Plans announced this morning by the Tories to reopen some of the railway lines closed in the 1960’s following the Beeching review have been described as meaningless and a way to distract from the Northern Rail fiasco.
Speaking on a visit to the Fleetwood and Poulton-le-Fylde line , where the Prime Minister announced the policy in November Transport Secretary Grant Shapps will launch the new investment that will drive forward the reversal of the controversial Beeching cuts. The Fleetwood line was closed in 1970.
The cuts, which were initially proposed by British Rail chief Dr Richard Beeching in 1963, ended passenger services on around a third of the rail network, closing more than 2,300 stations and up to 5,000 miles of track across the UK.
The Government has now pledged £500m to open the Fleetwood line and the Ashington-Blyth-Tyne Line in Northumberland
The funding pledged by the government would reopen just 25 miles of railway says the Labour Party with Transport spokesman Andy McDonald adding
“The Conservatives claim to have been reversing Beeching cuts since 2017 despite not reopening an inch of track.
“Investing in the railway is a fantastic policy but this is meaningless without a serious funding commitment of billions of pounds.
“The timing of this announcement is also suspicious and seems designed to distract from the imminent collapse of the Northern rail franchise.”
David Hoggarth, Strategic Rail Director for Transport for the North, said: “It’s great to hear that the Government is committed to funding better rail connections that will help level up regional economies – both these rail routes are in our long-term investment plan. Let’s be clear though, the Beeching Cuts took billions of pounds of value out of our national rail network and some communities have never recovered.” David said this was particularly true in the North of England meaning the region’s infrastructure has struggled with booming demand in rail travel in recent decades.
He added: “Funding for both these projects and for second round of the new stations is to be welcomed but there is so much more that needs to be done – including urgent work on projects like the Castlefield Corridor in Manchester. There is not a minute to be wasted. What we need to see now is a pipeline of investment of local schemes as well as larger programmes such as Northern Powerhouse Rail and HS2. This will deliver the benefits and the efficiencies that can only come with a steady stream of work spread across the region.”
