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Maidstone East Line

Almost exactly four years ago, on 14 December 2005, I initiated a debate in this House on the integrated Kent rail franchise, which had just been awarded to Govia and its rail subsidiary, Southeastern. In my contribution to that debate, I referred to the substantial growth along the Maidstone East line that was taking place, not least in the mini-new town of Kings Hill in my constituency, where it was estimated that some 20,000 people would be living and working by the end of the franchise period, which was six to eight years in length. We are now more than halfway through that franchise period and in my remarks in December 2005, I said:""That clearly necessitates significant improvement and growth in rail services. Sadly, we are starting from a base in which rail services are clearly inadequate to meet demand."—[Official Report, 14 December 2005; Vol. 440, c. 1410.]" That was four years ago and where are we now? The rail services on the Maidstone East line into the city stations in London have continued to be inadequate throughout that four-year period. In fact, what was inadequate has now become disastrous, if not catastrophic, as a result of last month's decision by the Minister who is here today to axe the services on the Maidstone East line into Cannon Street, Charing Cross and London Bridge. I wonder if the Minister really appreciates the truly devastating impact of his decision on the lives of hundreds, if not thousands, of individuals. They are facing significantly increased journey times, way in excess of the increased journey times that the Minister referred to in his letter to me on 27 November 2009, which I will come to in a moment. Those individuals are facing increased travel costs that run into hundreds of pounds a year and they are facing increased stress and hassle. As the Minister must surely know, Victoria is the most congested rail terminus in London. It is a station where access to the underground quite regularly has to be closed because there are too many people already standing on the underground platforms. Surely it is madness to take decisions that will send hundreds, if not thousands, more people into Victoria station, which in the peak periods already cannot cope with the level of demand to use it. Mr. Harold Sim, my constituent, wrote to me, telling me that his journey home, as he now must use Victoria station rather than Cannon Street station, can take up to an hour longer and is costing him more than £350 a year. Another constituent, Mr. Keely Oliver, wrote to me as follows, "Not only has my journey time been increased by 45mins per day/3.45hrs a week but I have to pay £600 more a year." Another constituent, Mr. Phil Brooks, tells me that because of his increased journey time his child care arrangements have been completely upset and he is now having to ask his mother and his father-in-law to pick up his children four days a week, because of the delays that he faces in returning home. My constituent, Mr. Jamie Gardiner, wrote to me, saying, "My quality of life has been reduced to the point that we are now selling our house in King's Hill". So the Minister's decision is leading directly to people being forced to sell up their homes. That is the real impact on the constituents that I represent and also on those constituents who are represented by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Miss Widdecombe), my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent (Hugh Robertson) and the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Jonathan Shaw). As the Minister knows, all of us were signatories to our joint letter to him on 14 August last year, enclosing the submissions that we had received from the Maidstone and Malling rail users associations; the local authorities, including Kent county council, Maidstone borough council and Tonbridge & Malling borough council; the firm Liberty, which is a joint developer with the Kent County council at King's Hill, and other key parties. We concluded that letter by saying to the Minister:""It is quite clear to us that the material in these submissions taken as a whole makes a totally conclusive case for the retention of the rail services to Cannon Street, Charing Cross and London Bridge on the Maidstone East line."" To bring home to the Minister the devastating impact of these cuts on the lives of so many people in the Malling, Maidstone and mid-Kent area, I shall tell him what the equivalent treatment would be of individuals in the town of Ipswich, which he represents here in Parliament, if he dealt with his own constituents in the same way. The action by a rail Minister that would be equivalent to what he has exposed my constituents and people in the neighbouring constituencies of my right hon. and hon. Friends to would be for that rail Minister to say, "I am not going to take a blind bit of notice of the representations that you have put to me, I am not going to take a blind bit of notice of the exhaustive demand information that has been submitted to you, including by the rail travellers associations. Notwithstanding that, I am now going to axe all the rail services into Liverpool Street station and instead you will be obliged to get out of the train in Paddington station." That would be the impact on the Minister's constituents in Ipswich that would be equivalent to what he has inflicted upon my own constituents. He will not be surprised to know that my constituents are hopping mad and, frankly, so am I. The decision to axe these crucial rail services is thoroughly bad and thoroughly irresponsible. Frankly, it also makes complete nonsense of the Government's housing and planning policies for the whole of the Maidstone, Malling and mid-Kent area. I have sought the intervention of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, the right hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr. Denham) and I must say that I have been surprised and amazed that he has chosen to stand aside while his own Department's housing and planning policies for our area