I have followed from a distance—it is not in my constituency—the goings on in Hammersmith over Earl’s Court and the development that goes with it. The points raised by the hon. Member for Bradford West (George Galloway) are so important in explaining what has happened there. The campaigners wanted to preserve local facilities, jobs and the opportunity for an improved transport system in the future. The very least we can do in consideration of this Bill is to look seriously at what TfL is trying to do.
We are all well aware of the problems of transport in London and of the need for serious long-term planning. I entered the House in 1983 when the Greater London Authority Bill became an Act, abolishing the Greater London council. There was a huge discussion about the role of Greater London council, formerly the London county council, in public transport matters. At the end of the debate on transport issues at that time, we ended
up with the establishment of Transport for London as a co-ordinating body for public transport undertakings in London. Fortunately, the right wing of the Conservative party was defeated on its wish to deregulate the bus service in London.
Even at that time, we were expressing concern about the disposal of assets. There was a degree of thinking among London Underground and others that transport usage in London would continue to decline. It did not. It has not. We now have a very fast-growing public transport network in London. As I said, London underground has a maximum capacity of 4 million passengers a day, which has been achieved twice—once during the Olympics and then more recently. London’s population is going to rise, but car ownership will probably continue to fall in London because of the costs, congestion and so forth, so there is likely to be greater and greater demand for public transport.
My constituency probably has one of the lowest levels of car ownership in London, if not in the country, with less than a third of the population having access to a car. They rely totally on public transport. They are often very happy with the transport they receive. Clearly, however, there are growing demands. Any sensible transport authority would not be planning to dispose of assets; it would be protecting those assets, in order to allow expansion to take place in the future.
Let me give an example. Finsbury Park station, which is in my constituency, is a very busy underground station, a very busy interchange between Network Rail and London underground, and a very busy bus interchange with both those services, as well as serving local people who walk to the station. It takes about 30 million passengers on the underground and 6 or 7 million on the overground every year, and it is dangerously overcrowded. I have raised the issue many times on the Floor of the House. It is to his credit that, in response to a question that I asked following the congestion during the Christmas period, the Secretary of State agreed to visit the station, which he duly did. He met me on the overground platform, and we spent an hour walking around the station and looking at the facilities.
I believe that what is being proposed for Finsbury Park station is inadequate. Lifts are to be built, which is good, and there is to be a new entrance hall, which is also good, but unfortunately the Wells terrace entrance is to be closed, probably for eight months but perhaps for longer. That has to be worked out, and I hope that the closure period will be minimal. I also hope that the land assets surrounding the station will be protected, because I believe that the station as a whole is fundamentally inadequate to meet the needs of the travelling public. At peak times, about 30 Victoria line trains go through it in each direction, as well as a smaller number of Piccadilly line trains, and the platforms are too narrow. Someone, at some point, must grasp the nettle and make the decision to rebuild the station with much more platform capacity. Such rebuilding is not unusual: it has been done at Angel, and at other stations. However, it will not be possible if that option is closed off by sales of assets surrounding the station.
I think that I understand Transport for London’s motives. Because the capital needs of the network are underfunded—that may sound extraordinary to people who come from outside London, but London underground is a very expensive system to operate because it is so
deep—and because of the difficulty of raising funds to deal with the problem, TfL has looked for assets to dispose of. That tends to be a short-sighted option, because it prevents later improvements to and development of sites. I hope that TfL understands that when those of us who represent constituencies with a very high usage of public transport—particularly London underground—raise concerns about the Bill, it is not because we want to delay its progress in a curmudgeonly way, but because we want to protect public assets so that we can have a better public transport system in the future.
I hope that the Bill’s sponsor will at least have the good grace to report our concerns to Transport for London, and to suggest that its representatives arrange to meet those of us who have raised those concerns and will continue to do so. We want an efficient public transport system in London, which I think is supposed to be the priority for Transport for London’s board. I am particularly concerned about Finsbury Park station, the relationship with Network Rail, and—in my view—the need for a single management of the whole station. At present, the station is managed by Transport for London and London Underground, and by Network Rail on the overground. I should have thought that making the station safer and more usable was the least that Transport for London could do. Some of us will not run away from this issue, because we are passionate about defending the interests of our constituents and others who use the underground system.
I want to mention two more stations in my area before I deal specifically with my amendments. Archway station is a deep and fairly old station in my constituency, which was once the last station on the Northern line. It was called Highgate then. It was rebuilt in the 1960s, and the plan included the building of a very large office block known as Archway Tower above the station. To call it an unattractive building is to do it credit. It is ugly, to put it mildly. No amount of cladding, Russian vines or anything else would make it an attractive building, although some cladding might improve it.
