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  • Andrew Jones – 2023 Parliamentary Question on National Resilience

    Andrew Jones – 2023 Parliamentary Question on National Resilience

    The parliamentary question asked by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in the House of Commons on 16 March 2023.

    Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)

    16. What progress his Department has made on strengthening national resilience. (904122)

    The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Secretary of State (Oliver Dowden)

    Strengthening our national resilience is one of my personal priorities, and my Department continues to lead on this crucial work across Government. We identified seven immediate priorities through the resilience framework; of those, we have already published four. We will soon publish an updated national risk register. Since I last addressed the House, I have also chaired a dedicated resilience Sub-Committee of the National Security Council.

    Andrew Jones

    Our preparedness for national emergencies relies on our local resilience, too. In North Yorkshire, we have a high-functioning local resilience forum. Is my right hon. Friend ensuring that these local forums are all operating at the standards needed, and are integrated into our national resilience plans?

    Oliver Dowden

    My hon. Friend makes an important point. We work closely with all resilience forums, which are essential to our whole-of-society resilience approach to any emergency response. There are well-established processes for Government to liaise with local resilience forums to enable national and local integration. In addition, the 2022 resilience framework commits to strengthening local resilience forums, including through clearer accountability and assurance.

    Mr Speaker

    I call the shadow Minister.

    Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)

    We all know how distressing it was for the relatives of people who died from covid to read the former Health Secretary’s leaked WhatsApp messages. There were some dreadful revelations about life and death decisions that were made, and about how they were made. The outcomes of the covid inquiry will be vital for learning lessons to strengthen national resilience—there could be another covid tomorrow. Will the Secretary of State confirm that all evidence from Ministers and former Ministers held on official channels, private emails and WhatsApps has been provided to the independent covid inquiry so that no more delays are caused by the Government?

    Oliver Dowden

    I can give the hon. Lady that assurance. There has been total and full transparency from Government, as we are required to do under the terms of the Act and the relevant legislation.

  • Andrew Jones – 2023 Parliamentary Question on Home Building

    Andrew Jones – 2023 Parliamentary Question on Home Building

    The parliamentary question asked by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in the House of Commons on 9 January 2023.

    Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)

    What steps his Department is taking to support the building of high-quality homes.

    The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Lucy Frazer)

    The design of our homes matters. That is why we have already taken steps to embed design quality in the planning system through changes to national planning policy and guidance. Furthermore, the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill requires areas to adopt local design codes, setting clear rules for development.

    Andrew Jones

    I thank the Minister for that answer. Councils can only require developers to build homes with energy measures that are in line with national guidelines. What work is being done to update these frameworks so that developers can be mandated to install measures such as solar panels or ground-source heat pumps and thereby reduce carbon emissions and, crucially, cut domestic energy bills?

    Lucy Frazer

    My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight the importance of ensuring that our homes use green energy. In 2021, the Government introduced an uplift in the energy efficiency standards that means that new homes are now expected to produce 30% less carbon dioxide than the current standards. Furthermore, that is just a stepping stone to the 2025 future homes standard. Although we do not mandate specific technologies to enable innovation and tailoring to individual sites, we expect that most developers will use solar panels or heat pumps to meet those new standards.

    Mrs Paulette Hamilton (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)

    It has been six months since Birmingham City Council applied for round 2 of the levelling-up fund. Sadly, Ministers overlooked our bid in round 1, but that was two Governments ago. I am grateful to the Minister for Levelling Up for confirming that the results of the second round will be announced by the end of this month. If our bid is successful, the funding will totally transform Erdington High Street—

    Mr Speaker

    Order. Unfortunately this is not a levelling-up question.

    Mrs Hamilton

    Have I missed it?

    Mr Speaker

    Do not worry. I will see whether we can pick you up later.

    Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)

    The Welsh Labour Government have applied schedule 3 to the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, which provides minimum standards for sustainable urban drainage systems on new housing developments. New properties in England lack those same statutory flood protections. The Government launched a review last year, so when will its results be concluded and when will schedule 3 be applied here so that homes in England can have the same standard of flood protection as those built in Wales?

