Weardale Railway — House of Commons, 2021-11-01
Topic: Transportation
Richard John Holden (Conservative, Centre-right): I am absolutely delighted to kick off this Adjournment debate on the feasibility bid for the Weardale railway. In an announcement last week, the Department for Transport agreed to that bid. I am delighted to see the Rail Minister here today, because he was one of the first people to come to Weardale to see the railway in all its glory at first hand The connection is particularly important for the communities that I represent, and for my hon. Friends the Members for Bishop Auckland (Dehenna Davison), for Sedgefield (Paul Howell), and for Darlington (Peter Gibson). It is not only the Minister himself who has visited. I have also, in the past couple of weeks, had a visit from the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Norfolk (George Freeman), who came up to Frosterley, Stanhope and Eastgate to see the railway and all the potential that it has to deliver transformational change not only for my constituency but other constituencies further down the line. I am particularly glad that my hon. Friends the Members for Sedgefield and for Darlington are here today. I am also grateful for the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland, who has just had the excellent news that the Toft Hill bypass is finally going to happen. It was first mentioned in the 1951 Durham county plan and it has now been approved by the Government a mere 70 years later. I beg the Minister to lean on his Front-Bench colleagues also to support my bid for Crook, Willington and Tow Law, which will hopefully be coming down the line in funding rounds 2 or 3 It is not just hon. Members in this place who have supported the bid for the Weardale railway. The Mayor of Teesside, Ben Houchen, was also involved, along with hundreds of local people who completed my recent surveys on it, my Crook councillors elected last year—Patricia Jopling and Mike Currah—and local candidates who have been campaigning: Robbie Rodiss, Will Wearmouth and Steve Cowie. In particular, there is the group of people who have been keeping the railway going as a heritage line over the past few years—the huge number of volunteers at the Weardale Railway Trust The Weardale railway ceased operation as a freight line back in the early 1990s, but it has been operating a heritage service since then. Last year it was bought by the Auckland Project after its previous owner failed. I thank Jonathan Ruffer, who has been doing so much great work down in Bishop Auckland, and the chief exec of the Auckland Project, David Madden, who has been really involved in helping me, and other hon. Members, in the project to help to transform the west of County Durham. One of the most important things that they have done is to give a private sector edge to what is going on. I also thank Durham County Council and Darlington Council for the support that they are giving more broadly to the project and to the bid Bishop Auckland was first connected to the rail network back in the 1840s. The extension went further to Crook in 1844, then to Frosterley in 1845, and finally to Stanhope in 1862. In 1887, there was a further bid to extend the line from Stanhope right the way up to the top of Weardale. The budget for the entire line, as I read recently on the excellent Weardale Museum’s website, was a mere £48,627. The bid we have just put in for the feasibility study alone is £50,000 for the whole project. It is one of those interesting quirks of history that Sir Joseph Pease, the then Liberal MP, finally cut the first sod on an extension in 1893. It would be great to see the first Conservative MPs, largely, for County Durham doing exactly the same for the renewed line—if, hopefully, the feasibility study comes through—in the next few years Far earlier than the railway line were the wagon ways that we had across County Durham. That is because we were part of the heart of the industrial revolution. Back in the early 19th century, we had horse-drawn wagons going all the way over the moors because we had ironstone that had to be taken to Consett. It is very much in that theme of us being at the heart of the first industrial revolution that Conservative Members now really want to press this project to provide the connectivity to help to transform our communities going into the next industrial revolution that we are currently seeing taking place under this Conservative Government Unfortunately, passenger services ended on the line in 1953 and to Crook in 1965, with the freight service finally ending in the 1990s with the closure of the Eastgate cement works site, at which my hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield worked. It is great to see him here today, supporting the bid as the Member for Sedgefield and wanting to deliver that transformational change.