are effectively being torn up by the Department for Transport. The Minister has quite recently received a fresh submission from the planning director of the Tonbridge & Malling borough council, Mr. Steve Humphrey. In the letter that Mr. Humphrey sent to the Minister on 17 December 2009, he said this:""I believe we now have a flawed and ultimately disastrous outcome that will have seriously adverse effects on the proper planning and regeneration of mid and west Kent and a backward step in terms of sustainable transport."" Coming from a very professional and, of course, politically wholly independent senior planning officer, that is indeed a very serious indictment of the Minister's decision. That decision might have been slightly better received—it would not have been accepted, but it might have been slightly better received—if the Minister had managed to come up with a more remotely credible and accurate justification for it than he managed to come up with in his letter to me on 27 November 2009. In that letter, he said that these cuts will only affect some 200 to 300 people in the peak periods. Frankly, that is a grotesque understatement of the real demand, which was demonstrated by the demand surveys that were carried out by the Maidstone and Malling rail travellers associations and submitted to him in August 2009. On the issue of the numbers of people using the Maidstone East line into the city, my constituent Mr. Martin Tripp, wrote to me as follows:""On Friday 11th December, the final day of the City services, myself and a colleague caught every train to and from West Malling (barring one) to make a final count of the users and to hand out leaflets. We handed out 1,000 leaflets and counted 1,213 journeys being made on these trains (despite missing one train and having incomplete counts on three)—a rather significant increase from the 200 to 300 quoted in Chris Mole's letter."" Of course, the figure of 1,213 for a single day includes only those on the West Malling to City trains and takes no account of the hundreds more living in the area who were already railheading, or driving to other stations all over west Kent and, in some cases, south-east London, in order to get a better rail service into the City stations. That number will increase further as a result of the Minister's axing of City services on the Maidstone East line. The Minister says that Maidstone and Malling rail commuters face a "journey time disbenefit" of 15 to 30 minutes as a result of the cuts. I do not know who in the Department for Transport thought up the phrase "journey time disbenefit", but whoever it was deserves an alpha for euphemism and a delta for accuracy. The crucial factor is not time spent station to station but time spent station to office, which is a quite different figure. It is clear from the many representations that I have received from my constituents that the Minister's decision to make the cuts is obliging people to spend up to two hours each day, and even more in one or two cases, making their journeys to and from work. The Minister says that it would cost an additional £637,000 in annual subsidy to keep the City services going, and claims that he cannot find that sum after April 2010. I must point out that that additional subsidy arises for only one reason: the Government misjudged—that is the politest word that I can use—in deciding to allow Southeastern Trains to axe those services at a time when growth in the area was taking place at a considerable rate. As a result of that decision to allow Southeastern to axe the services in its franchise contract under the integrated Kent franchise, the Government are effectively being held to ransom by Southeastern for the £637,000. The Government claim that they cannot find the money. I will leave aside the fact that they had no difficulty finding billions to give the banks; taking into account the money and the financial relationship between the Department and Southeastern, it is clear that the Government could find the money if they wished. Look at what is happening to the question of subsidy under the integrated Kent franchise contract. Charles Horton, the managing director of Southeastern, said to me in a letter of 23 July 2008:""With regard to subsidy, that given to Southeastern started at £139.9 million in year one and will decline to £24.7 million in year seven. In year eight, we will be expected to pay a premium of £9.3 million to the DfT to operate the franchise."" With such an enormous turnaround in annual subsidy in the Department's favour—from a negative outflow of £139.9 million in year one to a positive cash inflow of £9.3 million in year eight—the Department is making a cash gain well in excess of £200 million over the lifetime of the franchise. For the Minister to say that he cannot find £637,000 is ridiculous. He is acting like the multi-millionaire who says that he cannot afford a fiver. In light of the subsidy situation, the Government's statement that they cannot find the £637,000 required has no credibility with my constituents. In an excellent letter to the Minister of 8 December, Ms Laura Cloke and Mr. Felipe Alviar-Baquero, the chairpersons of the Maidstone Area Rail Users Association and the Malling and District Rail Travellers Association, say:""Your decision to axe the services into Cannon Street and London Bridge from Maidstone East and Malling is shameful and it has serious consequences for thousands of people that live in the area. Moreover, the area will suffer and it is likely that business cease to invest and leave, house prices fall and people lose jobs."" I agree entirely with that analysis. My fellow MPs from mid-Kent and Maidstone and I urge the Minister in the strongest terms to reconsider and reverse his decision. If he declines to do so, I can say with the utmost clarity that should I be returned in the general election in a few months' time, I shall once again beat a path to the door of the rail Minister, whoever he or she is, early in the next Parliament to urge most determinedly the restoration of City services on the Maidstone East line.