all come together to make this Union great. Today, we focus on a very important aspect of any union: physical linkages, infrastructure connectivity. It is welcome that the Government of the United Kingdom are putting such priority on that end.
For Northern Ireland, we have specific needs that we ask to be addressed as part of the review. Members will know that, as part of our confidence and supply agreement in 2017, we asked that the Government review domestic air passenger duty. We see APD as a regressive tax that disproportionately impacts on the outer regions of the United Kingdom. We urge the Government to seize the opportunities that scrapping APD would bring, such as job creation and boosting GDP. Importantly, it would also assist in better connectivity with more routes developed within the United Kingdom.
Connectivity to the rest of the United Kingdom is vital for Northern Ireland’s economy. As the protocol has shown, Great Britain is Northern Ireland’s largest market and being cut off from that in any way is damaging for business. We are about removing barriers. That is why the protocol must go. We must ensure that ease of travel and trade is restored. We encourage those advocating the opposite to rethink.
I will also address the issue of the proposed physical connection between mainland UK and Northern Ireland. In our 2019 manifesto, we supported a feasibility study of a fixed connection between Northern Ireland and Scotland. We asked the Government to ascertain whether it was feasible, so we welcome this being part of the review and await the consultation on this study. It is regrettable yet not surprising to watch the hysterical, immature dummy spitting of nationalists and others to the very suggestion. To see a devolved infrastructure Minister so frenzied in opposing infrastructure. For those same people, it would seem the harder the border, the better, the more barriers, the better, but dare not anyone suggest better connectivity across our United Kingdom. We want a Government that are bold and ambitious in promoting better connectivity within the United Kingdom.
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There is another reason that this is a timely moment to conduct a review of this sort. As we have left the European Union, we have consequently left the EU’s Trans-European Transport Network, or TEN-T. That common policy seeks to forge greater economic and social cohesion across the EU through the development of transport networks. How successful it has been, or could ever be, in achieving that aim across as vast and diverse a geography as the European continent is debateable.
What is clear is that the UK was not a major beneficiary of TEN-T projects. The UK contributed in the region of €447 million annually to the TEN-T funding vehicle, the Connecting Europe Facility for Transport. However, we achieved only around €48 million in awards. TEN-T was not a great deal for the United Kingdom, and the EU’s transport policy making was inescapably distant and remote from our needs and concerns. We now have the chance to replace that distant and remote policy with a new, bespoke and pan-UK strategic transport network. That is principled, it is timely, and it can deliver tangible practical benefits.
I will set out some of those benefits as they would apply in my own area in the south of Scotland. An obvious focus for the review has been cross-border links, and those are crucial for us in the south of Scotland. For the communities I represent, access northwards into the central belt, particularly the economic and cultural centres of Edinburgh and Glasgow, is of huge importance, but so too are links south into England and west into Dumfries and Galloway. For my constituents in Berwickshire, the local economic centre is over the border, in Berwick-upon-Tweed. Similarly, to the south-west of my constituency, around Hawick and Newcastleton, many residents look to Carlisle as their economic hub. As I am sure my right hon. Friend the Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) —if he catches your eye, Ms McVey—will say that residents in Dumfriesshire also look to Carlisle.
Frankly, the south of Scotland has not been well served by successive Scottish Governments, whose focus has always been on the central belt and who have consistently neglected rural areas, particularly in the south and north-east of Scotland.
I have campaigned for a number of years alongside my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan) for improvements to be made to the main A1 trunk road, which links Edinburgh and the borders to Berwick, Newcastle and the rest of England. I am delighted that the A1 between Newcastle and Edinburgh is listed as a major priority in the interim report.
Alongside improvements to the A1, my other chief priority for the review is the campaign to extend the borders railway to Hawick and Newcastleton, and on to Carlisle. That extension would bring huge benefits to the local area and has the potential to open up a new cross-border rail corridor. A £10 million feasibility study of an extension was announced last year as part of the UK Government-backed Borderlands growth deal. I pressed the case for borders rail directly with Sir Peter Hendy, and I will continue to make the case for it. The Campaign for Borders Rail is looking forward to meeting the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), in the coming weeks.