    Lucy Frazer

    The Government have taken a number of actions on flood and waste water management, which we have increased through the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. We will respond in due course to the consultation that the hon. Lady talked about.

    Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)

    Happy new year, Mr Speaker.

    Reference to high quality housing is often a shorthand for reference to expensive housing, yet in my community nearly 6,000 people are on the council house waiting list, so we desperately need affordable homes that are of high quality. Will the Minister agree to change planning law so that councils such as mine in Cumbria and in our national parks have the power to enforce 100% affordability, so that we build to meet need not just demand?

    Lucy Frazer

    I have had a number of conversations with the hon. Gentleman, and he knows that we are taking steps to help improve and build homes in his area. Not only do we have the £11.5 billion fund, but we have taken steps on the issue of second homes that he and other hon. Members on both sides of the House have raised with me, so that we ensure that people who live in particular areas continue to live there and use their services.

    Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)

    Does the Minister agree that the best way to build high quality homes is to give the greatest choice to the people who live in them as to what is built? Can she think of any ways in which we might encourage that?

    Lucy Frazer

    I wonder whether my hon. Friend is talking about self and custom-build, about which I have had many conversations with him. He knows that we are strengthening the ability in the Bill to build such homes.

    Mr Speaker

    I call the shadow Minister.

    Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)

    Happy new year, Mr Speaker.

    The Government’s decision to signal the end of enforceable local house building targets has already resulted in a number of local authorities pausing work on their local plans. I have a simple question for the Minister: has her Department carried out any analysis or assessment of the impact on overall housing supply of the changes to national planning policy outlined in the national planning policy framework consultation that is now under way?

    Lucy Frazer

    The simple fact is that under the present system, too few local authorities have local plans, because people do not want development in their area. Through the Bill, we are seeking to ensure that communities have a say on their local plans so that those plans are passed within the 30-month time limit that we have set out in the Bill.

  • Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on Rivers Achieving Bathing Water Status

    Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on Rivers Achieving Bathing Water Status

    The speech made by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in the House of Commons on 9 November 2022.

    I am delighted to have been successful in securing this debate to cover such an important subject, and it is very good to see my hon. Friend the Minister in her place at the Dispatch Box. She has led many Government initiatives on improving our environment, which of course I strongly support.

    There are many elements to the work to improve our water quality, but I am only going to focus on one specific element in this debate. As colleagues will have seen from the title of the debate, I want to see more rivers achieving bathing water quality status. Specifically, I want the River Nidd at the Lido Leisure Park in Knaresborough to achieve bathing water status. Even more specifically, that is a pinpoint location rather than a stretch of river, because that is the process we have to engage in.

    My hon. Friend the Minister is a knowledgeable and well-travelled lady, but I should detail for the House a bit more about the Nidd. It is a tributary of the Ouse, rising in the high dales on Great Whernside and flowing down through Nidderdale, skirting Harrogate and going through Knaresborough before joining the Ouse. The upper section is in the Nidderdale area of outstanding natural beauty, then the Nidd gorge, and when it reaches Knaresborough it forms part of one of the most famous Yorkshire views. I cannot distribute pictures, but I ask hon. Members to imagine a castle on a crag, a viaduct over the gorge and homes cascading down the valley side—Knaresborough is a very beautiful town.

    Just downstream from that famous viewpoint is the lido, a leisure home site owned and run by Meridian Parks and the Maguire family. It is also a popular location for wild swimming. Of course the issue of water quality is not confined to one area, and while we have many designated bathing areas around our coast, there are very few inland areas and those few are overwhelmingly lakes, not rivers. Indeed, looking at the data from the Outdoor Swimming Society, 98% of areas with bathing water status are coastal.

    There is one river in our area of Yorkshire that has achieved that status, and it is the River Wharfe in Ilkley. It is good to see my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore) in his place, and I know he intends to say a few words and share some insights from his excellent work there. The purpose of seeking this debate was to highlight that many more rivers must be awarded bathing water status right across our country and to promote our campaign for the River Nidd in Knaresborough.

    Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)

    Inadvertently or not, my hon. Friend is making almost precisely the points that the Environmental Audit Committee made in its inquiry into water quality in rivers: that bathing water quality status should be an objective of every water company over the next pricing period, so that we can radically improve the quality of our rivers and allow more people to take great pleasure from swimming in all weathers in more and more rivers around the country.

    Andrew Jones

    My right hon. Friend is absolutely spot on. I have to say that I had not picked up all the output of his Select Committee, so apologies for that, but I strongly agree with everything he has said this evening. He is right that it should be an objective, but to achieve that objective, a team approach is needed, and one that involves the local community, local businesses, Government agencies, local government and national Government.

    Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)

    I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this debate forward. I spoke with him before in the Tea Room, so he sort of knows what I am going to ask, and I am sure he is well prepared for it. To achieve bathing water status, it needs the efforts and the input of councils for a start, as well as that of local communities. It also means that the local councils and agencies should look at safe swimming in rivers. It is important that if the waters are right, they have to be safe for swimming. Does he feel that there should be legitimate signage and information posts to make strictly clear that if there is no information, individuals should not swim in any section of that river? It is about the quality of the rivers, but it is also about the safety.

    Andrew Jones

    Well, it would not be an Adjournment debate if the hon. Member did not intervene. These things should become proprietorially known as “Shannon moments”. I obviously agree with his point that water safety is critical, but also his point about informing people about where it is safe and not safe. There is a role for local government in signage. I certainly agree with him.

    I have met Nidd catchment anglers, the owners of the lido, residents and businesses, and they are all on board with the proposal for the Knaresborough site. So how do we reach that important water quality standard? The answer is to improve the actions and inputs on water quality from so many stakeholders.

    One key concern for river water quality is the Victorian design of our sewerage system. This system mixes foul water—sewage—and rainwater run-off in the same sewer system. Combined sewer overflows were installed to enable sewers to cope with the additional volume during periods of heavy rain. That enabled the sewers to discharge into rivers. If the CSOs did not exist, it would back up into our homes when the system is overloaded, and that would be worse, but we have seen them operating more frequently due to increasing population and in particular due to changing weather patterns, with more intense rainfall.

    Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)

    I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for letting me intervene on him. He speaks with total passion on this issue, and it is a passion that West Oxfordshire feels, too, about the Evenlode and the Windrush, which we have. He is right that this challenge must be overcome with a team effort, but does he agree that sooner or later the Victorian infrastructure he has spoken about will need to be upgraded and water companies’ investment will be key to that?

    Andrew Jones

    My hon. Friend is as wise as ever. I happen to know the Windrush a little bit, and it is a very beautiful part of our country. He is most fortunate to have it in his constituency. While it is a team effort, it will have to be backed by investment. It is one of a number of policy areas where our requirement for infrastructure has not kept pace with modern demands, so he is absolutely correct, and I do agree with him.

    One area where we have seen significant progress is with the increased monitoring of CSOs, and that has contributed to greater awareness of the number of discharges. In 2016, only 5% were monitored—next year it will be 100%. That is very good progress. Information from the House of Commons Library, based on monitoring data supplied by the Environment Agency, shows that 97% of CSOs are monitored in Yorkshire, which is ahead of the national picture. In 2021, each CSO in Yorkshire discharged on average 34 times, with the average duration at 5.8 hours. While that is the second-best performance for the duration of discharges in England, it is still way too much and it shows just how far there is to go.

    In terms of progress on this issue by my local water company, Yorkshire Water has recently announced an additional £100 million investment, funded by its shareholders, on top of its existing five-year business plan, aimed at reducing average bills by a minimum of 20% a year by March 2025, and that is compared with a baseline in 2021. In addition to the increased extreme weather and flash flooding events that cause CSOs to operate, a change to what we put into the system has been occurring over the past decade or so, particularly with wet wipes, but also with nappies being the main new entrants alongside fat from cooking.

