A leading expert on rail in Wales has called on the UK Government not to miss the chance to put rail funding for Wales on the right track to address decades of under-investment. Professor Mark Barry spoke to WalesOnline about the huge opportunity this year to reset the level of funding that goes into the rail transport network in Wales.
Prof Barry previously said that Wales not bidding for full devolved powers over rail infrastracture in 2004 was the “worst decision the Welsh government ever made”. It has meant that while Scotland gets full consequential funding as a result of the HS2 rail project and other English schemes, Wales does not get a fair share. Prof Barry says if the Welsh Government does not fight for those powers this time, it is repeating that mistake for the second time.
However, he does not believe there is the will from either the Welsh Government nor Whitehall for that to happen. We understand that the Welsh and UK Governments will make a joint argument in the coming week about their direction of travel, although it will not detail any figures.
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Prof Barry argues that if there is no political will on either side of the M4 to hand Wales full responsibility for its rail network, then Wales should be entitled to a ring-fenced fund of £2-3bn over the next 15 years.
WalesOnline has launched a campaign to raise awareness of the huge opportunity the UK Government has this year to end the historic underfunding of the rail network in Wales and to ensure parity across the UK over the long term. The two opportunities are firstly Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ spending review this spring and secondly through putting in place provisions in the Railways Bill making its way through Parliament. For our free daily briefing on the biggest issues facing the nation, sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here
The Railways Bill is the first legislative opportunity to address chronic injustices since the rail bill of 2004 that gave Scotland responsibility for rail infrastructure. You can read more about that here.
Prof Barry says Wales has been “shafted” in terms of rail investment for decades, losing out on billions of pounds because of a reluctance of Welsh Government to push for parity, and the UK Government to devolve powers to Wales. The scandal of HS2 being funded from the England and Wales transport budget while not benefiting Wales at all has underlined this unfairness.
Prof Barry says that in England until 2040, there are commitments to spend £80bn improving rail. In Wales, he says that sum is, at a very optimistic estimate, £400m. But he says the spending review is an opportunity to create a ringfenced fund of £2-3bn over the next 15 years for rail enhancements in Wales.
It would be overseen by the Wales Rail Board – which has representatives from the Welsh Government, Transport for Wales, UK Government and Wales Office – and would mean Wales was, finally, treated “equitably and fairly”.
Prof Barry said: ” I don’t think full devolution will happen this year, I still think it’s the most important thing but I don’t think it will happen, so the top of my list, forgetting devolution, is a ringfenced, joint fund from UK Government of £2-3bn over the next 15 years for rail enhancements, managed by Welsh Government.
-Credit:Marc White / WalesOnline
“What I want to see happen is the funding because at least the Department for Transport should be treating Wales equitably and fairly and not just saying ‘we’re not going to give you anything, we’re going to keep our money and spend £80m over here and you can have the scraps’. “They should say ‘we’ll give a fair, proportionate amount’.
“I think the first, most important thing is agreeing some sensible, acceptable funding mechanism for rail enhancements for the next 15 years. If you’ve got that in place then you can go back and say ‘ok, we can think about devolution’ and that can be unpacked in how Great British Rail is implemented and the reality is TFW have to be the lead, you don’t want to duplicate that, all the thinking and strategic planning is now being built.
“Over time you can find a point you can then say ‘you can be fully devolved now’ subject to these other things like long-term liabilities. The most important thing in the next six months is to agree a funding deal because if we don’t get that then Wales won’t get anything, nothing else is going to happen and that is unacceptable.”
Prof Barry says there is reluctance from Welsh Government officials to demand full devolution from the UK Government, as well as reluctance from UK Government to do so. Get the the latest Welsh news headlines delivered free to your inbox every day
“There are three or four arguments used about why we can’t devolve rail to Wales. One is there are too many cross border issues and I say ‘has anyone been on a train to Europe where trains cross the border all the time’? You just need to put the governance in place.
“The other thing is that Wales is incapable of managing the liability issues, I get the concern there are liabilities, but we manage the road network. We’re responsible for that and the liabilities.
“To suggest the UK Government has been a better custodian of the Welsh railways than Welsh Government could be, given what they’ve not done in the last 30 years, is laughable frankly. I’m not pretending Welsh Government are, or could be perfect, but even given teething problems etc they will do a better job than Westminster because they care about things, this is their issue. We’re peripheral, always.”
He said the risk is one worth taking because in Scotland, where rail is devolved, the difference to Wales is “stark”.
“We ran scared because we were given advice ‘what if the Conway Valley line floods’. Well, my argument was things like managing liabilities for economic infrastructure, pool that, the Treasury can manage that, we can pay our risk premium into the Treasury but that shouldn’t be the reason not to devolve rail.
“If you’re Welsh Government, for God’s sake grow up and take some responsibility, there are much smaller countries that manage it, Ireland has plans, Lithuania, Estonia. The idea that we can’t do it is pathetic.”
In relation to the Railways Bill, he suggests a model where there are a series of regional or national units. In Wales that would mean a system where Transport for Wales sits at the top and Network Rail is effectively the asset manager for the track it maintains. Prof Barry says that the as-yet-undetailed Great British Railway plan will fail unless we “properly devolve accountability and funding and responsibility for integrating not just rail but transport more broadly”.
In Wales, the Welsh Government and transport providers want to integrate buses and rail and active travel but he said “we’ve got one hand behind our back because rail is decided in London and that just doesn’t make any sense”.
He said one of the things people want in relation to Great British Railways is to get rid of the barriers between train operators and Network Rail. “There’s a massive bureaucratic interface between them which is unnecessary, but my contention is that if you try do that on a national basis, it isn’t helpful if you’re in Bristol, Leeds or Manchester if you’ve a London based vertically integrated organisation.
“I think ultimately, on a UK basis, you’re going to want a GBR Railway which is about coordination, integration, common strategy but very strong national or regional units”.
Asked what he believed should happen in the spending review, he said: “My naive expectation is they’ll go “you’ve been shafted big time, you need £4bn because we’re spending £80bn over the next 15 years, so we’re going to put together £200m a year [for you]”. I don’t think that will happen.”
That, he said, is because the UK Government’s Department for Transport’s finances are going mainly towards HS2 which is “squeezing” everything else including the Rail Network Enhancements Pipeline, the formal mechanism by which Wales could get funding.
“I do think there’s an opportunity to create a ringfenced Wales enhancement pipeline.
“There’s a chance if they offer us nickel and dime everyone will go ‘what’s the point of that’ and I think that’s the principal thinking in terms of the spending review, ‘can they set this up and squeeze a bit of the department’s budget to allow us to have a Wales enhancement pipeline’.”
He said that sum should be something like £200m a year, at least £1bn over a decade.” I don’t think they’ll give us what we deserve, they’ll offer us something to see if we’ll go away,” he said. He suggested the UK Government may well offer half of that yearly £200m and tell the Welsh Government to match it.
He says that sum could then be spent on things like a Cardiff Crossrail, or electrifying the north Wales mainline or a Swansea Metro.