Jerome Mayhew
MP for Broadland and Fakenham · Conservative · United Kingdom
“More than 100 organisations have warned the Government that their early release scheme will put women and girls at increased risk. Can the Minister explain to the House and to those organisations how the scheme will help her to halve violence against women and girls?”
“It is apparent to absolutely everyone that this local government reform is now a shambolic, incompetent mess. I just want to put on record how much time, as well as money, has been spent by councillors and council officials right across Norfolk, where this has been a massive, monumental distraction, not for months, but for years.”
“Rural and coastal communities are particularly reliant on seasonal tourism. If Members look at my registered interests, they will see that I used to run one of those businesses. Do the Government not understand that it is already tough enough out there, without them thinking up a new tax on holidays?”
“I am very aware that this may be the last time I face these Ministers across the Dispatch Box, so I just want to say that from my perspective, they are a good bunch. I have really enjoyed it, and I wish each and every one of them the best of luck on Monday or Tuesday.”
“Q7. Books are going to be written about how a Mayor of Manchester has managed to out-manoeuvre a sitting Prime Minister with a 170-seat majority and take the keys to No. 10.”
“Scotland’s beef breeding herd is in trouble; it is down 373,000 in the last decade. There are also declines in dairy cattle, pigs and chickens, which show that the industry is in distress.”
The complete record
Every one of 604 lines we hold for Jerome Mayhew, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 11 of 13.
“Paragraph 2 confirms that GBR should never be exempt from holding a licence, and paragraph 3 inserts new section 7B, which will enable the Secretary of State, following consultation, to grant GBR a written licence to operate specified railway assets. The licence must be in writing and will remain in force unless revoked or surrendered. Surrendering the licence will require the Secretary of State’s consent. Paragraph 3 also sets out the process for granting licences to persons other than GBR. The Secretary of State and the Office of Rail and Road will continue to be able to grant licences to persons other than GBR to operate railway assets. The ORR may grant such licences only with the Secretary of State’s consent or under a general authority issued by the Secretary of State.”
“I beg to move amendment 109, in schedule 1, page 55, line 10, leave out from “may,” to “grant” and insert— “at the recommendation of the Office of the Rail and Road in relation to matters related to safety and standards and, after consultation with the Passengers’ Council,”. This amendment would require the Secretary of State to get a formal recommendation from the Office of the Rail and Road that the GBR licence adequately ensures that licence obligations related to safety and standards are not compromised or undermined. Schedule 1 contains the meat of what we have been talking about. It amends part 1 of the Railways Act 1993 to set out how GBR will be licensed.”
“At present, the Bill merely requires the Secretary of State to consult the Office of Rail and Road. Legally, that is weak; after consultation, the Secretary of State may simply ignore whatever the ORR comes up with. The amendment and those linked to it would require the Secretary of State to obtain the Office of Rail and Road’s agreement for the licence to be issued. Subsequent amendments would require the Office of Rail and Road’s agreement for the licence to be modified. Modification of the licence requires consent from the new passenger watchdog. If the passenger watchdog is to be as powerful in championing the interests of passengers as the Government claim they want it to be, it requires proper powers that go beyond an invitation to be consulted. For that reason, I propose that we put amendment 109 to the vote.”
“Perhaps the Minister will tell us which one it is. Amendment 109 would constrain the Secretary of State’s ability to modify GBR’s licence without first seeking consent from the ORR and the passengers’ council. It is part of a series of amendments including amendments 110, 112 to 116 and 233, to which I will speak later. The Government strategy is that the Bill will be the legislative shell for the creation of GBR. Crucial matters of detail, such as the licence under which GBR will operate and important long-term strategies, business plans, targets and so on are separate and, at this stage, missing. Such details matter and deserve proper scrutiny. We know that other plans and targets are unlikely to be set until after the Bill is enacted, so it is important to include strong checks and balances. That is the purpose of amendment 109.”