    Wet wipes are responsible for 90% of sewer blockages and contribute to the formation of fatbergs—all hon. Members probably know what fatbergs are; they are truly grim. When the sewers are blocked, the CSOs operate and flush the wet wipes, and anything that is backed up behind them, which obviously includes human waste, into waterways. The hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson) has done good work with her Plastics (Wet Wipes) Bill to remove plastic from wet wipes. I support that work and think it is right, but even removing plastic from wet wipes is not guaranteed to make the problem go away. Consumer behaviour can change, however, which could help; the UK currently flushes 11 billion a year.

    I raised the issue of new building standards at business questions last week. Rainwater run-off from new housing estates contributes to the volume of water that can overwhelm sewers and trigger a CSO to operate. In terms of building standards, developers must ensure that water is retained on site for longer before it is gradually released into the system. Attenuation tanks and ponds have a role to play. We have just had an important debate on levelling up rural Britain, and agricultural practices are also involved. Rainwater can cause fertilisers, pesticides and animal waste to enter rivers and lower water quality, which is highly significant in many parts of our country.

    We as legislators also have a major role to play. The Environment Act 2021 contains a variety of measures, but at its heart is transparency. It makes it a legal requirement for companies to provide discharge data to the Environment Agency and make it available in near-real time to the public. That increase in monitoring and transparency has already led to more enforcement action, and in some cases fines, for water companies where breaches have been found—and quite right too.

    I view water improvement as a real team effort; it is not for a single actor to take the actions. It means improved targets, vigilant monitoring, enforcement action, increased investment from water companies, and behavioural change. Achieving bathing water status is a significant step to implementing the changes needed to improve river water quality more widely because, if achieved, the Environment Agency will develop a bathing water profile and put plans in place to monitor and protect the bathing water.

    That is why I wanted to bring this complex and long-standing issue to the House to ask the Minister what more can be done to promote the quality of inland waterways. Bathing water status in the UK has mainly been a coastal issue up to now, but rivers must be included far more in future. I also wanted to highlight, of course, our campaign to secure bathing water quality status for the River Nidd at the lido in Knaresborough to make one of Yorkshire’s best even better.

  • Andrew Jones – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    Andrew Jones – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Jones on 2014-06-26.

    To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, if his Department will estimate the additional receipts accruing to the Exchequer as a result of changes in levels of employment since May 2010.

    Mr David Gauke

    The information requested is not available.

  • Andrew Jones – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture Media and Sport

    Andrew Jones – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture Media and Sport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Jones on 2014-06-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if his Department will estimate the level of financial benefit in (a) Harrogate and Knaresborough constituency and (b) Yorkshire and the Humber as a result of the upcoming launch of the Tour de France.

    Mrs Helen Grant

    UK Sport is supporting the production of a full economic impact assessment of the event and this will be made available later this year.

  • Andrew Jones – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Andrew Jones – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Jones on 2014-06-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many (a) primary and (b) secondary school places have been created in (i) Harrogate and Knaresborough constituency, (ii) Yorkshire and the Humber and (iii) the North of England since May 2010.

    Mr Edward Timpson

    The Department collects information from each local authority on the number of available school places (school capacity) in state-funded primary and secondary schools (except special schools) through an annual survey. The most recent data available relates to the position at May 2013 and can be found at:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-capacity-academic-year-2012-to-2013

    Statistics for May 2010 can be found in table 1 of the SFR main tables:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-capacity-academic-year-2010-to-2011

    “

  • Andrew Jones – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II

    Andrew Jones – 2022 Tribute to HM Queen Elizabeth II

    The tribute made by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in the House of Commons on 10 September 2022.

    It is a privilege to pay tribute personally and on behalf of the people of Harrogate and Knaresborough to Her late Majesty, one of the greatest figures in our national story. We send our deepest condolences to His Royal Highness the King and all members of the royal family.

    Her late Majesty was a regular visitor to our part of Yorkshire. So many people have met her and beautiful stories have been shared. She was held very dear. The outpourings of love and grief at her passing have come from right across the community. The depth and breadth of emotion felt across the UK and the world shows her astonishing connections with us, her people.

