Chris Grayling, Secretary of State for Transport, is not everybody’s cup of tea. Unpopular in his previous role as Justice Secretary and an arch-Brexiteer, his profile often seems to confirm the worst prejudices towards a right-wing Tory.
Yet I beg to disagree. Actually, he is a solid cabinet minister. He is supportive of the unprecedented challenges Theresa May faces and refuses to leak cabinet discussions unlike his flakier Brexit colleagues who, in any other circumstances, would have been fired by now.
And, as a bit of a transport geek, he has also finally found his raison d’etre as Transport Secretary. He is rather good at it.
Let me explain why. Chris Grayling is committed to ‘public transport’ but also its privatisation, believing it is the best way to deliver a superior service. However, on trains, he certainly wouldn’t have started from here as he brings the East Coast Main Line back under government control.
He would have combined track infrastructure and service providers on a regional basis so the one cannot blame the other. On franchise bidding, he understands the dangers of going with the highest bidder and would not have necessarily done so. But he also doesn’t rule out the same bidders coming back with smarter proposals. Pragmatism is everything.
He is committed to investment in transport as long as it is accountable to the taxpayer. Take HS2 for example. He is frustrated that this was positioned as a vanity speed project. Despite its cost it is about much needed new capacity, not speed, and if it had been positioned in this way, there would not be the opposition there is now.
In other areas of transport, whether you like Heathrow expansion or not, a decision had to be taken and he took it. And he is cooperating with the EU on a new plan for sharing the skies post Brexit. Incidentally, on air travel issues, he successfully repatriated hundreds of thousands of stranded Monarch passengers when the airline went bust at little or no cost to the affected individuals. His road policies also mostly involve sensitive by-passes to meet local needs.
On the debate of public versus privatisation of rail, those who advocate long term public ownership rarely refer to the chaos of the old British Rail and its shoddy, unaccountable services. In France, Macron is heading in the opposite direction. Does anybody really believe a Labour government, made up of the current front bench, could run a proverbial whelk stall, let alone a railway network? How would transport investment priorities stack up with all the other spending promises Labour have made?
Transport is hamstrung by a shortage of funds like many other infrastructure projects. Rail privatisation in particular has been wrongly executed which has exacerbated the challenges of delivering a service ‘fit for purpose’. The current Transport Secretary is trying to avoid the buffers and put things right. It will take time and there will be no thanks at the end of it. Worth pointing out though.
Inside Right Politics 