17:54 Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)

I wish to talk up our railways and their success. Let us remember that since 1997, under the current Administration and the previous Labour Administration, the number of passengers on our railways has doubled. The rail system now largely pays for itself; it does not need the £2 billion a year taxpayer subsidy that British Rail took to not run things properly. When we compare our rail system to those in Europe, we see that we have the second safest railway after Ireland; that we have the second best-performing railway in terms of passenger feedback, second only to Finland; that we use our rail system over 60% more than the European average; and that we have put more investment into our railways than any other EU country. We should talk up the rail system’s success, because not only is there all that, but it employs 250,000 people, releases about £11 billion of costs that would otherwise go on congestion charging, reduces carbon dioxide emissions by 8.4 million tonnes, and adds £10 billion to our gross value added. So we should all talk about the success of our rail story.

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