Stockton to Darlington Railway — House of Commons, 2015-09-16
Topic: Transportation
Helen Catherine Goodman (Labour, Centre-left): Before I come to the claims of my constituency for the things we were first in, let me say that the invention of the railways was the most significant technological development in the past 250 years. It ranks with the invention of printing in the way it transformed human life and human culture, because it brought together people who had previously been separated if they had been living more than 20 miles apart, it sped up economic development, and it had a massive impact on the level of trade and, consequently, on the industrial revolution I am extremely proud that Shildon in my constituency has a long-standing tradition of railway making. My hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Phil Wilson) rightly said that the first train was made by George Stephenson, but he could not make the engines work and they kept breaking down. The person who could make them work was Timothy Hackworth, who lived in my constituency. Had he not had the engineering skills that he did, the Stockton to Darlington railway could not have run. The train making in the Shildon shops continued right up until 1983, when they were closed by the then Tory Government because it was claimed that the Shildon shops were a barony of engineers—if only we had baronies of engineers today We are delighted with all the work my hon. Friend and Durham County Council has done, and with the good sense of our right hon. Friend Lord Adonis in securing the inward investment of Hitachi. It is going to be an incredible boost to our local economy, because it will create not only 800 jobs in the factory, but a further 800 in the supply line. The fact that we cherish the Stockton to Darlington line and all the history that goes with it was shown in my constituency this summer when we had our annual walk along the Etherley incline. The incline is very interesting because one reason why the steam engines and the railway lines were developed was to get the coal from the Durham coalfields to the coast and around the whole country, in order to boost up and provide the energy for the industrial revolution. The steam engine on the incline did not move but it powered the movement of the coal—this was before we even got to passenger trains, ticket offices and all those marvellous inventions Following the closure of the Shildon shops, my predecessor, now Lord Foster of Bishop Auckland, had a fantastic initiative to get the National Railway Museum to open a branch in Shildon called Locomotion. That has been very successful, with about 200,000 people a year visiting it. It is particularly popular with local people and people from our region. One good thing it does is have apprenticeships, so that people can learn engineering skills alongside viewing the old technology. As a continuation of that work, the Friends of the Stockton and Darlington Railway have put together their successful project to celebrate the anniversary. I congratulate them and Councillor Trish Pemberton, who has been a driving force behind this piece of work. As my hon. Friend said, they have a medium-term plan to secure world heritage status. We are looking for support from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on this. We want to develop a long-distance walking and cycling route as well as new exhibitions in Shildon on the history of the line People do not usually think of Durham as a holiday destination, but they are making a mistake. We have another world heritage site in the cathedral. In the previous Parliament, the DCMS provided help to my constituency to develop Auckland castle. We will do more on the Stockton to Darlington line. All Members of this House should come to Durham for a long weekend, as they will have a great time.