Labour has exciting plans for our railways – but we also have a record to be proud of

Labour has exciting plans for reforming the railways – but we must stand firm against attacks on our record in Government.

You almost have to admire the Tories’ brass necks. Even as the rail upgrade programme falls apart and the delivery of their manifesto commitment to introduce part-time season tickets is called into doubt, Ministers still find the time to claim that their present woes can be traced back to the last Labour Government.

According to Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin, Labour’s 13 years in office ‘were wasted.’ He recently told one of my colleagues whose seat is served by the Great Western Main Line that her constituents ‘waited for 13 years between 1997 and 2010 with nothing happening.’

Here are the facts. Labour invested more in the railways, in real terms, than any previous Government. We rescued the Channel Tunnel Rail Link programme, and we got Railtrack’s hopelessly botched West Coast Main Line modernisation back on track. We removed hundreds of unsafe, slam-door coaches from commuter routes in the South of England – something that had been judged to be too difficult under the Major administration. We invested heavily in rolling stock, enabling over 5,000 new vehicles worth approximately £6 billion to be ordered between 1997 and 2006 alone.

We delivered HS1 – 67 miles of brand new, electrified railway – and laid the groundwork for further infrastructure improvements. By the time we left office, we had committed to Crossrail, HS2, and a rolling programme of main line electrification. Passenger numbers rose rapidly, in no small part due to the investments Labour made. Under the last Labour Government intercity passenger numbers more than doubled, rising from 54 million in 1997 to 119 million in 2010.

Most importantly of all, we tackled the appalling safety crisis created by Railtrack. Anyone who knows the history of the Ladbroke Grove disaster and other fatal crashes will recognise that there is something especially distasteful about claiming that nothing changed on the Great Western Main Line, or on our railways as a whole.

Ending Railtrack and creating Network Rail was the first step that the last Labour Government had to take: billions were also spent on installing safety equipment and addressing maintenance backlogs. Rail subsidy peaked at £7 billion in 2007/08, and as the Transport Select Committee said earlier this year, this can be ‘attributed in the main to the costs of addressing the maintenance deficiencies revealed by the fatal accidents at Hatfield and Potters Bar.’ By the time we left office in 2010, Britain had the safest major rail network of any country in Europe.

Ministers’ constant denigration of the thousands of men and women who worked under British Rail, and the record of their own predecessors in Government, leaves a poor impression. It is political opportunism of the worst kind to re-write history so brazenly, especially when such serious issues are at stake. Their wilful ignorance of the recent past, coupled with reported plans to privatise Network Rail, suggests that a repeat of those mistakes is all too plausible.

For our part, while views may have changed on the best way to deliver passenger services, we must never apologise for Labour’s decision to prioritise passenger safety. It was a precondition for winning back public trust in the railways, and it is the foundation upon which all subsequent investment has been built.

We will fight the next election on our plans for the future of the railways – but should never forget that we also have a record to be proud of.