HC Deb 13 January 1992 vol 201 cc784-92

Motion made, and Question proposed. That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Boswell.]

11.39 pm
Sir Fergus Montgomery (Altrincham and Sale)

I am grateful for the opportunity to have this debate on an issue that is causing great concern to many of my constituents. I am afraid that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Transport will hear a rather sorry story.

On 1 November 1991, notices appeared in local papers to say that the direct rail service between Altrincham and Manchester would cease from Christmas eve until the middle of April 1992, when the metrolink would take over. The estimated period of closure from Christmas eve until April 17 is considered by many people in my constituency to be too long, especially as it had been announced initially that the changeover period would be only two to three weeks. Because I was concerned about that, I wrote to my hon. Friend the Minister for Public Transport. I received a reply from him on 27 November in which he said: I am aware of the delays mentioned by your constituent, which I understand are due to late delivery of rolling stock as well as engineering adjustments to ensure adequate clearance along the line. I understand however that the Passenger Transport Executive are confident"— I emphasise the word "confident"— that the new timetable for the opening of the project will be met. The Bury to Victoria line will open in February, the city centre section in March and the Altrincham to Piccadilly section in April. So much for his confidence: I am told that today at a press conference it was announced that the opening had been delayed even further.

During the interval, when there are no trains on the direct route from Altrincham to Manchester Piccadilly, people are being asked to use a replacement bus service. No doubt, some people will decide that they will go to their place of work in Manchester by car. Many commuters in my constituency travel from Altrincham to Manchester for work. Whether they go by bus or by car, it will mean more traffic on roads which are already overcrowded. Going by bus will add considerably to the length of time that will be spent travelling, which is not an especially attractive proposition for many people.

Throughout the argument, the one ray of hope was the Chester to Manchester railway, which would still be operating. That railway goes from Chester to Hale. Altrincham. The service would make a call at Navigation Road, go across to Stockport and on to Manchester. I had hoped that at peak times that service could be increased or, if that were not possible, at least trains with a higher passenger capacity could be provided.

To push things along, I wrote to Sir Bob Reid, the chairman of British Rail, on 16 December 1991. I thought that I wrote quite a reasonable letter, because I said: I am very concerned about the fact that the Metrolink in my area is running behind schedule. All trains on the commuter service from Manchester to Altrincham will cease on Christmas Eve and the Metrolink is not due to start until mid-April at the earliest. I shudder to think of the consequences with all that extra traffic on the roads. I am told that there are going to be meetings this week and I am wondering if British Rail could perhaps run more trains through peak hours on the Chester to Manchester Piccadilly service? These trains would halt at Hale, Altrincham. Navigation Road, and then go straight across to Stockport and Manchester. This at least would be of great help for many of the people in the area and take some cars off the road. There is a degree of urgency here and I should be most grateful if you could let me know whether this is feasible. That was on 16 December. I got a quick reply, dated 18 December, from Keith Hill, the parliamentary relations assistant, who said: The Chairman has asked me to thank you for your letter of the 16 December. A reply will be sent to you as soon as possible. Lo and behold, this morning I got that reply. It was a copy of a letter sent to the chief executive of Trafford council on 19 December which said: Many thanks for your letter of 16 December. So the chief executive of Trafford council wrote on exactly the same day that I wrote to the chairman of British Rail. The letter went on to say: The Manchester-Sale-Altrincham railway line is operated by British Rail in our role as contractor to Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive, who are responsible for both policy and funding. Greater Manchester PTE have asked us to cease operations on this route on 24 December to allow the new operator, Greater Manchester Metro Limited, to carry out conversion works. I note your concern about the length of time which these works will take, but am unable to comment as this is a matter for Greater Manchester Metro Limited. The Manchester-Stockport-Altrincham-Hale route is also operated by us as a contractor on behalf of Greater Manchester PTE. Discussions have taken place between ourselves and Greater Manchester PTE in respect of the possibility of provision of extra services and/or capacity on this route, but I have to advise you that Greater Manchester PTE have decided that they are unable to fund such extra provision. I trust this answers the points you have raised. In his covering letter, Sir Bob Reid said: I am sure you will agree that this is self-explanatory and there is nothing I can usefully add, other than to say that Metrolink plan to run replacement buses in advance of their new train services. It is strange that, having received an acknowledgment on 18 December, I had to wait until this morning for a reply from Sir Bob Reid, which was a copy of a letter dated 19 December 1991 that had been sent to Trafford council. It took four weeks to send me a copy of a letter written three days after my original letter. That does not reek of efficiency in British Rail.

