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Railways

My Lords, that is an aspect of passenger comfort. Like the noble Lord, I suffer from the excessive noise of people sitting beside me and the overuse of mobile phones. It is an issue that we continue to raise with the train operators. To make it easier for passengers to identify and buy the ticket they need, we are bringing greater transparency to the fares structure. We are radically simplifying the fares structure by creating four simple categories across the whole network. They will be: anytime, off peak, super off peak and advance. The rail industry needs more efficient ways to sell tickets if it is to cope with the predicted growth in demand. The noble Earl, Lord Attlee, referred to the success of the Oyster card. We certainly support those developments, and other developments such as using a mobile phone to buy tickets. Increasingly, people want to be able to access services on their own terms, at a time and place of their convenience. As noble Lords will I am sure appreciate—I certainly do—they do not want to queue. That is why we will roll out ITSO smartcards across the rail system, supported where appropriate by ticket-to-mobile and print-at-home facilities. Additional internet-only fares will be allowed where they bring real value, responding to the recent growth in the trend for buying tickets over the internet. For the more traditionally minded among us, tickets will be available to purchase at stations. The National Rail Enquiry Service will provide a single source of comprehensive information through its website and over the telephone. Details about timetables, service disruption, real-time train running, fares and facilities will be available. Passengers will be able to find information about any fare available on the network and will be able more easily to plan their route. A number of noble Lords mentioned standards of physical access and facilities at stations, which vary across the network. The noble Lord, Lord Methuen, raised the sad case of Derby station, which he thought was badly in need of attention. That is one of the 150 mid-size stations for whose refurbishment and modernisation the Government have set aside £150 million. Of course, that money has been set aside on top of the £370 million of accessibility funding that we have announced at an earlier time. Precise costed plans for the near future include approval for the £5.5 billion Thameslink project, a £120 million grant for the major redevelopment of Birmingham New Street to improve passenger capacity and station environment and works at Reading station to eliminate a major bottleneck on that particular part of the network. A number of noble Lords referred to the Crossrail project. Of course, much is known about that—it is a new east-west railway, linking Maidenhead and Heathrow with Shenfield and Abbey Wood through new tunnels under the centre of London. It is to be funded by the Government, Transport for London and businesses that will directly benefit from that link. Work on this massive £16 billion project will begin in 2010 and the first trains are expected to run in 2017. It will carry nearly 200 million passengers a year, significantly increasing capacity on the network into and across London. That will be achieved by increasing peak east-west capacity by some 40 per cent, adding 21 per cent to total rail capacity to the City and 54 per cent to Canary Wharf. Its contribution towards relieving congestion and overcrowding on the existing national rail and underground networks should not be underestimated. Ultimately, Crossrail will help to meet the substantial growth in demand for travel in the capital expected over the coming decades and continue the important regeneration and growth in London's economy. Crossrail is and should be recognised not just as a project for London but as a project for the nation, as it will benefit not only London but the country as a whole, providing strategic interchanges for local, national and international rail passengers.