    Our relationship with Her late Majesty was profound and based on love, respect and inspiration over so long. A lady in my constituency told me that, when she was a young girl, during the war, she looked up to the young princesses and their role in our national effort. That was over 80 years ago.

    I never met Her late Majesty; I never knew her, but I felt like she knew me. In her broadcasts, she spoke to our hearts. She has been a part of our lives—almost a part of our families. The depth of the grief that we are now all individually and collectively feeling shows that we are starting to understand just what she has given us: how she helped us through tough times and how she helped to make our country, and so many others, better places—immeasurably so.

    The tributes in this Chamber, across our communities and across the world have highlighted the magic that Her late Majesty brought to all that she did. Her remarkable life leaves a powerful legacy. She has defined the standard for service: wisdom and compassion; dignity and humility; speaking less but saying more; and, above all, duty. There is a deep sense of loss for a beloved figure. From the people of Harrogate and Knaresborough, I say: thank you. May Her late Majesty rest in peace. God save the King.

  • Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on Independent Brewers: Small Brewers Relief

    Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on Independent Brewers: Small Brewers Relief

    The speech made by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in the House of Commons on 6 September 2022.

    I thank the hon. Member for Midlothian (Owen Thompson) for securing the debate and allowing other Members to participate, now that we have a little longer for this Adjournment debate.

    I will not detain the House long because I have spoken on this issue many times before. I initiated the small brewers relief review as a Treasury Minister, quite some time ago. I did so because during preparation for the 2017 Budget, I spoke with brewers large and small. There is clear affection for the industry across this House; every constituency has examples of businesses that reflect the ingenuity, creativity, enterprise and character of the area. These businesses are deep in the DNA of our country, so a taxation regime that disincentivises the sector needs to be corrected. One of the most depressing conversations I had in the run-up to the 2017 Budget was with a small brewer who said they had stopped their export operation simply because they had reached the top of the threshold for relief. We have a taxation structure that disincentivises activity when we want and need growth, particularly in exports. That is where this proposal came from.

    I tried to ensure that we had an industry-wide solution, with the industry coming together, because frankly this has been the source of some dispute. That was not to be—the industry could not come together—but significant work has been done by successive Exchequer Secretaries, resulting in proposals that have brought the industry together and are broadly supported. That is a good thing. This has been a good piece of work, done as part of a broader alcohol review, and I have a couple of points to make to my hon. Friend the Exchequer Secretary.

    We need to get on and implement the findings of the review, simply to end the uncertainty that has dogged the sector. The hon. Member for Midlothian and my hon. Friend the Member for Aberconwy (Robin Millar) are right to have articulated the challenges and broader business pressures facing the sector, so let us act in the one area we can control and implement the review right away. As I said, this is part of a broader alcohol review, other parts of which have not landed quite as well as the beer category. I urge the Minister not to delay implementing the beer review while work on other parts of the sector is refined. Get on with implementing these findings, because I think it would be a popular move and end uncertainty. I am thinking in particular of activity that will incentivise growth. People are stopping product and market development when they hit a top threshold. The proposals will go a long way to make that problem disappear.

    We also have proposals in mergers and acquisition for production to absorbed over three years rather than one, so that businesses can make accommodation for that. That is a good thing. We have seen depressed M&A activity in this sector, because of the historic rules, but the proposals will correct the problem.

    I have spoken with local brewers in Harrogate and Knaresborough and beyond in the past few weeks, and the message from them is, “Please get on with it.” We need to create a regulatory taxation platform that encourages growth and corrects the problems that the existing SBR had created, while recognising that, as the hon. Member for Midlothian articulated, it has driven new entrants into the market. We are good on start-ups, but bad on scale-ups—we can correct that by implementing the review.

  • Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on Transport

    Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on Transport

    The speech made by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in the House of Commons on 19 May 2022.