I am concerned about the end of that letter and the PTE's decision not to fund extra train services but instead to rely entirely on a replacement bus service. I am sure that whoever made the decision is not a commuter in my constituency who must travel to work in Manchester every day. I wonder why the travelling public in my area were not considered or asked for their opinions before a decision was made. If only there had been more forethought, some of the inconvenience could have been avoided.

I still maintain that increased use of the Chester to Manchester route would have avoided some of the congestion that we are now experiencing. I agree that that route does not offer too much comfort to my constituents, who use the stations between Altrincham and Manchester Piccadilly. I feared that buses would fill up in the Altrincham area, which would have made things intolerable for people who wanted to board at intermediary points. More people using the Chester to Altrincham and Manchester line would have allowed more space on the replacement bus service, but somewhere along the line somebody in authority decided otherwise.

Another snag for people using the replacement bus service is that buses terminate not at Piccadilly station but at Chatham street in Machester. I have asked a number of my constituents who are regular travellers for their comments. The letters that I have received make interesting reading. There have been continual comments about the difficulties for people who need to get to Piccadilly station to journey to other parts of the country.

A constituent told me of a friend who took her mother to Piccadilly station so that her mother could return to Halifax. They used the bus service because there was no train service and were alarmed to end up not at Piccadilly station but down a pokey back street well away from the station. It is believed that that stop will cause considerable hardship to elderly and disabled people in the area. If we have a spell of bad weather in the next few weeks, my constituents will suffer much more inconvenience.

The length of time taken to make the journey by bus will make the working day much longer and will cause difficulty at places of employment, with people arriving late through no fault of their own. A lady in my constituency, part of a one-parent family, says that by using the train service before Christmas she could arrange to put her child in a nursery school, get the train to Manchester, do her job, catch a train back and at the end of the working day be fairly certain of the time she could collect her child from the nursery school.

That has all disappeared. The lady tells me that she has tried the Chester to Manchester route and that the trains are extremely crowded, with standing room only at peak hours. Another constituent told me that, on 6 January, last Monday, the 8.15 am train from Altrincham had about 170 people standing in addition to the 150 who were seated. He believed that to be well in excess of the maximum recommended loads. He echoes the point of so many travellers in asking why no extra carriages have been provided on the Chester to Manchester route. I hope that my hon. Friend can take that up with British Rail. My constituent also poses the pertinent question why the passenger transport executive asked the transport users consultative committee to collect objections and report back to it, when it appears to have ignored every recommendation.

If urgent action is not taken, more people will use their own cars, causing even more congestion on the roads. One man told me that he has decided to use his car because the journey takes so long by bus. He has found three other people to take the other seats in his car and they share the cost of parking, which apparently makes it cheaper than any form of public transport. When metrolink finally functions, people like those four are likely to decide that, instead of using it, they will continue travelling in a car together and sharing the costs. With the long delay in metrolink reopening, there is a danger that other passengers will take the same action.

As my hon. Freind may have guessed, I am unhappy—that is an understatement—about the situation. Those responsible for metrolink must listen to the legitimate complaints of the travelling public. Once the conversion period is over, many potential passengers may have made other arrangements, as have the four people whom I mentioned. Metrolink will have to think carefully about fare levels and I hope that they will be no higher than the existing fares.

I hope that, in the immediate future, metrolink will monitor the situation to find out the main difficulties facing people trying to get into the city of Manchester and that it will alleviate some of the inconvenience caused. Even at this late stage, I hope that metrolink talks to British Rail, in the hope of strengthening the AltrinchamStockport-Manchester route. If more of the trains called at Navigation Road after the Altrincham stop, at the very least the situation would be improved, with more and more people using the route and easing the congestion for other passengers along the line.

I hope that tonight my hon. Friend can assure me that the situation will be monitored and that, if the PTE finds that action is needed, urgent action will be taken to alleviate as much hardship and inconvenience as possible for my constituents.

11.53 pm
Mr. David Sumberg (Bury, South)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Sir F. Montgomery) for allowing me a brief intervention in this debate.

My constituents welcome metrolink, but they are disappointed that the original start date in November has now been postponed to February or March. They want it quickly because it will undoubtedly improve the links through my constituency into Manchester where many go for business, leisure and work.

A couple of lessons about the construction of the link through Bury can be learnt. The Minister should take note of them and pass them on to the Greater Manchester passenger transport executive. First, the times of construction are important. Many of my constituents have houses backing on to the line and they were caused a great deal of inconvenience by construction going on until very late at night. Those of us who have or have had young families know the difficulties that that can cause. In future, when such lines are constructed, we should try to limit construction to times that will not cause such disturbance.

