Contributions
1,819 recent contributions in Hansard
HANSARDWilliams-Shapps Plan for RailMy hon. Friend is absolutely right: it is a stunning location. I launched the Williams-Shapps rail review at the York National Railway Museum. I commend it to everybody in this…24 Jun 2021HANSARDLocal Transport UpdateThe Government and Mayor of London have agreed a third extraordinary Transport for London funding deal of £1.08 billion for the period up until 11 December 2021. The deal will…07 Jun 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysWith permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement about the future of rail. The railway is one of the nation’s proudest and most enduring innovations. Almost 200 years…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I have to say that I sympathise, because I appreciate that it must have been difficult to take in a report of 114 pages in the time available.…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI am grateful to the Chair of the Select Committee and I look forward to coming before the Committee on Wednesday. I hope I will get a bit more chance to expand on some of these…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI wish to correct a couple of things that the hon. Gentleman said. There has been extensive discussion with the Scottish Government at official level about all of this, so they…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI can most certainly provide an absolute assurance to my hon. Friend, who, I have to say, has been an incredibly doughty fighter on behalf of his Stoke constituency. He mentioned…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI do agree, but we have a fundamental issue here: our railways were built by the Victorians, who did not have any kind of disability discrimination legislation at the time. Many…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysMy hon. Friend illustrates the problem with the setup that we have at the moment, where each individual railway company bids for its own bit of the track—its own path. We are not…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI most certainly welcome the hon. Lady’s welcome for the White Paper. It is great to hear that she thinks that flexi-tickets will help her constituents; I think that they will, as…20 May 2021HANSARDBritain's RailwaysToday, we are announcing our plan for the transformation of Britain’s railways. The Williams-Shapps plan for rail fully reflects the independent recommendations of Keith Williams,…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s welcome of the policy paper and I know he is meeting the rail Minister on this as well. We will publish the pipeline for future railways…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysIt is a pleasure to respond, on this last question, to somebody who has actually worked on the railways and understands these things. I feel for his franchise, because it has to…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI do not think we could ever accuse my hon. Friend of not putting on the record his concerns about a new railway line, HS2, being built through his constituency. He has been a…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysAs I have tried many times to stress to Opposition Members, we are not ideological about this; we just want to do what works for passengers, because they are the people who matter…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysWell, there is a challenge. As I said, the strange thing about the May 2018 timetable change is that it attempted to make more paths available in order to use the track that we…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysYes, absolutely—open access is something we really think is an important part of the structure. It provides the competition. It keeps everybody on their toes. These are often…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s tacit support for this; he is right about what we want to do and where we want to go with it. As I mentioned earlier, I spoke to the…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysI certainly welcome the right hon. Lady’s partial welcome, at least, for the White Paper. I completely agree with her about the necessity to join up northern towns. As the…20 May 2021HANSARD Britain’s RailwaysYes, we are charging Great British Railways with looking at the way that all ticketing operates. One of the things that is so crazy at the moment is the extent to which we are…20 May 2021