“The Minister seems confident that he can go through a consultation process that has not yet started, that the Department can then properly consider the contributions and come to a considered view and redraft the licence, taking into account all the comments, good, bad and ugly, that the consultation came up with, and then produce the draft licence in the two or three months that the Bill has to run through both Houses. That is an extraordinary position. It suggests either that the Minister will have to come and make a second point of order in a couple of months’ time, or that the consultation to which he refers is an absolute farce, because the Government have already decided what they want to do. They are going through the performance of a consultation, but they have already made up their mind.”
“It must be somewhere within the Department; otherwise those words would not have been used in the supporting documentation. There is no excuse for the Minister not to describe the definition of a streamlined licence and what is anticipated. My hon. Friend the Member for South West Devon made the point that the Minister has corrected the record on when the draft licence will be provided during the passage of the Bill through both Houses, but in the next breath he said there will be consultation on that document, which has not yet started. How can that consultation be anything other than a paper exercise?”
“The Department for Transport has got as far as saying it is going to be smaller, perhaps significantly smaller because it is streamlined, but this is critical. The licence of ORR is a mission-critical document that anyone who works in the industry would acknowledge, yet we are told it is streamlined, and therefore elements of what is traditionally considered to be a licence under the current system are anticipated to be removed. Is the Minister able to tell us what parts are likely to be removed? What is it? Because the Government documents refer to a streamlined licence, he can tell the Committee what that means. The Department says it is going to be streamlined, but what does it intend to remove to justify that description?”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have made that point as forcefully as we can. I trust the Minister when he says that he will take it away and do his best with his ministerial and departmental colleagues, but it is not just a matter of saying, “We kind of understand that licences already exist. Licences have been issued by the Office of Rail and Road. It will not be some kind of copy and paste, but taken from what already exists and we are going to get something similar here.” As Ben Plowden said, there are various references in the documents that the Government have published to something very different: a streamlined licence. That begs all sorts of questions about what is anticipated to be removed from the licence.”
“I am grateful for Minister’s explanation, but I am not persuaded by it and seek to put amendment 109 to a vote. Question put, That the amendment be made.”
“I beg to move amendment 233, in schedule 1, page 55, line 10, leave out “consultation” and insert “agreement”. This amendment limits the Secretary of State’s powers to set GBR’s licence unilaterally.”
“For those reasons, this group of amendments, taken as a whole, would provide important strengthening of the role of the ORR. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.”
“The amendments would ensure that, as GBR is granted new responsibilities by the licence, it continues to be subject to safety standards obligations that are in the licence issued by the Office of Rail and Road to the current infrastructure manager, Network Rail. Such licence obligations go beyond obligations under the Railways and Other Guided Transport Systems (Safety) Regulations 2006—which are called ROGS for obvious reasons—and would require Great British Railways to participate in the industry’s collaborative structures around collective decision making, managed by the Rail Safety and Standards Board, and comply with safety and interoperability standards set collectively by the sector, including for freight and supply chain.”
“If the Government wish to reduce their involvement in the day-to-day running of the railways and the Office of Rail and Road deems that an application from a non-GBR operator meets all the requirements and conditions set out in the Bill, why do the Government think it necessary to have that overriding power? It does not appear to make sense. Amendment 118 would remove that power of veto. The group of amendments, together, would require the Secretary of State to obtain a formal recommendation from the Office of Rail and Road, and would require that the GBR licence adequately ensures that licence obligations relating to safety and standards are not compromised or undermined.”
“That leads me to amendment 118, which would leave out line 6 on page 56 of the Bill and would strengthen the right of the ORR to grant a licence to a non-GBR operator. The schedule contains important powers for the Office of Rail and Road to issue licences to operators other than GBR to operate services on the network. However, proposed new section 8(5)(a) in paragraph 3 of the schedule gives the trump card to the Secretary of State, who must consent to the granting of such a licence. Why is that power of veto required? Perhaps the Minister will explain when he responds.”