That building was constructed by London Underground, with public money. A succession of leases have been sold, at greater and greater cost, from developer to developer, and on many occasions the building has had to be leased back to the public sector. This is an object lesson in the mis-operation of public assets vis-à-vis private assets. The public have spent a great deal of money on the building of Archway Tower, on leasing it to developers who have then subleased it, and on its refurbishment for the Department for Social Security and, when it moved, the Office of the Public Guardian and the Lord Chancellor’s Department, as it then was.
The building has now been sold to a group called Essential Living, which is turning it into luxury flats. When I went to see its representatives, they told me that they were developing 120 luxury flats. When I asked them what was the social housing content, they looked at me blankly. When I then asked what contribution they were making to the community, they offered to subsidise an arts festival in the area. I want council housing there, because that would at least alleviate the problems in the area.
That asset was disposed of with no forethought, and there are many other such examples throughout London. I hope that Transport for London will understand that it has a real responsibility in respect of the way in which
it uses its assets. We want to know what assets it has, and why it wants to put them on to the market or use them to engage in a joint private development. I am not against development when it is appropriate. My borough—along with, I am sure, that of the hon. Member for Harrow East—has massive housing issues. Indeed, London is full of such issues. I have no problem if TfL uses genuinely surplus land for housing. However, it must be housing that will benefit the ordinary people of London who are living in the desperately overcrowded, poor-quality private rented accommodation about which I know the hon. Gentleman is also concerned. Those people need to live in social units run by the council, or by a housing association, and to pay social rather than market rents.
As a public body, Transport for London has a responsibility in that regard. The aim of the Bill is to make TfL into a market operation that will maximise whatever market interest it has while ignoring its wider social responsibility to deal with housing issues throughout London. I hope that that is fully understood.
The other station that I want to mention is Tufnell Park, whose problems relate to the sale of land and local assets. Tufnell Park station is very busy, although it is fairly small. I have just received a letter from Transport for London telling me that it will close the station for many months while it replaces the lifts. I have written to Transport for London—as have the councillors representing both the Islington wards that are adjacent to it, as well as the council itself—expressing concern about the fact that the station will be inoperative, and the fact that the nearest two stations are a considerable distance away. Why can TfL not replace one lift at a time, so that the station can remain in use? TfL says that this is how it does things, and that it is cheaper this way. Well, it may be cheaper for TfL, but it is not cheaper for all the people who will have a very long walk, and the people who must spend more rather than less time travelling to work.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will convey the message that sensible planning, rather than the disposal of neighbouring assets which, in the case of other stations, could be used to make local improvements, could alleviate some of the problems.
Of course I recognise that assets have to be improved and the important works that have to be done on all transport networks at various times. The amendments I have tabled—amendments 25, 26, 27, 28 and 29—relate to the schedule at the end of the Bill. It is headed:
“Property which may be charged by a TfL subsidiary without the consent of the Secretary of State.”
That worries me a great deal, because if the property referred to in this schedule can be disposed of by TfL without the consent of the Secretary of State, I ask myself where will there be any public accountability over a decision made by TfL?
7.30 pm
The property listed in the schedule, in paragraphs 1(a) to (o), start with
“property related to a road user charging scheme”.
The ones I am most concerned about, however, include sub-paragraph (k):
“property related to the use of land for keeping installed automated teller machines within stations and other property at stations which is exploited for commercial purposes”.
I have an amendment that seeks to remove sub-paragraph (k) from the list, and I do so because, although it might sound fairly arcane, it is actually quite important to have somewhere to store equipment or to locate ticket—or any other—machines that might well be put there. If that is then disposed of to somebody else, £100,000 may be made—perhaps £500,000 if it is a big area. Quite a lot of instant money might be made out of that, but it is like the magic of the private finance initiative; it is candyfloss money that comes from nowhere. The problem is the rest of us pay for it for decade after decade as a result.
If TfL in its infinite wisdom—and its wisdom is absolutely infinite in all matters—decides to get rid of an area that is a location of automated ticket machines, or any other type of machine, and lease it back from the people it has sold it to, that is the road to nowhere. That is a small dollop of cash in from the private sector, and a very large payment out over years from the public sector to the private sector to maintain what was once ours in the public sector. That cannot be a sensible way of running—