Secondly, it is important to heed the lesson about the alternative transport that should be provided. When the rail link to Manchester from Bury was discontinued during construction, alternative bus services were provided for rail link users. That was a satisfactory arrangement, but the bus service was not additional to existing services, which were merely re-routed.

Many of my constituents, particularly those in Prestwich, lost services that they had used hitherto. Many were elderly and they suddenly discovered that the bus service that they had used to get them into Prestwich and to parts of Manchester was no longer available. They suffered a great deal as a result. I pay tribute to their fortitude and I pay particular tribute to Mrs. Rachel Lawton, who has been vigorous in the defence of those passengers. Sadly, the passenger transport executive has not made proper alternative arrangements and my constituents have been caused a great deal of hardship this winter. I hope that that hardship is coming to an end.

As a result of those lessons, I hope that, in the future, others will not have to suffer similar problems.

11.56 pm
The Minister for Shipping (Mr. Patrick McLouglin)

I congratulate my hon. Friends the Members for Altrincham and Sale (Sir F. Montgomery) and for Bury, South (Mr. Sumberg) on starting the new season of Adjournment debates. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale has taken a keen interest in this matter on behalf of his constituents, which he has often pursued with my hon. Friend the Minister of State. Before I respond in detail to the points that my hon. Friend has raised, I should like to say something about the Manchester metrolink scheme.

Most people recognise that the light railway scheme, which is nearing completion, will mark a major improvement in Manchester's transport infrastructure. First, it will replace existing British Rail services from Bury and Altrincham with a fast, modern and comfortable light rail system. The British Rail stock being used along those lines needed replacement, and I am sure that passengers will be more than happy with the modern, light rail vehicles which are to come into service soon.

Secondly, the system will, in addition, link those two services to the heart of the city centre via a new street—running section, with seven new stations. Access to the city centre, and between the north and south of the city, will he greatly improved. That is likely to play a part in encouraging motorists to travel by metrolink rather than by car, so reducing congestion and pollution. However, I noted what my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale said in this respect and I shall deal with it later.

Thirdly, the system will provide a direct link to BR's main line station at Piccadilly when that section opens in June, which will be of great benefit to many travellers. Fourthly, the system will be accessible to mobility-impaired people, whereas the existing services are not. All the railway stations are being upgraded, with ramps and lifts provided to allow mobility-impaired people to have access to the vehicles. In the street-running section through the city centre, profiled platforms will enable the vehicles to be accessible. Those features will help not only mobility-impaired people but also those with prams, luggage or heavy shopping.

This £135 million project has required a great deal of preparation and effort on the part of all concerned—principally Greater Manchester passenger transport authority and executive, and the Greater Manchester Metro Ltd., which won the contract to design, build and operate the system. The project could not have gone ahead without the substantial grant of £53 million provided by the Government.

I know from my visit to the light rail exhibition in Manchester last November that the system has attracted wide interest and attention, not just in this country, and is likely to attract visitors to the city in the months and years ahead, as well as being of great benefit to local residents.

I have gone into the advantages of the system in some detail because it is essential to be aware of those when considering delays to the system's opening, so that those delays can be put into their proper context. I have a great deal of sympathy with the position of some of the constituents of my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale, which he has so eloquently described, and also with some of the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury, South on construction. There are lessons to be learned. Light rail schemes are being promoted throughout the country and I hope that we can learn from some of the points he made, because construction can be annoying and irritating for people if it is done at the wrong time of day. I shall ensure that other people's attention is drawn to that point.

It is not surprising that, with a project on this scale with so many new features, unforseen problems can arise, and timetables can, unfortunately, prove over-optimistic. It is of course vital, as I am sure my hon. Friend will agree, that the system should be subject to the most stringent safety requirements, and should not be opened until all those requirements have been properly satisfied. I do not think that there will be any difference between us on that.

The delays are nevertheless extremely regrettable, and it is disappointing, to say the least, that the first section will not open until early March. The project is the PTE's responsibility, as promoter of the scheme, and the contractor is responsible to the PTE. However, I will try to outline what I understand from the PTE to be the main reasons for the delays.

First, the Bury line, which was inherited from British Rail, required more work to be done on it than was originally anticipated by the contractors. In particular, a proportion of the track had to be renewed, and the amount of bridge refurbishment work which was needed was greater than had been expected. Secondly, the delivery of the vehicles, which are being supplied by Firema of Italy, was later than scheduled, with consequent delays to the rest of the timetable. Thirdly, the task of ensuring that there were adequate clearances for the vehicles along the street-running section through the city centre was more extensive that first thought.