“At present, the Bill merely requires the Secretary of State to consult the ORR. Legally, that is of course very weak and, after such consultation, the Secretary of State may simply ignore whatever it is that the ORR comes up with. Amendments 110 to 112 therefore require the Secretary of State to obtain the Office of Rail and Road’s agreement for the licence to be issued, and amendments 113 to 115 require the Office of Rail and Road’s agreement for the licence to be modified. In addition, modification of the licence requirements would need consent from the new passenger watchdog. If the passenger watchdog is to be as powerful in championing the interests of passengers as the Government claim they want it to be, it requires proper powers that go beyond an invitation to be consulted.”
“Crucial matters of detail, such as the licence under which GBR will operate, together with important long-term strategies, business plans, targets and so on, which we have mentioned more than once in our deliberations so far, are separate from the Bill. That detail matters and deserves proper scrutiny by this Committee and elsewhere in the Houses of Parliament. When the Rail Minister and his officials appeared before the Transport Committee on 7 January, Members took several attempts to secure an assurance that the draft licence would be published before Parliament completes scrutiny of the Bill, albeit without a specific date set. It is therefore important to include in the Bill stronger checks and balances than exist now, and that is the purpose of amendments 110 to 115.”
“Thank you, Mr Western, and for agreeing to be in the Chair this afternoon. We are part-way through consideration of the schedule, with a degree of overlap: amendment 109 was selected in a separate group to this one, although its wording is intricately linked to that of amendments 110 to 116. I shall try to minimise the degree of repetition for all concerned. The amendments in this group seek to constrain the Secretary of State’s ability to modify the licence of Great British Railways without first seeking consent from the Office of Rail and Road and the passengers’ council. The Government’s strategy is for the Bill to be the legislative shell for the creation of GBR.”
“I listened with interest to the explanation the Minister gave and his request that the amendment be withdrawn. I was particularly interested to hear him describe the role of the ORR as a “trusted expert adviser”. In my submission, when we have GBR as the player and referee in many of the areas it will be active in, with a designed-in conflict of interest, we need more than a trusted expert adviser to hold the Government and GBR to account; we need an independent regulator. That is exactly what the ORR currently is. I intend to press amendment 233 to a vote and, dependent on the outcome, I will not proceed to press amendments 110, 111, 112, 118, 114 and 115 as they address similar wording in other parts of the Bill. However,but I will seek to press amendment 126 to a vote if we get the opportunity to do so this afternoon.”
“Clause 12 is an enabling clause. It is very short and merely refers to schedule 2, so I make no representations to change it and shall not seek to divide the Committee on it.”
“On its own, that provision removes that funding certainty—which is obviously a backward step. The RIA has stated: “The railway has benefited from 5-year funding settlements for infrastructure for over 30 years, but the legislation proposes that the Transport Secretary will be able to reopen these at any time without consultation. Any deviation from 5-year funding stability risks increased future costs for taxpayers and a deteriorating experience for passengers.””
“The statement of funds will indicate what the Secretary of State “reasonably considers may be…available”. That gives no certainty of funding, which is a key concern of the sector. It would be a backward step from the status quo. Paragraph 4(3)(c) of schedule 2 contains no focus on minimising the cost for the taxpayer, but merely refers to “how Great British Railways proposes to meet those costs.” Paragraph 4(5)(b) refers only to “good value for money” and not to good value for money for the taxpayer. Under paragraph 4(7)(a), regarding the business plan, Great British Railways could retain a huge amount of information from potential open access operators, thereby preventing a level playing field. Finally, paragraph 7(3) removes the whole point of funding periods, which is to provide funding certainty for five years.”
“There is…currently already a lack of full work visibility to the end of the current Control Period, which completes in March 2029, and companies are now repositioning themselves away from rail to target other industrial sectors in the UK and overseas rail markets—the ability for the Secretary of State to remove funding would clearly exacerbate this situation…Concerningly, even on its own terms Schedule 2 does not require transparency over the impacts on efficiency, performance and safety if there are changes within a funding period and longer-term.” Mr Western, you cannot tell me you agree that that is a very troubling statement from the industry, but I am sure you do agree, or are likely to. The difficulties with the current system are only going to be exacerbated by the proposed changes under schedule 2.”