    I will make a few points, but I will be particularly aware of the time and make sure that I do not overrun, so that other colleagues can get in. First, I agree strongly with the point made by the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Pendle (Andrew Stephenson), that Government support for the transport sector during the pandemic was very strong. It was necessary in the emergency that we faced. However, the message to people to avoid public transport, while I understood its point, undid some of the progress that had been made in getting people back on to public transport in the first place. Our task now is to encourage people to resume using public transport and to ensure that the Government investment programme surges ahead, although I recognise fully that these are tough times in transport planning, given all the uncertainties. We are still facing problems from the pandemic, when things like train driver training were cut back, but it is a bad mistake to think that the current level of passenger demand has stabilised and is somehow fixed and that service levels can be cut back accordingly.

    We have seen some of the implications of this locally on the Leeds-Harrogate-Knaresborough-York line. The services that have been cut back are the early morning services to Leeds, although many people from Harrogate commute to Leeds for work. Some will now find it impossible to be in work on time. For other service users, it is now impossible to connect with the Leeds to London services that get into our capital before 10 am. That is not good enough for business people, and Harrogate has significant conference business at its convention centre, with many people travelling to it from across the country. Other rail cuts have created long gaps in the evening services and an earlier finish on the Knaresborough service. These cuts are obviously bad for our night-time economy.

    It is not great to see these things because we had been making such great progress after all of the years of Labour’s no-growth northern franchise. We have got rid of the Pacers, we have much better rolling stock and we have more services, especially the six direct London services per day using the new Azuma trains. I have taken this matter up locally, specifically with the chair of Northern Rail, Robin Gisby, with whom I had a very positive meeting. It was clear that he recognised the significance of the services that have been cut, and he is working on reinstatement for later this year. Getting more drivers through training is a necessary ingredient for progress.

    I recognise the challenges in resuming full pre-pandemic levels of operation. We have lower demand at the moment, as well as operational issues. We can see comparable issues in other sectors of the economy and in our public services, but lots of people have worked hard to secure the rail improvements we have enjoyed over the last 10 years and lots of people need the services that have been lost. Those services have a disproportionate economic impact, which is why we need them back at the earliest opportunity. May I ask the Minister to focus on ensuring that the operational side of the catch-up is delivered as fast as possible? I recognise that this is the industry’s responsibility, but pressure from the Minister can help.

    I would like to switch modes and talk about buses. We have many electric buses in Harrogate already. There was a step change in 2018 when a fleet of eight electric buses went into service. That funding came from a green bus fund initiative, which ran for many years. Before anybody intervenes, I acknowledge that I am indeed marking my own homework here, as a former bus Minister, but the point is that we are now seeing comparable initiatives all across the country. Indeed, only in the last few weeks the Harrogate Bus Company and North Yorkshire County Council, under the excellent leadership of Councillor Don Mackenzie, have won approval for their bid to the Government’s zero emission bus regional areas—ZEBRA—scheme. The county council has secured £8 million and the Harrogate Bus Company is investing £12 million to create a scheme that will bring 39 electric buses to Harrogate and, especially, to Knaresborough.

    I would like to share the experience we have had in Harrogate. The bottom line is that the new electric buses are very popular, and the customer response has been excellent. I have checked this with the bus company and with passengers. People like the ride quality and the quietness, alongside the fact that the vehicles are bright, airy and pleasant to be in. They are obviously also emission free, which is highly popular. When the new buses arrive, I know that they will be popular too. The point of mentioning this is to encourage the Government to put as much pace as possible into the Bus Back Better campaign. The 4,000 zero-emission buses that will come from it will be popular. They will drive passenger usage, they will help to deliver our net zero objectives and as the buses will be built across the UK, including in Northern Ireland, they will help to deliver on the levelling up agenda. There are not many policy areas that can tick that many boxes, so please can we look at how the zero emission schemes have been implemented? There are lessons to be learned there, and those lessons will speed deployment. More wins, more quickly.