Fourthly, there were other works as a result of safety requirements, in particular containment works at Piccadilly Undercroft and Victoria Stations. I am sure that my hon. Friends will agree that there should be no skimping on safety, and some of those problems have taken longer to solve than was anticipated. Fifthly, the amount of work that needed to be done on the Altrincham line was undersestimated by the contractor. As a result, it has had to be closed for longer than originally envisaged, and British Rail was unable to give the contractors much by way of access before the line closed.

It is for the PTE to comment in detail On the relative importance of these and other factors, but it will come as no surprise to anyone who has been involved in a major construction project, with so many novel aspects, that there should be some delays owing to unforeseen circumstances.

Even without those delays, however, I understand that it would have been necessary to close the existing lines for up to three months, in the case of the Bury line, to enable the work on metrolink to be completed. Inconvenient though this may be, for a major project of that sort, some disruption is inevitable.

I turn now to the difficulties being experienced by some of my hon. Friend's constituents, and to the action that has been taken to minimise them. I recognise that, during the transitional period between the closure of the British Rail services and the opening of metrolink, travellers have experienced and will continue to experience some disruption. However, I am assured that the PTE is doing everything possible to try to minimise the inconvenience to passengers.

In the case of the Bury line, which closed in August, passengers can use replacement bus services. I understand that the PTE carried out a detailed survey of passengers' needs before drawing up its plans for those services. The bus services were then organised as a mixture of limited stop express services and services that stop at all points previously served by the railway, so that passengers can choose the service that best meets their needs. I am told that, although these routes were put out to tender, operators agreed to run them commercially, without the need for any financial support from the PTE.

I understand that, for most passengers, the increase in journey times experienced has not been as great as expected. and that road congestion has not been a major problem. I am told that very few complaints have been received by either the PTE or by the Transport Users Consultative Committee, and I should add that my Department has not received a single complaint about the replacement bus services on the Bury line since the BR service closed. That shows one area in which the PTE went to a great deal of trouble.

In the case of Altrincham, I understand that the PTE is confident that the replacement bus services provided will also be sufficient to meet the demand, and will provide an adequate, albeit not an ideal, substitute for the rail service in the short term. I recognise that the circumstances of the Altrincham line are such that passengers transferring from rail to bus are likely to experience a significant increase in their journey times, in contrast to the position on the Bury line. It is too early to judge the extent of this increase, as it is only a week since most people returned to work following the Christmas break.

I am sure that the PTE will carefully consider any representations about the adequacy of the replacement bus services and will consider whether any improvements or changes are needed. My hon. Friend has described some of the many inconveniences that some of his constituents have already felt, and I will ensure that those complaints are passed on. I will ask the PTE to investigate ways in which to improve that service.

My hon. Friend has also described the problems of his constituents who use the alternative rail route via Stockport. and he has made some suggestions for alleviating them. I will ask the PTE to explore further with British Rail the practicability of that.

I recognise that, in the short term, there has been a regrettable disruption to the travelling public, given that there is an interval of several months between the closure of BR's services and the opening of metrolink. I believe, however, that the PTE has done a great deal to try to minimise the inconvenience to passengers. I realise that my hon. Friend is not convinced of that at present, and that he feels that a lot more needs to be done. We must ensure that we both make representations to the PTE to see whether we can go some way to help his constituents and those who have to travel on the line.

From the information available to me, it seems that the arrangements made by the PTE have worked well on the Bury line. I hope that that will also be the case eventually on the Altrincham line and, as I have said, I am sure that the PTE will consider any representations made by my hon. Friend and his constituents most carefully.

I believe that any difficulties that passengers have experienced during the transitional period are a small price to pay for the introduction of a modern and innovative scheme from which they will benefit—a system which will he much studied and admired by cities elsewhere in this country and abroad when it is complete.

Although I understand why some people may choose to use their cars during the interim period. I am confident that, when metrolink is up and running, it will soon win them back. It is essential that it does so, because one of the ideas behind the scheme is to try to relieve some of the congestion and to provide a good, reliable transport service for my hon. Friend's constituents and for the other people in and around the area. When metrolink opens over the next few months, it will provide a major improvement to Manchester's transport network of which the city can justly be proud.

We have been told tonight of a number of examples of improvements that can be made as other light railway schemes come to the fore and as suggestions are made. I will ensure that those are passed on so that the changes can be made and so that the lessons can be learned, because a number of places, such as Sheffield and the midlands, are considering such a scheme. They will look with envy to Manchester, because it will have the first scheme up and running.

I am sure that, when it is up and running properly, my hon. Friend's constituents will be well satisfied with the vast amount of Government money which has been put into the scheme to ensure a good and effective transport system for all those in the constituencies of my hon. Friends.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at eight minutes past Twelve midnight.