Lord Grayling (Con)

My Lords, I have to say that I take great issue with what the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, has just said. It is perfectly possible to have sensible housing development that is wildlife friendly; indeed, we have to have that. I remember in my days of political campaigning walking around a new estate in my old constituency and meeting three deer running through. It is correct that we have to develop housing around stations, and in a sensible way that does not damage biodiversity but encourages it. That is just plain common sense. While I sympathise with much of what the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, and my noble friend Lord Harper said about writing too many duties into law, the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones and Lady Willis, have rightly raised some extremely important issues that need to be a part of what Great British Railways does. We cannot have the country’s major landowners not focusing on protecting biodiversity in the land they control. The research the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, has done highlights that it is indeed important to do just that. While I am sure he will not accept the detail of the amendments, I hope the Minister can set out for us how, in the duties the Secretary of State provides in the various strategies for Great British Railways, they will make sure that the issues highlighted in this debate are reflected. It matters particularly to ensure that Great British Railways develops the network for the future. Where I probably do not agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, is that, for me, capacity development is the number one priority, as it always was when I was Secretary of State, because the more people you get off the roads and on to the railways the better. There are hard choices to be made about which projects you spend the money on. My personal view is that expanding the capacity of the network, reopening disused routes and so on should be the priorities. As my noble friend Lord Harper rightly said, sometimes there are trade-offs around the cost of electrification. Battery trains and hydrogen trains provide a much better route for parts of our network for the future. I hope the Minister will take on board much of what has been said. I hope the guidance he gives to the future organisation will be clear on this issue. Sometimes there have to be compromises on what is perfect for the railways. I profoundly disagreed with the engineering standards of Network Rail, which scalped huge amounts of earth out of the route along East West Rail. It used a railway track bed that had been in existence for a century and needed restoration. It clearly needed better drainage, but was it really necessary to scalp all the biodiversity from a largely redundant corridor and leave it as brand-new open grassland? There are compromises to be made when that capacity is put in place, but that what the two noble Baronesses have said, supported by others, about the need for biodiversity to be protected by Great British Railways is extremely important. I hope the Minister will make sure that, in whatever way it is best achieved, that happens.