“Supply chain confidence in the UK rail market is already historically low with 64% believing the rail market will contract in 2026 and 62% freezing recruitment or reducing headcount (over one in three business leaders plan to lay off staff in 2026), according to a RIA-commissioned Savanta survey of rail business leaders.”
“Changes to the Control Period style five-year infrastructure funding settlement (Schedule 2) undermine this and amplify the uncertainty already faced by suppliers. RIA and our members are very concerned the current Bill drafting allows the Secretary of State for Transport to remove railway funding mid-period, at no notice and with very limited transparency over the impact, for example, on safety, performance or efficiency. We disagree with the principle that the Secretary of State should be able to remove funding mid-period. Stable multi-year funding settlements are a longstanding principle for infrastructure networks because short-notice funding changes reduce the efficiency of spending and make it harder for suppliers to plan ahead with any confidence.”
“Re-opening of the settlement should only be allowed in very exceptional circumstances that should be explicit in the legislation.” Why has the Minister moved away from the position that was previously articulated? Why is the sanctity of the funding settlement within a five-year control period—which has been, albeit imperfect, so valuable for the industry—actively removed by schedule 2? To put it another way, why is the Secretary of State being granted new powers to vary the financial settlement without notice? The Rail Industry Association, which represents the supply sector for the railways, states: “The railway, and rail supply businesses, need stable funding to be able to plan effectively and be efficient.”
“It does two pretty terrible things: first, it drives up costs for Network Rail and therefore for the taxpayer, and secondly, it means that less work gets done per pound. It is expensive and it takes longer. In written evidence to the Transport Committee, the Rail Forum states: “The Bill states in Schedule 2 Part 1 that the SoS can ‘vary the financial assistance’ previously agreed as part of the GBR five-yearly settlement during the five-year term. This flies in the face of providing the stability that the Transport Committee was seeking to address through the ‘Rail investment pipelines: ending boom and bust’ inquiry earlier this year.”
“That is because, given that we currently have five-year control periods, funding certainty decreases in the run-up to the end of one control period and the beginning of the other and, as a result, the amount of work undertaken and committed to by Network Rail decreases proportionately. We therefore get a wind-down of activity, with specialist staff being laid off by the supply industry, before it all grinds up a gear at the beginning of the next control period. We end up with a bell curve of activity. We have heard strong evidence—I will read some out in a moment—about how that uncertainty disrupts the ability of the supply sector to service Network Rail and its infrastructure development plans efficiently.”
“Thank you, Mr Western, for allowing me a second bite at the cherry. I misdirected myself in dealing just with clause 12 in itself, rather than the new clauses in the group. A forward view of funding certainty is key to stopping the stop-start approach to infrastructure funding. The Committee has received plenty of evidence from the industry—both in written evidence and in the oral evidence we heard on Tuesday last week—that this is a major concern. The date in schedule 2(1)(d) is therefore important, and needs to be a minimum of two years prior to the start of the next five-year funding period.”
“That money can be either reinvested in accelerated infrastructure roll-out, rather like the ability of ScotRail electrification to do more for less, or—heaven forbid—used to produce tax cuts for the hard-pressed taxpayer. I hope the Minister will be bowled over by those suggestions, and look forward to hearing his response.”
“Apart from anything else, we need to reduce the tax burden, which this Government have raised to the highest on record, so anything we can do to build a structure that incentivises GBR to reduce its dependence on the taxpayer is a good thing. It also forces public accountability. Finally, new clause 44 would require the Secretary of State to give GBR an annual savings target. Taking all the new clauses together, the intention is to allow GBR to focus on providing genuine value for money for the taxpayer, not just in abstract terms, and to cut away some of the existing inefficiencies in the infrastructure commissioning and decommissioning process, to provide a longer period of certainty for the supply chain so that it can pass on the resultant efficiencies to the taxpayer.”