The Union connectivity review is taking a new approach to assessing where our transport investment priorities should lie. In line with the Government’s levelling-up agenda, and following the Treasury’s recent review of the Green Book process, the focus is rightly shifting away from a narrow cost-benefit analysis towards a more strategic approach, taking into account wider environmental and social impacts. That is why I say that the connectivity review has the potential to be transformative, because better transport connectivity can transform lives.
Those who live in cities or in well-connected suburbs take connectivity for granted. They know that if they want to change jobs, embark on further study, take up a new hobby or simply go to the shops, the cinema or a concert, there will be transport options to get them there and back, but there is no such certainty in the smaller rural communities that I represent. That limits people’s opportunities, and it drives away younger people who might want to stay in the local area surrounded by family, friends and support networks but just cannot make it work because of the lack of transport connectivity.
The improvements for which we are fighting in the Scottish borders are not about shaving a few minutes off a commute or increasing the chances of getting a seat on a rush-hour train, important as those things are for many people. We are fighting to replace no service, no choice and no opportunity with something new and something better.
I remember speaking to a parent in Newcastleton about the lost opportunities experienced by her family. Her children could not take part in after-school activities at the high school in Hawick, as the school was more than 28 miles away, and there were no public transport options for getting the kids home after the sports and other activities had finished. What impact does that have on our children who live in communities where they simply cannot access what other young people take for granted as part of their educational experience? Doing things the old way has not served many of the communities in the Scottish borders well. The Union connectivity review represents a new, principled, pragmatic and imaginative approach that has the potential to change lives. It has my support, and I urge Governments at all levels across the United Kingdom to give it their support too.
Finally, this process is not about a Union of equals; it is not about connectivity. This is a political bribe. It is today’s equivalent of baubles and shiny beads for the natives because the Tories can see that Scotland is building its own road—a road to independence—and that scares the life out of them.
I want to use the final minute to make one brief plea to the Minister about a very particular local issue: the upgrading of junction 45 of the M6. Cross-border connectivity is not just about big schemes. Junction 45 of the M6 serves the Gretna area, but is in England and administered by Highways England. There have been long-running efforts to improve that junction, which would prevent heavy traffic having to go through Gretna, which, as the Minister will know, is world renowned for its wedding industry and offerings. The junction needs to be upgraded to stop that. There have been various attempts to do it, but they have not progressed. I hope in her closing remarks she will give me some hope that that will indeed happen.
It is not good enough either for Tory Ministers to continually point the finger at the Welsh Government on transport issues, when they will not do anything about the ones that are within their remit and their gift to remedy. On this theme, a connected issue—which was not explicitly mentioned in last week’s interim report, but is the elephant in the room for Welsh passengers—is the UK’s chronic under-investment in Welsh rail infrastructure. Wales accounts for 11% of the UK rail network but receives only 2% of rail investment enhancement. Welsh Government research suggests that, on current estimates, there will be an under-investment in Welsh rail of between £3 billion and £8 billion by 2029.
This under-investment was specifically identified by Lord Burns in the South East Wales Transport Commission’s recent report as something for the UK Government to fix, with crucial work on the south Wales relief lines and new stations for Magor, Llanwern and Somerton as part of the plan. If the Government are serious about creating an interconnected Union, they cannot keep ignoring their responsibilities here.
The interim report published last week said the review will continue to engage with stakeholders over the coming months. I hope that the views of the Welsh Government and the South East Wales Transport Commission can form an important part of that. The report will provide a stimulus for long awaited investment in our rail network. My constituents and I will be watching closely.
Ultimately, the electrification of the Crewe to Holyhead line will be necessary, for reasons of both connectivity and decarbonisation, and preferably by the time HS2 first operates. I would appreciate an indication in the Minister’s response of how the initial £20 million UCR fund is to be allocated and prioritised, and of the timescales for the process.
Sir Peter Hendy’s interim report shows that the UCR is heading in the right direction. The review must continue to focus on how infrastructure of national and regional importance, including that which is divided by an administrative border, can be delivered in a more successful and joined-up fashion.