    I have a moment left, and I have one further ask of Ministers. Will they keep the House informed of progress in the single leg pricing rail fare reform trial? Again, I must be up front about the fact that my fingerprints are on this issue. This trial is about simplifying fares on the London to Leeds, Newcastle and Edinburgh routes so that passengers can mix and match to get more flexibility and therefore better deals. Initial feedback from LNER has been positive. I am not surprised by that, because we have seen passenger benefits. If Ministers could keep the House informed, that would be great. If the trail remains successful, perhaps it could be rolled out into other areas of the country so that more passengers can get better deals.

    Lastly, there has been an enormous amount of hot air today from the Opposition Benches. The Labour Government did nothing to invest in rail during their time in office. We have listened to Labour Members suggesting that they would spend billions of pounds without identifying where the money would come from. Their track record is woeful. I ask them to consider how many miles of electrified railway the Labour Government delivered during the course of their term in office. It was woeful. They should not try to hide from their record. They should recognise that things have changed under this Government.

  • Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on the Future of Rail

    Andrew Jones – 2022 Speech on the Future of Rail

    The speech made by Andrew Jones, the Conservative MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, in Westminster Hall on 26 April 2022.

    It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles.

    I congratulate the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) on securing this debate. She spoke very well about why the headquarters of Great British Railways should be located in York, and about the opportunities that transport investment delivers for levelling up and decarbonising for the future. I want to support that argument.

    Lots of Members will put forward the case for their areas. Some of those cases are, quite frankly, a bit on the thin side. I understand why they are doing it, but I believe that the correct way to approach this question is to look at the criteria that the decision makers in this competition have set.

    Let me start by suggesting what the challenges for rail are, and how they influence what Great British Railways needs. The rail industry is a huge success. The pre-pandemic data, which I use for obvious reasons, tells us that it had 1.8 billion passenger journeys per year and 140,000-plus services per week—more than ever before. The question for Ministers and the industry is how to cope with the growth. The answer has been, through a variety of mechanisms, to increase capacity with new lines, improve existing lines, and provide new rolling stock and better signalling. The pandemic has clearly changed things, and it is too early to see how the trends will settle, but we can see that demand is returning already, although the commuting sector is still weak. The long-term problems have not gone away, and Great British Railways will need to address them.

    The Government have published six criteria for judging the bids, and a critical element is the opportunity for Great British Railways. That is the third of the listed criteria, and I will focus on it for a few moments. It is against that criterion that York emerges head and shoulders above the others as the strongest bid. The question is: how do we deliver the future? The digital signalling, the planning of line enhancements, the new systems of power to drive the industry as the sector decarbonises, the expertise, the skills, the wider rail ecosystem with companies based in York and beyond in Yorkshire, the partnerships with academic institutions—they are all in place in York now, ready to be expanded and play a greater role.

    Let me give one small example. The UK has been developing a series of rail operating centres—12 in total—that will control all the country’s signalling. They have been operating for some years and have taken on more services over time. York hosts one now, and it is in fact the largest of them all. It was part of a Network Rail campus, and it includes a workforce development centre, so York is already at the heart of the digital rail future.

    The other criteria against which the bids will be judged are again met by the qualities of York: connectivity north-south and east-west is excellent; it is centrally located, half way between London and Edinburgh; the railway heritage is obviously second to none; and it hosts one of the major rail museums of the world. I know that the Science Museum Group has already made an important representation to the Minister in the bid process in favour of York. Public support has been demonstrated by the work undertaken locally by political representatives, not least in this debate. York is Yorkshire’s choice.

    The hon. Member for York Central did not mention that in Yorkshire we are famous for liking value. [Interruption.] That is not really a joke, but a truth. We are famous for liking value, and with the York Central development we have an enterprise zone, with much of the land already in Network Rail ownership, so there is a ready-made value solution.

    The last criterion is levelling up. Some of the most left-behind communities in the country are within a short journey time from York. The halo effect, building upon the current cluster, would have the positive effect of providing opportunity across these communities. Looking at the criteria as a whole and seeing what York can deliver, I see the York bid as being head and shoulders above the others, which is why I support it. I am grateful for the opportunity to share my views this afternoon and to support this bid.