“The new clause builds on the theme, forcing Great British Railways to focus on its financial performance and reduce its reliance on the taxpayer. It may be the skimmed-milk version of new clause 40 that the hon. Member for Birmingham Northfield might find more palatable. It is important that we do everything we can to design into a nationalised structure, where there is no competitive tension, incentives for GBR naturally to seek to achieve efficiency and productivity enhancements. There is a very real need for that, because the taxpayer’s pound can only be spent once, and funds are needed in many areas of Government.”
“New clause 40, on non-reliance on taxpayer funding, would make the direction of travel for GBR clearer. It may be—in fact it is almost certain—that it will never achieve it, but it is a noble objective. It should be clear that GBR should aspire to reduce the need for the taxpayer to support the rail sector by making it as efficient and attractive to passengers as possible, thereby attracting more passengers and freight on to the railways. That would create a virtuous circle, rather than the opposite. We should start thinking about that, which is what new clause 40 is intended to achieve. New clause 41, also tabled in my name, would require Great British Railways to publish an annual statement of its financial performance.”
“I agreed with the hon. Gentleman until that last sentence, because new clause 40, which I will come to in a moment, would require not the removal of subsidy but looking towards it—it is aspirational. It would set GBR’s sights on minimising its costs to the taxpayer, not through penny pinching if that would be the wrong decision, but through growth in its revenue by becoming efficient and doing more for less. Those are all good incentives that a private business inevitably has because of the challenge of competition. New clause 39 would require Great British Railways to focus on other opportunities for funding and on minimising operational costs, just like any other business. The areas of focus under subsection (7) are the revenue opportunities.”
“I beg to move amendment 119, in schedule 2, page 60, line 2, at end insert— “(1A) The date specified in section 1(d) must be at least 24 months before the start of the funding period.” This amendment would ensure the Secretary of State has to notify the ORR and GBR of the amount of financial assistance for the next funding period at least two years before that funding period is due to start.”
“Our amendments in this group develop the theme that I spoke about in the debate on the last group. We have tabled two small probing amendments to challenge the stop-start nature of funding under the current control period. Amendment 119 would insert the following new paragraph (1A) into schedule 2: “The date specified in section 1(d)”— which, to paraphrase, refers to the funding agreement for a control period— “must be at least 24 months before the start of the funding period.” Amendment 129 would insert the following new subparagraph (6A): “The Secretary of State may not, however, vary the financial assistance provided to Great British Railways”.”
“I heard what the Minister said, but it flies in the face of the evidence that the industry itself gives him and all of us about the need for certainty towards the end of a control period. All that the amendment seeks is certainty for two years at the start of a control period. How is he going to address that particular issue?”
“As I intimated earlier, amendments 119 and 129 are probing and I will not press them to a vote. I was interested to hear the Minister’s apparent position that there is no boom and bust, that the current situation for infrastructure funding is fine and that the evidence from the industry appears not to be—”
“I am grateful for that clarification, but although the Minister may share that ambition, he is not choosing to do anything about it. Having said that, I said I was not going to press the amendments to a vote and I will not. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.”
“I beg to move amendment 120, in schedule 2, page 60, line 36, leave out “may” and insert “must”. This amendment would require the statement of objectives to contain standards to be achieved when carrying on activities in relation to railways and railway services.”
“Increasing passenger services should obviously form part of the functions and aspirations of GBR, and that should be included on the face of the Bill. It should be clear that GBR aims to increase passenger services, not just freight. In addition, the list of objectives in the schedule is missing a specific objective on productivities or efficiency, which amendment 123 would add. This series of simple amendments seek to perfect the currently imperfect drafting, to put performance at the heart of the Bill and to recognise that the pursuit of increased passenger numbers should be a key objective of GBR, in addition to its focus on growing rail freight, which we all agree with.”
