16:30 Robin Millar (Aberconwy) (Con)

Investment will also help deliver on the promise to decarbonise our economy. The line is not as well used as it could be. Some 680,000 residents of north Wales rely on it for movements within north Wales and into England—for business, for pleasure, for contact with family and friends, and for public services. Higher service levels, line speeds and rolling stock, and lower-than-average fare levels, would result in higher usage, as they have done in south Wales. It is important that, in addition to fulfilling our manifesto commitment to levelling up, we invest to help bring us closer to our aim of decarbonising our economy.

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16:39 Simon Baynes (Clwyd South) (Con)

Finally, such investments will deliver benefits of decarbonisation through electrification, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberconwy said. The electrification of the north Wales line is key to reducing the carbon footprint of the traffic, and vital to our meeting our decarbonisation commitments. The infrastructure of north Wales has been overlooked and underfunded by the Welsh Labour Government in Cardiff Bay for far too long. As was mentioned earlier, the last major step change was the Conwy tunnel, which opened in 1991—many years ago—and was the biggest construction project in Europe at the time.

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16:50 Tan Dhesi (Labour)

I recently met the Growth Track 360 partnership in the north-west, which is made up of businesses and local authority leaders from north Wales, the Wirral, Cheshire and Chester. Alongside more investment for the Mersey Dee Alliance, the partnership has been calling for electrification. Where is it? It is important not just for connectivity but for the climate. Can the Government explain why they completed just 2 km of track electrification in that area last year? At the rate they are going, they will not meet their own net zero rail target until past the year 2100—almost 50 years late.

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