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Mary Creagh MP, Labour’s Shadow Transport Secretary, in a speech at Arup, said:

Thank you for coming today.

I want to talk about the choice rail passengers face at the next general election.

A choice between this government’s inaction on fares and chaos over rail franchising and Labour’s radical plans for our railways.

I am proud of Labour’s record in Government.

We invested more in our railways than any previous Government, doubling the number of passengers.

We abolished Railtrack and set up Network Rail as a not-for-profit public company.

We prioritised passenger safety to deliver the safest railway of any major European country.

We stopped the Tories privatising London Underground.

We invested in new trains, to replace the ageing fleet we inherited.

We delivered the channel tunnel rail link. We started major projects including Crossrail, Thameslink, and electrification of the Great Western Main Line.

This supported British jobs, British apprenticeships and British engineering.

For instance, our plans for new inter-city express trains led to Hitachi making the UK its European headquarters.

But there’s more to do.

Talking to passengers across the country, I know people are concerned about high fares, old and dirty train carriages, and poor reliability and punctuality.

The railway is no longer run for the benefit of passengers. It is run for its shareholders.

This is hardly a good deal for taxpayers, either.

Our rail fares are among the highest in Europe. Commuter season tickets have risen on average a painful twenty per cent under this Government, fuelling the cost of living crisis.

Rail passengers rightly feel ripped off when they are uncertain if they paid the lowest fare.

There is no ‘guiding mind’ - no single organisation plans investment in the railway or properly integrates the track and the trains.

Most carriages are owned by just three companies who make huge profits in a low risk environment.

The Tory-led government’s West Coast franchise fiasco cost taxpayers fifty million pounds directly.

And hundreds of millions more was lost in the resulting delays to investment and franchise extensions.

After the collapse of two successive franchises on the East Coast the previous Labour government took the franchise back into public ownership, setting up Directly Operated Railways.

This is working well and will return around a billion pounds to taxpayers by March next year.

Yet this Government is obsessed with handing East Coast back to the private sector.

If we were in government now, we would keep East Coast in public ownership.

Big decisions over the future of the railway face whichever party wins the next election.

How do we plan future rail investment when there’s less money around?

How can we deliver a better deal for passengers on fares?

How do we give local communities more of a say over their services?

How do we get Network Rail and train companies to work together in the passengers’ interest?

And how do we ensure the best value for money for passengers and taxpayers?

Labour has an ambitious plan for our railway that will ensure these decisions are taken in the interest of passengers.

The next Labour government will create a new organisation - a single guiding mind - to plan investment and services.

This new body will bring Network Rail together with a representative passenger rail organisation.

It will contract routes; coordinate services; oversee stations, fares and ticketing; plan new rolling stock; raise skills and be accountable for customer satisfaction.

The next Labour Government will review the franchising process and put in place a system that is fit for purpose.

Building on the success of East Coast, we will legislate to allow a public sector operator to take on new lines and challenge the train operators on a level playing field.

This will ensure better value for money for both passengers and taxpayers.

We will give passengers and employees more of a say in our railways.

We will devolve decisions over the running of regional and local services, including to Scotland and Wales, so communities can bring together different modes of transport into a single network.

Together these reforms will deliver efficiencies in the railway which a Labour government will use to ease the pressure on fare-payers and invest in infrastructure.

Finally, fares. Today we learned commuters will face fare rises of up to 5.5 per cent next year.

Once again David Cameron has failed hard-pressed commuters by allowing regulated rail fares to rise. Season tickets have risen on average by a staggering twenty per cent since he came to power.

Labour will act on rail fares to help tackle the cost-of-living crisis.

We will create a legal right to the cheapest ticket for your journey, ending the confusion passengers’ experience.

And we will introduce a strict cap on rail fares, removing the so-called ‘flex’ arrangement that allows Train companies to raise fares more on popular routes.

Rail passengers, taxpayers and rail workers face a clear choice.

Five more years of a the Conservatives rising fares, overcrowded trains and cutbacks to staff and services, or Labour’s plan to put passengers first by delivering the most radical package of reforms since privatisation.

ENDS

Please find a link to Labour’s briefing document, The Choice on Transport, here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/0wmxl139hy77cgh/140819%20The%20Choice%20-%20Public%20Transport.pdf