“Amendments 120 to 123 aim to strengthen GBR’s value for money and wider performance duties. As drafted, paragraph 2(2) in schedule 2 only gives the Secretary of State the option of tying performance objectives to granting public funds. The performance objectives should be at the core of the granting of funds, so amendments 120 and 121 seek to change the wording of the current drafting by replacing “may” with “must”. In other words, they would make it clear that it is not an option but core to the application of the process, and should therefore be mandatory. Amendment 122 would make it clear that Great British Railways should aim to increase passenger services. I do not know why this has become such a hot topic; I would have thought it would be obvious—I was about to use unparliamentary language for a moment there.”
“The Minister wants flexibility, and he says that is why amendments 123 and 206—tabled by myself and the hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage respectively—should not be agreed to. Will the Minister set out the circumstances in which he thinks it would not be appropriate for the organisation to focus on “delivering improved productivity and efficiencies” or on “customer experience and satisfaction”? Why does he need flexibility to ignore those objectives?”
“We have heard with interest what the Minister has to say, but I am wholly unpersuaded that he is adequately reflecting the needs of the industry, so I will seek to press amendment 120 to a Division. Question put, That the amendment be made.”
“I beg to move amendment 124, in schedule 2, page 62, line 9, at end insert— “(d) measurable performance indicators for each statutory duty listed in Section 18.” This amendment would require the business plan to include measurable performance indicators for GBR’s duties.”
“Amendment 128 would welcome transparency, which—given the huge amount of public funding that the organisation currently requires and no doubt will continue to require—is necessary, so that the public can see how their money is being spent, and whether the organisation is focused on driving down the cost to the taxpayer and driving up value for money. I commend all the amendments to the Minister.”
“Amendment 127 would require the Office of Rail and Road to provide an assessment of whether GBR’s plans to minimise costs to the taxpayer are, in fact, likely to do so. That would be undertaken before the Office of Rail and Road approves the business plan. Again, this is about driving behaviour through focus and making sure that the taxpayer is not forgotten in the deliberations between nationalised Great British Railways and civil servants at the Department for Transport. Finally, amendment 128 would require GBR to publish its full business plan, save for commercially sensitive sections, which they should of course have a carve-out from displaying to their potential competitors—although most of their competitors have been designed out under the wording of the Bill.”
“The only response from the Government as a result of that probing is that they will be “robust”, whatever that means, hence the need for amendment 124. Amendments 125 to 128 would strengthen GBR’s focus on minimising the cost to the taxpayer and increasing the role of the Office of Rail and Road to make sure that that happens. Amendment 125 would require an express focus on how plans will minimise costs to the taxpayer, which is too often overlooked—the Bill makes hardly any reference to value for money. The taxpayer is ignored entirely. This amendment would make it a legal requirement to address that and would—under the maxim that “you get what you measure”—drive behaviour.”
“We now turn to paragraph 4 of schedule 2, which deals with the business plan and approval by the Secretary of State. To receive public funding under paragraph 4, GBR is required to include in its business plan an explanation of how it will meet the objectives set by the Secretary of State. Amendment 124 seeks to strengthen this obligation by requiring GBR to set meaningful KPIs against which its performance and meeting its statutory duties—as set out in clause 18, which we will come to in a bit—can be measured. We had the saga of the missing licence; now we have the saga of the missing KPIs—and 19 other documents. This is important, given the absence of any direction from the Government on KPIs, despite being repeatedly requested on the Floor of the House over a number of months.”
“The Minister is a mind reader; I was just about to ask him to give way. He says he cannot agree to amendment 124 because we need flexibility in the future, but he will see that it refers to “measurable performance indicators for each statutory duty listed in Section 18”, so that flexibility would only run so far as any alteration to the statutory duties set out in his own clause 18, which GBR has no ability to change. The Government do not intend for there to be flexibility, so why does the Minister say he needs it?”
“Mr Western, you get what you measure. We on this side of the Committee are very keen that we measure the level of involvement for the taxpayer and that we do our best to look after the taxpayer in the design of this structure, so I intend to press all the amendments.”