Olly Glover

My hon. Friend is quite correct. Having previously worked on this subject in my past life, modelling of acceleration shows that electrically hauled freight is transformative compared with diesel, and it enables more to be hauled, making the most of the limited capacity that we have. Let me give an example from my constituency. The electrification of the 10 miles between Didcot and Oxford would reduce operating complexity and costs by reducing the long periods when trains sit idle at Didcot because of the split between London to Didcot, which is electrified, and Didcot to Oxford, which is not. It would also enable the sort of fast and frequent suburban service that is needed to serve a proposed major housing development and an artificial intelligence growth zone site at Culham. Full electrification of East West Rail would cost very little, as the project is based on new and heavily upgraded railways, yet massively increase its potential. Rail freight promotion would reduce the need for costly upgrades to roads such as the A34. Even National Highways acknowledged that to me in a meeting the other day. The A34 through my constituency has heavy freight traffic from Southampton’s ports, including container haulage heading to the midlands and the north. There are capacity constraints that prevent more of that freight being taken on the railway between Southampton, Reading and Birmingham. As a recent excellent report by the Transport Committee on accessibility highlighted, accessibility improvements make our railways far more attractive. Last night, it was my pleasure to attend a meeting in Cholsey, where people are campaigning hard for accessibility improvements at their station. Such improvements have been made down the line at Pangbourne, Goring and Streatley. New stations on existing lines, such as at Grove and Wantage—an area of major population growth in my constituency—would make more of the infrastructure that we already have. Do the Government plan to think radically, or will they be stuck in a rut, doing more of the same? Government support for more depot capacity at Temple Mills in Stratford is all that is needed to get more people using international rail services. The private sector will do the rest. That would free up landing slots at the ever-busier Heathrow airport, potentially avoiding the need for a costly and disruptive third runway. I call on the Government to provide sustained and generous funding for Active Travel England, so that it can continue its strong work of ensuring that local authorities provide not tokenistic cycle paths that go nowhere, but the highest quality infrastructure to get us all walking and cycling. Innovation in retail systems to make it clearer where and when the cheapest fares are to be had has the potential to increase revenue yields. As we found on a recent visit to the port of Dover, there is great electrification potential for the Dover-to-Calais route, which is one of the shortest and busiest shipping corridors in the world. French ports are ready for rapid charging of battery ships, but we were told that Dover needs power supply and grid capacity upgrades. No plans are in place for those, which means that we are missing an opportunity to achieve a global first: fully decarbonised freight.