Greenwood slams response to rail infrastructure inquiry
TRANSPORT Select Committee Chairman Lilian Greenwood has criticised the Government’s response to the TSC’s report on rail infrastructure investment, describing an “apparent unwillingness to engage with some of our key conclusions and recommendations”.
Among the recommendations in the report, published in June, were that electrification schemes cancelled in July 2017 should be recategorised as pending, and that future alternative power technology should be compared with any outstanding electrification schemes.
The Government said it would do the latter, but said that passenger benefits promised by the three cancelled electrification schemes are being provided through other means.
Greenwood said of the Government’s response: “It has nothing to say on the long-term cost-effectiveness and wider sustainability benefits of railway electrification. It provides very little detail on how it plans to implement emerging traction technologies such as battery and hydrogen power.
“Perhaps most concerning are the responses to our recommendations on changes to transport scheme appraisal methods, which give no sense that the Government intends to address biases against regions that have not received their fair share of investment for decades.
“We have published the responses today [September 19], without substantive comment - people can draw their own conclusions on their adequacy. We will contact everyone who contributed evidence to our inquiry, inviting them to comment. We will draw on the analyses of stakeholders and continue to challenge the Department, Network Rail and the Office of Rail and Road on these and other important issues set out in our report.
“The Department for Transport and the Secretary of State need to appreciate the role of the Committee, which is to scrutinise
the work of the Department on behalf of Parliament and the public, and to engage with us properly.”
The Government accepted a recommendation that it and Network Rail should demonstrate a greater willingness to engage with third-party proposals for alternatively funded schemes such as one for Midland Main Line electrification, but argued that its existing appraisal approaches for investment “do not work against regions in need of regeneration”.
It also said it would be “impractical” to make use of the regional rebalancing toolkit mandatory, and demurred on a recommendation that it should publish analysis of the difference its use has made in its regional transport investment decisions every two years.
In its response to the report, the Government also disputed assertions that there could be a slowdown in workflow on rail enhancements in Control Period 6 (2019-24), and said that schemes in the Rail Network Enhancements Pipeline would have priorities set out at a national level.
However, it committed to greater transparency about the status of enhancement projects in the pipeline, and said it was confident it had the skills to make investment decisions effectively.