The South West peninsula is “angry” the Government has only offered “crumbs” to improve rail connections to the region following the Dawlish disaster, an MP has told George Osborne.
The Chancellor yesterday failed to add to an announcement on Tuesday that it is examining an additional £875 million rail line across Dartmoor to avoid the vulnerable coastal route in south Devon.
Some hoped he would use his Autumn Statement to signal support for a faster inland route – a so-called Dawlish “avoiding line” burrowed under Haldon Hill.
There was also no further detail on how much the Government was willing to spend to shore up Brunel’s spectacular but fragile line.
A review is to look at reviving the Exeter to Plymouth line via Okehampton and Tavistock, which was closed in 1968, to provide “resilience” if the Great Western fails and leaves much of the region cut off.
But business leaders in Plymouth, the Westcountry’s urban centre, have led calls for a more inland route as well.
Alison Seabeck, Labour MP for Plymouth Moor View, challenged the Chancellor in the House of Commons over the “crumbs” offered to the region.
She said: “The Prime Minister said ‘money was no object’ when we had storm damage. He clearly didn’t mean it, and the people in the South West will not forget and will be angry.”
But Mr Osborne pointed to the £2 billion invested in dualling the A303, including via a tunnel under Stonehenge, and A358, plus improvements to the A30 in Cornwall, to create an “expessway” from London.
He said: “I don’t think what she says bares a resemblance to what has been announced this week. The South West has been one of the biggest winners of the infrastructure plan we have announced a massive upgrade of the A303 and the A358. Something that in all the years of the Labour government nothing happened to.
“The Dawlish rail line, of course, had the problems when the storms came – which I think says something about the investment the Labour government put in there in the past. Not only have we repaired that line but we are now looking at an alternative route to increase resilience to the South West. She says it’s ‘crumbs’. This is billions of pound of investment into the South West that never happened under a Labour government.”
Network Rail has already looked at seven additional inland routes and Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin will still formally respond to the report. Whitehall officials insist a further line has not been ruled out.
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